St. Boniface Students Conduct Musical March Madness

Students in Elgin found a fun way to mix the high-profile March Madness tournament with music.

The St. Boniface Elementary first through sixth graders celebrated Music In Our Schools Month with a March Madness tournament. However, instead of basketball teams, the bracket consisted of composers.

Thirty-two composers from the Medieval time period all the way through the present day were matched against each other, and the students had a chance to vote for their favorites each round. The students listened to lots of music, compared styles, decided on what they liked and narrowed down the bracket to the final two composers: Hector Berlioz from the Romantic time period and John Williams from the 20th and 21st centuries.

The students liked the exciting, fast music of Berlioz like his Symphonie Fantastique and his Hungarian March, but they also enjoyed listening to the familiar movie scores (which they often recognized from the very first notes) of John Williams, such as Harry Potter, Star Wars, and Jurassic Park.

​The students will complete the final round on Wednesday and vote for the 2017 March Madness Composer Champion. ​