Saint Mary's brings beloved musical to the stage
The hills were alive in Buffalo Grove as 80 middle students from Saint Mary School performed the "Sound of Music" to a standing room only audience the evenings of March 11 and 12.
The Rogers & Hammerstein musical was codirected by recently retired staff member Mary Burke, who holds a bachelor of arts degree in theater from Loyola University, and Allison Melville, who is in her sixth year teaching religion and general music at St. Mary School, her alma mater. Melville frequently sings at other parishes and performs in community theater.
Kim Geraci, St. Mary School preschool, choreographed the show. Geraci is in her second year at St. Mary School and is involved in several theater groups in the community. Mike Tuntland, the show's technical director has been involved in technical theater since junior high. He has been teaching at St. Mary school for seven years. He technical directs many other shows for community, park district and high school theater performances. Many of the cast members have been performing in St. Mary musicals for three or four years. The level of confidence and caliber of singing is matched at a high school level.
The annual musical is one of many ways that St. Mary School enriches students' lives. According to Principal Nikki Raftery, " The children look forward to the musical each year. The younger children can't wait to reach fifth grade to be eligible to participate. The musical follows our goals to develop the whole child. It requires students to follow a timeline, to use self-discipline and to accept feedback. It also teaches children to work together. Whether they are performing or involved in the technical crew, they learn what a group effort can achieve. It' real-world education in action."
According to education.com, "No one would argue the importance of literacy or fractions, but study after study has shown that the arts are more than fluff. Longitudinal data of 25,000 students involved in the arts, conducted at UCLA's Graduate School of Education by Dr. James Catterall, shows that consistent participation greatly improves academic performance and significantly bumps up standardized test scores."
In the ever penny pinching world of education, St. Mary places a high value in the fine arts. St. Mary's fifth- to eighth-graders provided stellar performances.
For information, contact publicrelations@stmarybg.org.
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