This class will develop a mini-musical culminating in a performance on the final date for family and friends that includes minor set pieces, costumes, props , and stage lighting. A favorite of students grades K to 2 for many years, our Music Box Theatre class is expanding this year, with a pair of teachers working together as director and music director to provide more one-on-one focus and attention to students, create more challenging and creative staging, and add a bit more production value (minor set pieces, props, costumes, and stage lighting), so students have a better sense of what the experience of “putting on a show” may be like. Using song, character expression and choreographed movements and gestures as storytelling tools, students will assemble a mini-musical based upon a story or fable that they will perform for families on the final class. A new mini-musical is explored each session for recurring students. A new mini-musical is explored each session for recurring students. This fall's selection is entitled, A Three Piggy "Opera," (which is a comical reference to the Broadway musical title, A Three Penny Opera). Students will be cast in various roles and provided with a script and recorded music tracks. The class will also include special craft projects which will be incorporated into their performance. All students must be available for their performance on the final date (November 14).
This low-pressure class environment allows students to explore a variety pack of acting tools and techniques for budding young talents including improv, character creation, scripted scenes/sketches and commercials, without the pressure of rehearsing and preparation associated with putting on a show. Build confidence, presentation, social and public speaking skills. Highlights of the students’ work have often been presented in a showcase for an invited audience at the end of the session if the class is comfortable.
*No class 9/25 (Yom Kippur) or 10/9 (Columbus/ Indigenous Peoples Day)
This class is a dance/ movement class to help students build confidence in movement and learn how actors can use their bodies to create characters and tell stories. Young performers will build comfort and confidence in learning to use their bodies as acting tools. Acting requires more than words. Actors and dancers use their bodies and facial expressions to inform the audience of what kind of personality they are, and what they are feeling and thinking. Just simply how a character stands or how they walk can tell us an awful lot about them. (A giant would move very differently than a mouse, for example.) In this class, students will use music and movement exercises, and choreography to get in tune with their bodies creatively, and explore how body language, posture, gesture and facial expression can be used as effectively as a costume in order to create a character. They will also use masks and work with props.
Registration: $136 for all eight weeks or register as a drop-in at just $20 per class.
Music Box Theatre: An Introduction to Musical Theatre, Grades K to 2