This program explores avenues for public school choirs to meaningfully engage with living composers and their music. At Central High School, a highly diverse Title I public high school in downtown Omaha, innovative programming is key to developing lifelong singers. This session will highlight the choir’s unique creative relationship with collaborative pianist and composer, Stephen Bouma. Under the guidance of choral director Sara Cowan, singers in the choir write poetry, which Stephen sets to music. This partnership has produced three new works thus far, all premiered by CHS choirs. We will discuss ways for public schools with limited budgets to build deeper connections to diverse works from living composers and how these collaborations offer new insight into historical music.
Our Voices, Our Words: Innovative Approaches to Meaningful Repertoire
Central High School Singers
Central High School
The Central High School Singers is a highly select chamber choir chosen from students in Central's A Cappella Choir. CHS Singers performs throughout the year at community events and civic functions. They have sung the National Anthem seven times for the NCAA Men's College World Series and for several Nebraska state athletic championships. CHS Singers was a featured choir at the 2002 North Central ACDA Region Conference in Des Moines, IA, and served as a demonstration choir for the 2008 NC Region Conference in Fargo, ND. CHS Singers have performed for the Nebraska Music Educators fall conference six times, most recently in 2022. In 2024, the choir performed at the Minnesota MEA Clinic. CHS Singers consistently earn superior ratings at contests and was awarded second place in 2025 at the Worlds of Fun Festival of Music.
Sara Cowan
Sara Cowan is in her fourteenth year at Central High School. Cowan was named the NCDA Outstanding Young Choral Director in 2016, the Central High School Teacher of the Year in 2021, and earned a Music Teacher of Excellence Award from the Country Music Awards Foundation in 2022. She currently serves as treasurer for Nebraska Choral Directors' Association and previously served as Treble Choirs R&R Chair (2014-2019). She also served on the Nebraska MEA Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, and Access Committee (2020-2023). She has presented at NMEA and NCDA conferences and regularly serves as a choral clinician and adjudicator. She holds a BM from Grinnell College and an MM in choral conducting from the University of Minnesota. She and her husband, Brian, are both proud alumni of Central High School and loving parents to Miriam and Clara.
