MOSES LAKE - Over Presidents Day Weekend, Moses Lake High School choir students will perform for their toughest audience ever: more than 1,000 music educators.

The Washington Music Educators Association holds their biannual conference in Yakima that weekend, and Moses Lake High School's chamber choir will be among the student performers. Several individual students also perform with students from various schools.

The public has an opportunity to hear the choir's repertoire this week, when they'll be joined by the Ellensburg High School Chamber Choir at 7 p.m. on Wednesday for a free concert at the Moses Lake High School theater.

The chamber choir auditioned for the opportunity to perform at the conference. They just didn't know they were auditioning.

Choir Director David Holloway taped one of the choir's performances, but didn't tell them he sent in the audition tape last spring.

"I didn't want to get them all excited in case they didn't make it," he said.

But in September, they discovered they did make it.

Since then, the choir has worked extra hard to prepare for the performance, putting in an extra hour-and-a-half-long rehearsal once a week after school and flexing their vocal muscles whenever they have a chance to perform, whether it's a performance for the Moses Lake School Board or conducting a small tour with stops in Ellensburg and Yakima.

It's all to help the students prepare for one of the most nerve-wracking performances of their careers so far.

"When I first heard about it, my thought process was, 'Oh cool, another performance,'" said senior Jared Jones. "But after we actually started talking about it, the seriousness of it kind of got a little bit more daunting, because you're singing in front of all the music educators in the state."

Where parents might chuckle at - or not even notice - any flubs, music educators watch out for mistakes and expect a really good performance, he said.

"I think that's why it's really been pushing me and a lot of the other students to put in that extra effort to making these songs as best as we can," he said.

"I think it took awhile for a lot of us to realize how big of a deal this actually was," said senior Brittany Callahan. "It was just another performance."

But this performance could be the biggest performance of Holloway's career as a music educator, she said.

"Our audience is just a bunch of music teachers, so they know exactly what we're doing right, what we're doing wrong and so it's really important for us to make a good impression and we intend to do well. Mr. Holloway will be regarded as a really, really good director, because it'll be like, 'Check out that awesome choir!'"

It's Holloway's ability to push students to work hard while keeping choir fun that seems to attract many to the school's choir program.

"We have had some pretty rigorous songs," said junior Bryce Merkley. "Mr. Holloway isn't really satisfied with a lot of work, but he's just trying to make us better."

"I've never really had a teacher that I was emotionally attached to and excited to have," said junior Jayne Goodrich, noting that students from some schools tell tales of unpopular choir directors, or of having to get used to a new choir director each year. "(Holloway) works hard so that we can have the good high school experience for those that want this experience. I think that we're really honored to be selected to perform for the music department of our state, because that shows how much potential we have and how much we have to look up to later in life."

Junior Holly Tye remembers singing at a choir retreat after she made into the chamber and jazz choirs.

"I never really sang in a group like that, like in a big mixed group," she said. "I remember the first time we went to choir retreat and it was just such a big sound and I thought it was the neatest thing ever, and so I've been really fortunate to be in these groups the past couple of years and what I really value about it is I really value the teamwork that's involved and with it being such a teamwork-driven thing. You form a lot of really good friendships and relationships with other people."

Sophomore Madisyn Lybbert agreed that the relationships students form are one of the most important parts of the choir experience.

"We are a family," she said. "And we all figure things out together and we all can learn from each other. But we all have one thing in common and that's the music that we all love so much."