Most West students aren’t taking advantage of the orchestra program at Canton High School. The main thing that drives away potential orchestra students is that it starts at 7:00 am in Canton High School, and many students are not about to give up sleep time. What these students don’t know is that they are missing a whole musical world.

Currently, there are 35 West Students taking orchestra, 15 of them in 6th grade, 11 of them in 7th grade, and 9 of them in 8th grade. 35 is a low number compared to the entire amount of students in the school. However, because the orchestra has students from West, East, Pioneer, Discovery, and Liberty, you would never guess just how few students there come from West.

The orchestra consists of four instruments, the violin, the viola, the cello, and the bass. You can play all of them by plucking their four strings, or you can play them with a bow.

The violin is one of the most well-known instruments in the orchestra, and it is also the most common instrument there. The violin’s four strings are G, D, A, and E. Violins read their music off of the treble clef. There are two groups of violins in the orchestra, creatively named 1st violins and 2nd violins. Violins are held up by the player’s shoulder, although it is very tempting to hold the instrument by its neck.

The viola is often mistaken for a violin but is definitely not the same. The viola doesn’t have an E string, but instead, it has a C string. The viola’s size is another difference from the violin; the viola is slightly larger than it. Also, violas are similar to violins in the way they are held. In fact, the viola is held in the exact same way as the violin, with the exact same bow hold. Viola players read music from the alto clef. The viola tends to play with the second violins, or the cellos and bass.

The cello is a wonderful instrument that many people would probably recognize. Cellos have the same notes as violas, but that’s where the similarities stop. Cellos, unlike violins and violas, are played with the player sitting down one hundred percent of the time. If a cello player is sitting with bad posture, they could hit their by accident when playing the C string. To add on, cello players don’t read the alto clef or the treble clef, instead, they read the bass clef. A cello player would often find themselves with a really important part of the music and crucial to the final sound.

The bass is the largest instrument in the entire orchestra, which gives them a low sound. Basses are important when it comes to keeping the orchestra grounded. Without them, the entire orchestra would sound far too light and lofty. Out of the four instruments, the bass has the most shifting. The bass has the strings G, D, A, and E. Although the E sounds quite different from a violin’s E. Out of the entire orchestra, bass players are the least common.

Don’t be scared off by the early wake-up time! Orchestra is an interesting place that more middle schoolers should explore!