This may be their second year on the provincial stage but that doesn't mean Port Moody's Sam Ellington and Tiana Jung will take it easy.
In fact, the Heritage Woods and PoMo secondary students say want to do the Tri-Cities proud as they compete against the best young musicians in B.C. at next week's Performing Arts BC Festival.
Both teens won spots in the annual competition after scoring top marks in their respective categories at the Coquitlam District Music Festival (CDMF), held in February and March in Port Coquitlam.
Ellington, the CDMF junior musical theatre rep who was the 2013 provincial runner-up, defended his local title this year after singing Close Every Door from Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat and I Wanna Be A Producer from The Producers (he also placed in the pop and jazz categories singing All Is Fair in Love and The Best Is Yet to Come).
The 14-year-old Grade 9 student will repeat the two tunes in Penticton in the musical theatre category and, in the vocal variety competition, For Once In My Life.
Ellington, who last year trained with Port Moody's Sandi Siemens - Michael Buble's former teacher - and is now under Paul Ouellette in Vancouver, thanked CDMF's organizers Harold Peters and Thelka Wright as well as adjudicator Kevin Power for being "encouraging and supportive."
"I'm very excited and grateful to have been given this opportunity and I am always happy for the chance to express myself through my singing," he said.
Jung said she's equally honoured to have been selected to represent CDMF at the provincials.
While Ellington took junior musical theatre, Jung snagged the senior musical theatre category for the second year in a row at CDMF (in the 2013 provincial contest, Jung won an honourable mention award).
"To be in the senior category is extremely rewarding in that my hard work is paying off," she said. "I've just turned 16 so competing in this senior musical category of 28 years old and under motivates me even more as I will be up against big voices."
For the provincials, Jung will repeat her CDMF number There's a Fine, Fine Line from Avenue Q as well as Pulled from The Addams Family; for her vocal variety piece, she will sing her version of Taylor the Latte Boy.
Working with vocal instructor Gina Oh for the last three years, the Grade 10 international baccalaureate student has already seen success: Last year, the soprano played the First Spirit in Vancouver Opera's The Magic Flute and had a part in Gateway Theatre's The King and I.
The training, productions and accolades are stepping stones to her dream of performing on Broadway one day - a dream that will be shared with the teachers and coaches who helped her along the way.
"They are all truly amazing mentors," Jung said.
CDMF REPS
Junior piano: Athena Deng, Port Moody
Intermediate piano: Catherine Xu, Coquitlam
Senior piano: Steven Gong, New Westminster
National piano: Eric Liang, Vancouver
Junior classical voice: Lydia Querengesser, Pitt Meadows
Junior musical theatre: Sam Ellington, Port Moody
Intermediate musical theatre: Olivia Leon, Port Coquitlam
Senior musical theatre: Tiana Jung, Port Moody
National musical theatre: Roan Shankaruk, Vancouver
Junior speech: Alison Keogh, Vancouver
Intermediate speech: Timothy Sayson, Richmond
