Time to "go for hard burn"

Happy New Year to you all. 2013 was certainly an interesting year. Ad-LibMusical Theatre was instituted, starting with Little Shop of Horrors, then replacing that with Les Miserables before finally settling on Sunshine on Leith. Boy, was that a challenge - singing, acting and dancing. Some are good, but some are born with two left feet and a very short-term memory. However, encouragement of others does help those people and make them feel more confident.

However, it's now just over three weeks until opening night. That means not a lot of time to get things polished to a shine that gleams. So it's time for "hard burn" - those who are fans of the short-lived TV show Firefly will know what that means.

Full musical rehearsal tonight, followed by full dress on Sunday. It should be pointed out though that it's not the full dress rehearsal with sound and lights. 'Tis but a test, to paraphrase Monty Python.

See you all tonight.

We're well-known now...

It seems that word about our forthcoming performance of Sunshine on Leith gets around. Check out Amateur Stage Magazine - they've got us on their website at http://www.asmagazine.co.uk/magazine/page/3. You'll need to scroll down to see it.

We're rich(er)...

Y'know, putting on a show like Sunshine on Leith is not cheap. There's the licence, hire of the venue, costumes, lighting, sound, beer(!) and other assorted items. Some of that can be covered by ticket sales and sponsorship, but the rest of it has to come via fundraising.

To that end, towards the end of November Ad-Lib Theatre Arts ran held a pub quiz at the Abbotsford in Perth. There was singing, dancing, drinking and quizzing. There were prizes too:

First place prize was 4 tickets to Sunshine on Leith
Second place prize was 4 bottles of wine
Last place prize was 4 giant tubes of Smarties!

There was also a raffle.

As a result of all the activity on the night the amazing sum of £723 was raised. Wow!!

Of course, it wouldn't have worked without a lot of help. So thanks go to the following:

• Chic and the staff at The Abbotsford
• Scott Reeves, Kelly, Alice & Tom, Kyle, Rachel, Sharon and Gill for entertaining us with music and song (not forgetting Pat and her tambourine)
• Vicky Glennie for organising the event
• Gill, Alice, Sharon and Steven for helping out on the night

Finally a HUGE thank you to everyone who donated raffle prizes and who took part in the quiz. Everyone had a fantastic evening.

Remember those childhood days?

You played outside, you played inside. Outside it was football, hide-and-seek, tag, etc. Inside your games were more limited, normally board games. But once in a while you'd play a physical game...and no, we're not going down the route of The Crystal Maze here. When you were young you might've enjoyed a good game of Sardines. Oh, how those days have come back and mugged the cast of Sunshine on Leith without warning.

On St Andrew's Day 2013 the cast got an invite to perform at one of the local hostelries, Greyfriars. Now, anyone in Perth will know of Greyfriars. Anyone who's walked past will also know how big the place is...or small, as the case might be. It's usually fairly packed on a Saturday, but on St Andrew's Day it was jammed-packed like a tin of sardines for a ticket-only event. And that event was the cast of Sunshine on Leith...plus band!! So that's six singers plus bass, 2 guitars, keyboard and perchance a drum, all squeezed into a tiny corner.

Needless to say the performance went down a storm. There was even dancing on the tables!! Although bass guitar having to be played almost vertical certainly was a sight - sorry Thom.

There will be more ad-hoc sessions in the lead-up to to our performances, so keep your eyes open.

You dancin'?

"Are ye dancin'?"
"Ye askin'?"
"Ah'm askin'..."

...you to come on a date. And that date is 29th January 2014. The time is 7:30pm and the place is the Goodlyburn Theatre at Perth College UHI.

Ad-Lib Theatre Arts will perform Sunshine on Leith: The Musical over four evenings, starting on 29th January 2014 through to 1st February 2014.

We hope that as many of you as possible will be able to make the journey to the Fair City of Perth to see these special performances, the first such by an amateur cast in the UK.

Tickets are £8 for 16 years old and under, and £10 for over 16s.

The Old Landmark

Cross-over time. Let's see if you can guess the connection between the title of this post (it's from a movie soundtrack) and the photos.

That is all.

How many parts?!

It was Sunday. Rehearsals were taking place. The song du jour was What do you do? "OK", you think, "I can do that." Errrr - OK, try six-part harmony, each part with different lyrics, with a few Ooohs and Aaahs thrown in for good measure. It's a good job that other people were doing this song and not the author of this epistle.

It sounded impossible to nail it, but nail it the team did. And it was almost the same as the soundtrack a la Dundee Rep.

There's no facility to upload audio on Blogger, so you'll have to make do with some photos instead. Enjoy...

Elaine

Lynne

Myke, Lynne, Vicky & Elaine

Myke

Vicky

Alice &Gill Donaldson 

Vicki doesn't get it

Ceri

Vicki

Ceri, Mary Macdonald, Gail & Elaine

Director (Vicki) counting 'em in

Vicki gives up(!)

Gabi enjoying a joke

Alice keeping time