High school teacher, songwriter sings ‘God Bless America’ at Twins game

The seventh inning stretch of Sunday’s Minnesota Twins game featured a rendition of “God Bless America” from a choir teacher at Tea Area High School.

It’s the latest in a series of memorable performances for Janice Gilbert, a country artist who took the stage with a full band at Levitt at the Falls in June.

“That was amazing,” she said. “That was my first time performing with a full band — just my music — so that was really exciting because the Levitt wanted original music and you don’t get a lot of places like that, so that was really cool.”

Two days later, she opened for Deana Carter at the Washington Pavilion.

“And that was amazing because she’s someone I really looked up to,” Gilbert said. “It was a massive weekend.”

Gilbert originally is from Miller. She earned a degree in music education from SDSU, then taught in Arlington before becoming the 2004 Dakota Star Talent Search winner at the South Dakota State Fair. She won a chance to record with Chad Shank of the Minneapolis-based independent record label C-Sharp Productions, which prompted her to focus more on writing music.

Dolby Photography

In 2006, Gilbert moved to the Nashville area, where she taught and “was all about songwriting and doing the music thing,” she said.

She recorded three full-length CDs there before moving to Sioux Falls in 2013 to be closer to her family and her husband’s in the Twin Cities. They’ve lived in Tea for five years and have a 10-year-old son. Her most recent EP, “Home,” was recorded in South Dakota in 2021. All her work is available for purchase through major streaming services.

Singing the national anthem at sporting events “has been a hobby of mine,” Gilbert said, going back to 2005 when she was selected to perform at a Chicago White Sox game.

She subsequently has performed the national anthem for the Sioux Falls Canaries and other professional baseball teams. In 2020, the Minnesota Twins used a video of her singing “The Star-Spangled Banner” when fans couldn’t be in the stadium, and the team used it again in 2021 with a small crowd. By 2022, she was able to sing it live.

“This was the first time I’ve gotten to do ‘God Bless America,’ which was pretty cool,” she said. “It was really laid-back. There’s a lot of pressure with “The Star-Spangled Banner” in the beginning, so it was nice. It was right in the middle, and there were a lot of people there.”

The family also appreciates the complimentary tickets to the game that come with her singing, she said.

The performance  Sunday “was so different,” she said. “I feel like everyone was feeling it. It felt like a time when you can all come together and forget about the crazy politics in the world and just know we’re here and we belong.”

Tara Tulberg Photography

This week, she heads back to her classroom in Tea. While her performances tend to slow down during the school year, she’s looking ahead to some summer festivals next year and hoping to continue playing more with full bands as well as return to the Washington Pavilion for its Live & Local Series.