By Jadynne Brady

Editor-in-Chief 

The Jag

While almost everyone has heard of a spelling bee, not many have heard of a sight-reading bee. Senior Isaac Azimi-Tabrizi has, and he became South’s first ever winner of the Missouri All-State Sight Reading Bee. 

This bee is a sight reading competition, which means that the singers must sing the music put in front of them with no prior preparation. They must read a series of rounds of five measures sight reading. The competition is only one part of the entire All-State Choir competition, which takes place over the course of four days.

“It’s just the culmination of how much you practice music,” says Azimi-Tabrizi. “And you can practice it, especially just alone sight reading, but a lot of sight reading is just how much you’ve done music in general.”

To get to this point of competition, a student must first receive a perfect score at the All-District Choir audition. Of the 3,000 students that auditioned, only 19 made the cut and were able to participate in the State Sight Reading Bee in Osage Beach. From there, each three rounds of compete eliminated more and more students until it was Azimi-Tabrizi and another student from Lee’s Summit High School. 

This isn’t his first time competing. Azimi-Tabrizi competed last year in the same event but got out in the second round. This year, his only goal was to make it to the second round. Instead, he won in the fourth round of competition. 

“I just didn’t believe it,” he says, “It was pretty surreal. Last year, it seemed very unattainable.”