Gallery • 3 Photos

Paige Kokolakis

The Mello Divas practice new songs after school.

It’s hard to find a student in Berkeley Preparatory School’s Upper or Middle Divisions who doesn’t know who the Mello Divas are. The talented, all-female a cappella group keeps us enthralled during convo performances, and represented Berkeley in the Varsity Vocals International Championship of High School A Cappella (ICHSA) in New York last year. The group trains intensively four hours a week, and is coached and exclusively handpicked by the chair of the visual and performing arts department, Rob Redei.

The Mello Divas has recruited bright talented new faces to join their ranks this year. The Divas’ test not only examines singing ability and vocal strength, but also knowledge of music theory such as sight reading, pitch and tone. After the intensive auditions in the first weeks of school, only four new Divas were recruited: Mason Gilden ‘16, Addison Aloian ‘18, Naomi Mora ‘16 and Shaila Ghanekar ‘17. They have all been working extremely hard in the past few weeks as new Divas. Gilden said, “Divas has been an exhilarating experience, the girls are so nice and I’m learning so much! The music is really fun to learn and it sounds great! I can’t wait for everyone to hear it.”  The novice girls in Divas are personally mentored and taught their pieces and harmonies by the talented seniors of the group, Alicia Babin and Julianne Tanella. The seniors of the Divas each year tend to be the frontrunners of the group due to their refined, more mature voices. Seniors also tend to have more sway over song choices and group decisions. Each senior that participates in Mello Divas gets to pick one song that they may sing as a solo, dubbed the “Senior Solo.” Last year at Nationals, two of the performance pieces were Senior Solos: “This Love” by Lizzie Rothschild and “Feeling Good” by Aiden Fisher.

The team has been practicing their music relentlessly in order to maintain their prestigious position of regional champions. Junior Grace Roman said, “We will be competing in the ICHSA regional competition as the returning champions, and our win last year qualified us for a spot in the national competition in New York. We hope to repeat this at this year’s regional competition, which will be hosted at Berkeley sometime in February.” In order to show us how much love and dedication they put into music, the Divas performed an enchanting number in convo, comprising of “Mad World” with Sophia Raterman ‘16 as a soloist, and “Breathe Me” with Tanella acting as the soloist. The group mesmerized the crowd with their precise beatboxing, and smooth, melodic riffs and harmonies. Not only did Divas prove their worth in convo a few weeks ago, they also proved that they’re better than ever.