Members of the band auditioned at the annual All Region Band Auditions at Cedar Ridge High School on Friday and Saturday, Dec. 13-14.

Phase 1 occurred on Friday where bigger instruments such as trumpets, trombones, flutes, and clarinets auditioned. If they placed high enough in their room, they advance to Phase 2 the following morning, which consisted of all instruments that didn’t audition Friday, plus people that advanced from Friday. Phase 2 auditions determine what region band you get placed into, as well as if you are good enough to advance to Area Auditions in January.

In total, Westwood had 59 students place into a region band, and 23 of them advanced to Area, meaning they are one audition away from All State. Westwood set a region and school record for the most students to ever advance to Area, beating last years number by two.

“I’m really excited about all of the success the band has had this year,” Annie Kim ‘22 said. “It really shows the positive overall growth of the program and the strength of our musicians and I’m really happy that all of our hard work paid off.”

The following students, listed by instrument, advanced to the Area Band Auditions at Duncanville High School on Jan. 11:

Flute:
Annie Kim ‘22*
Cassidy Lee ‘21

Clarinet:
Maxim Gao ‘22
Connie Huang ‘21* (Eb Clarinet)
Andrew Li ‘22
Nathaniel Thomas ‘20
Erin Xu ‘20

Saxophone:
Rohan Engineer ‘23*
Jordan Van Gulick ‘20
Sai Tadiboyna ‘22* (tenor)
Will Sedberry ‘20 (tenor)

Trumpet:
Sophia Castaneda ‘20

Horn:
Ian Kim ‘22
Arjun Kurkal ‘21
Marc Machieu ‘20
Luke Mason ‘21

Trombone:
John Kangos ‘21
Aaron Slack ‘20
Jason Sato ‘21* (bass)

Euphonium:
Matthew Jourdan ‘21

Percussion:
Adam Perry ‘20
Devin Qu ‘20

*principal player