A hush falls over the room as Tasha Moorjani (12) begins to act for her Advanced Acting final. Her character? A theater major recounting the madnesses of her fellow theater enthusiasts. Her face becomes animated in accordance to the emotion she portrays: hesitation, enthusiasm and sadness. She talks with poise, using hand gestures to accentuate each point, and delivers punchlines that are met with howling laughter from the audience.

With her performance over, she accepts applause with a beaming smile and numerous high-fives as she returns to her spot on the floor, a skip in her step. 

When she isn’t rehearsing her advanced acting solos, Tasha can be found doodling in a lime green manuscript paper book. But instead of cartoons, the notebook is filled with pages and pages of original arrangements and songs. Often inspired by musical ideas from the wide variety of genres of music she listens to, she arranges her own songs. When a friend in choir mentioned his love for the song “Dancing Queen” by ABBA, she arranged the song into a four-part mens’ arrangement, and her arrangement was chosen by upper school choral group Signature to perform at Hoscars, the annual upper school talent show. 

Besides composing music, Tasha also likes to express herself through singing, having joined choir in middle school. After taking a brief break from choir to practice violin, she rejoined choir in high school and has been singing ever since. She joined Cantilena her sophomore year and joined Signature when it became co-ed. For Tasha, performing is a thrill like no other.

“Somebody once watched me at a choral concert and told me, ‘That was the happiest I’ve seen you in two years.’ That really stuck with me, because I didn’t realize just how happy I was while performing,” Tasha said.

One of the main aspects of choir that Tasha loves is the welcoming environment of Cantilena, an environment where she always feels comfortable to sing. Although Tasha used to be shy about singing, she overcame her nervousness about performing for an audience over the years that she has spent in performing arts. Choir is also where she met some of her closest friends. 

“What they say about singing together makes you better friends ⁠— that is one hundred percent true,” Tasha said. 

Tasha has also stepped up to become an assistant director, directing one of Cantilena’s pieces for a fall choral concert.

“She’s grown a lot in confidence, in taking more risks and putting herself out there as a musician,” upper school vocal music teacher Susan Nace said. “A very significant [way that she’s grown] is learning how to bring people together for a common purpose. When I see her working with other people, I think [learning how to direct] is one of the most significant things that she has done.”

Because of her immense love for music, Tasha spends her time learning more about creating and performing music through exploring the intricacies of music theory. Her interest in music theory is evident in her daily interactions with her friends. In fact, she and her friend Audrey Liu (11) connected through discussing various music theory topics and bonded by sharing music pieces that they found musically intriguing with each other.

“We have music theory together, and she’s always like, ‘Here’s this song I’ve been listening to, and there’s the chord progression, it has an interesting melody and it’s in this mode,’” Audrey said.

For Tasha, learning music theory is a stepping stone to sharing the joy of music. As both a composer and a performer, she is able to better convey meaning in music through using concepts of music theory.

“It’s not really music theory, I don’t think anyone actually likes music theory for the sake of music theory. It’s that musicians love music itself and music theory is a just a vehicle for that,” Tasha said. “You have to know music theory in order to share music, whether that’s composing or performing.”

Friend Sofie Kassaras (12) has noticed Tasha’s keen interests in her wide range of passions. 

“Whenever she finds something that she really likes, whether it’s Star Wars or [a] book series, she gets really into it and really passionate about unfolding it and seeing how it looks,” Sofie said. “It’s that kind of mindset that I think got her into music in the first place because she would take apart things and put them back together. It’s interesting to see how her mind works and to see what she creates.”

Tasha’s dedication extends towards her friends as well, her kindness and compassion leading her to encourage her friends to excel in their artistic endeavors.

“She’s helped me so much with my own writing and with my own art,” Sofie said. “I really don’t think I could have achieved anything without her encouragement and without her kindness driving me.”