Even after months of preparation for The Music Man, no one was prepared for what happened on the night of the last production.
Halfway through the first half of the last show, the pre-recorded piano music for the play stopped working and choir director Brooke Grall had to play the rest on the piano, for the first time, for the show to go on.
“When the music system of our show crashed I was very nervous at first, wondering how we were going to finish the show with a full house of audience members expecting a good show when we no longer had music,” female lead Tessa Haas said. “I am so grateful to Mrs. Grall for literally saving our show. She sight read the whole Music Man score. The trust between her and the actors is so great and we owe her a lot. She is amazing.”
Cast members all seemed to agree that Grall saved the show.
“Mrs. Grall was our super hero on Saturday. She saved the show and I will never be able to thank her enough. But it was also our other two directors Brewster and Ms. Green who prepared us for anything that could go wrong,” male lead Drew Shafranek said.
The cast along with the directors and advisers had different emotions when this happened on Saturday night. All of the directors took great pride in the cast as to how they reacted to the mishap that occurred.
“I would not relive that evening for any amount of money. Trying to find a tuned piano and whispering cuts and vamps to our new performers and changing scene-change music to more manageable songs from the show and listening for balance between singers and the new instrumentation probably aged me several years in a matter of minutes,” Green said.
Green has appreciation for all of the people that helped get past the technical difficulty.
“Mrs. Grall is the best. She is irreplaceable, professional, and the best “partner in crime” I could ask for. She deserves all the accolades she has received and more.” Green said.
In the end, Grall pulled it off and the show went on. So besides the 15-minute delay and confusion, the show was great. The songs from the lovely performers sounded great and the audience could tell that the cast had worked long and hard to perfect every piece of the musical. So the theatre department did it again and presented a musical that will be remembered.
“I miss it already,” Green said.
