This week, justArts&Culture spoke with Mariel Guzman ’19, the president of Voices of Soul and Minnie Norgaisse ’19, music director of Voices of  Soul. Voices of Soul held their Collegiate A Cappella of Boston Invitational on May 4.

JustArts&Culture: Tell me a bit about yourself and your role in this event.

Minnie Norgaisse: I was the music director of the group. … so my job in the group was arranging music and teaching it to the group.

Mariel Guzman: I am also a senior with Minnie. I’ve been in the group since freshman year. I am the president. ... As president I kind of work together with both the business manager and the music director to plan out practices, look at set lists and keep the group in check when we need to.

JA&C:  How did you pick the songs that you performed?

MN:  So the way it goes is that at the start of the semester, we figure out what new songs we are adding to our repertoire. … As far as specific songs, for like particular event or concert, typically we want to make sure that every song gets their time to shine. So we are always trying to make sure that our newer songs get the chance to be performed.

MG:  It also depends on the gig sometimes … It also depends on the vibe, from smaller things like a coffee house to bigger things like a concert.

JA&C: What is the process like to organize the CABo Invitational with so many performers from different schools?

MG: Andrew, our business manager, reached out to every group he could think of in the area. We started off asking our group members who we knew at other schools. … Some of us did individual outreach, but we gave Andrew all the information and he reached out to everyone. … Every semester we try to do one event off campus, but with this event was our opportunity to network with other groups in the area, and we are so happy he was able to put it to light, because it was even better than we expected. ... Andrew is the first business manager we every had. ... He paved the way for the rest of the group, and it’s going to get better.  

JA&C: What’s the most rewarding part of organizing this event?

MN: Being able to enjoy the fruit of labor at the end and listen to the other groups. We been looking forward to it for such a long time, and finally getting there and been able to enjoy it was huge. … Also meeting with the other group members. I wish we had more time to just chill with them after, but it was super rewarding just to talk with them for a little bit. … Having other colleges able to come and unite over our mutual love of music is super great.

MG: I completely agree with Minnie. Seeing how hard our entire group worked as a whole was rewarding to me. I think how well this event ran was a result of all learning experience we had. … Whether it’s some as little as like how to film the event and stream it to something as big as just knowing the sound would be ok and we would have the space for it. … To be a representative of such a wonderful group was a really rewarding experience for me.

JA&C: Anything else you want to tell the readers?

MN: We hope that this event would get better and bigger over the next couple of years. … I love Voices of Soul and I am really proud of everything we have done.

MR: Come audition for Voices of Soul! We are great!

 —Luke Liu

— Editor’s Note: Editor Andrew Baxter ’21 is in Voices of Soul.