For over a decade, groups of Loudoun County Youth have hosted a joint program for teen musicians. With the help of Loudoun County Parks, Recreation, and Community Services (PRCS), Loudoun Youth Inc., and Loudoun County Youth Advisory Council (YAC), Loudoun County Youth created a platform which allows youth musicians to compete against each other annually for prizes in front of a crowd at Cascades Overlook Event Center. In the third Battle of the Bands finals qualifier on February 16th, 2024, World View was awarded second place by the judges at the event! This allows them to move onto the finals on March 15th, 2024.
Battle of the Bands was approaching and World View spent days perfecting their performances. It took them about a month to finish learning “Take You”, and they decided to perform two other songs that people found to be the most popular and appealing.
For the third battle, there were nine musicians and groups ready to perform for the program.
There are four categories for qualifying for the finals: fan favorite, best soloist, first, and second place. First, second, and best soloists are categories chosen by judges, while fan favorite is chosen by the audience using a Google form.
As we walked into the building, me and the other World View members scattered around to scope the area. As we looked around, our eyes landed on the posters planted on the doors that had each contestant performing for the night. I had been in this building before, just a year ago, and I remember being in awe over the performances that happened that night. Everyone had so much music potential. It felt overwhelming to try and beat them in a competition. Some of the other groups, such as Downe Lands, already participated years before, and left high expectations on me.
Once we met up again, we walked into the performers room to grab ourselves a slice of pizza; the slices were small, but we were down to eat anything before the event started. We lounged on the chairs, talking to each other, and taking pictures for memories. We were scared of the competition, and we struggled to convince ourselves that we would win.
“I felt pretty unconfident because there were a lot of advanced competitors with unique talents.” —Carly Ochgerel, keyboardist and vocalist of World View.
“I felt nervous going into it just because that’s kinda how it goes for me with musical performance.” —Ibby Ahmad, guitarist and vocalist of World View.
As the evening progressed and the groups performed one by one, we eventually reached the voting time where the audience was able to choose their fan favorite. Fan favorite is a category where the audience signs a Google form to choose their favorite performance of the evening.
We hear the announcer’s voice boom into the microphone and we turn around to hear the news. Each of the World View members looked at each other as we heard that we won second place for the competition. World View performed three songs for the evening. Our genres consisted of a mix of calm to upbeat indie songs that we’ve grown to love performing over the past few months.
“‘The Perfect Pair’ was an obvious choice for its large appeal, and it shows our softer, more intricate side of things.” —Ibby Ahmad, guitarist and vocalist of World View.
“Take You is by far one of the most challenging pieces, especially for guitar, and Sunflower is just a classic!” —Carly Ochgerel, keyboardist of World View.
When we walked backstage, the judges expressed their love for the diversity in our song choices and the phenomenal stage presence that we had been practicing for months.
Butter Chicken Band, the first performers for the evening, won fan favorite. Fan favorite is a category voted by the audience and allows for the band to move to the finals. Butter Chicken Band is a group of teenage musicians consisting of a drummer, two guitarists, a bassist, keyboardist, vocals, and a violinist. They played three songs for the evening, but their cover of “Thriller” by Michael Jackson left the audience in awe. Many of their supporters were filming and taking pictures of their performance, and the audience clapped as their act ended for the night.
Penelope Lyla won best soloist with two covers and one original song. As a musician and vocalist, she expresses how she struggled with learning fingerpicking when she first started to play guitar.
“I used to hate fingerpicking when I was just learning to play guitar. But I’ve learned to love fingerpicking, especially this song.” —Penelope Lyla at the Battle of the Bands.
The first place winner of the evening was Downe Lands. Consisting of three members, Nathan Harris, Trevor Kaclold, and Owen Saraceno, Downe Lands have been performing at Battle of the Bands since early 2018.
“We’re juniors in high school. We’re running out of time, so we just wanna make the most of it.” —Nathan Harris, guitarist of Downe Lands.
“We’ve played on stage so many times that I feel like the fact that I’m interacting with my band mates, the audience, and putting the energy out is enough for the audience to get hyped and for me to not get nervous.” —Trevor Kachold, bassist of Downe Lands.
They performed three songs, but the one that got me jamming the most was when they played a Deftones song. It was the highlight of my evening, and I was glad I was able to converse and meet the members in person.
“I really loved Downe Lands’ performance of ‘Be Quiet and Drive’ by Deftones. I’m the biggest Deftones fan and it was my first time seeing a band play it live! The vocals were on point and they were overall amazing.” —Carly Ochgerel, keyboardist of World View.
In the audience, we saw some of our friends cheering us on and vibing to the music. Park View alumni Alex Matthew Perla attended the event as a supporter for World View. He’s known by underclassmen as the leader of the previous generation of the same band, graduating high school in 2023 and attending James Madison University as a music major.
“Downe Lands performed with us last time and they were super good. They only lost to Sheltered last year, and Sheltered is also very good. Shout out to Manny; he also goes to JMU.” —Alex Matthew Perla, previous keyboardist and leader of World View (2021-2023).
“I thought the event was great. It gave all these guys a chance to perform on a stage like this. When we did it, it was fun, so I hope it was fun for everyone else.” —Alex Matthew Perla, previous keyboardist and leader of World View (2021-2023).
Sofia Munguia and Alex Torres, sophomores at Park View High School, also came by to support World View.
“The main reason why I attended Battle of the Bands was to support all of my amazing and talented friends in World View. But also because Battle of the Bands was super fun to attend last year.” —Sofia Munguia.
“Other than World View, my favorites would have to be Downe Lands. I watched them last year at Tally Ho and both experiences were super fun to be at. I love their genre of music; it gets the audience hyped, and it’s very enjoyable.” —Sofia Munguia.
“There were a few bands that were repetitive, not gonna lie… but my favorites were definitely Downe Lands—and I think Eternals or the Purple Voyagers. But those three were all really good, other than World View.” —Alex Torres.
We all went home with smiles on our faces, excited to face the next challenge in the finals.
“Make sure you are there to see what we are doing next at Tally Ho on March 15th!” —Ibby Ahmad, guitarist and vocalist of World View.
