{The Spitfire Grill}

This is a Marajen Denman, my daughter's theater arts teacher, with part of the cast of The Spitfire Grill---read on for more info.
(First let me say---this is totally a family post, so if you are looking for a card, I'm sorry! you won't hurt my feelings if you move on!! I hope to stamp this weekend, but it's not looking too promising. My friends and I have decided that if you have school-aged children, May is just as bad as December. It's just crazy! There's just no break at all. I won't bore you with the details---oh, yeah, I think I will--it's my blog!

Caitlin is moving home---daily---so there's more and more stuff coming into my house, but nowhere to put it. Caitlin leaves in 3 weeks for a 5 week trip to Turkey to help some overseas workers there.
Hannah has a paper to finish, 2 AP exams, a paper to write for a Summer Study excursion to England (bless her heart), two soccer tournaments and The Capital Awards--which is actually what this post is about--oh, and she still has school and final exams. Oh, and Hannah leaves for a 3 week trip to turkey in just over 3 weeks as well.
Joshua---well, he's just along for the ride
David and I are both teachers---two very different institutions, but it's MAY---and that means "wrap it up"---so, LIFE IS CRAZY---but very fun!)

OK---I digress, so on to the post---Trinity Academy is where I work and my two younger children attend school. The High School has 60 students---yep, it's not a typo---60. The arts are important at Trinity and the performing arts is one area where our students can compete with "the big boys"---just last weekend our choir attended a competition at Music in the Parks in Busch Gardens in Williamsburg, VA. They have Music competitions at all of the Busch Gardens Parks, I'm sure. Here's a note from the Choral Director about the competition.

The Upper School Concert Choir competed against 5A schools from Pennsylvannia to Florida this past weekend in the Music in the Parks Festival at Busch Gardens. We were the only choir to compete in our division: AAA. (Schools are put into divisions by enrollment. The winning school was an by audition only ensemble and had over 5,000 students in the high school!) In other words, we were a David among many Goliath's!
Our little choir, comprised of only two seniors and the rest underclassman, scored the second highest score given by the judges for all seventeen of the high school choirs who competed on Saturday!
I was so proud of the sound the students made and for the heart they put into their sound.
Please congratulate our students on their well deserved recognition!

Anyway, I know I'm a fine arts teacher, so I will show a little (OK, a lot) of Arts favoritism, but here's the deal on "The Spitfire Grill".

Our Theater Arts department is made up of half of the high school. Kids choose 2 Fine Arts electives. One of the fun things about this class is two productions a year. A great thing about Trinity is that even students who aren't in drama will help to paint sets, or work backstage the week of the show. There's a real tradition at Trinity for great drama. (and I mean the stage kind of drama---not the "drama" in any high school!)

The NCT Capital Awards is a program designed to recognize outstanding
high school musical productions and performances in Wake County. Trinity was entered in this competition along with 19 other High Schools--public & private--in Wake County.
This year Trinity students did a production of The Spitfire Grill-winner of the Richard Rogers Production Award in 2000. This was an off-Broadway musical based on the movie of the same name which won the audience award at the Sundance Film Festival in 1996.

Well---here's the cool news---we have been nominated for 3 NCT Capital Awards including:

Best Scenic Design. Holly Gillon, our Upper School Visual Arts teacher worked with our Theater Arts teacher and students to come up with the set design for this year. We were nominated in this category last year as well.










We were also nominated for Best Featured Performer--
Victoria Oliver. She played a sassy postal worker and gossip and she did a terrific job.


















Well---I did say three awards, right? We were nominated for Outstanding Musical
---what? our little school---competing against major arts magnets and schools with $50,000 budgets has been nominated with "the big boys"--again! (We received 3 nominations last year as well) YES, it's TRUE.

I'm so proud of everyone involved---here are a few more pictures from the show. Many thanks to Denise Myers, one of our parents at Trinity who took amazing pictures and shared them with all of us.


The girl on the 60's crocheted shawl is my Hannah. She was actually the student director and called the show from off stage, but she stepped into this one scene. I know it's not a great shot of her---but, hey, she's my kid!!
Back to Ms. Denman---this woman is a visionary--truly. I think of myself as artistic--but she sees things that I would NEVER dream of! She drives the kids crazy(she knows it!)---as most Theater Arts teachers do---especially close to productions---but she produces AMAZING shows---and the kids ALWAYS say, "it was worth it"! Kudos to Marajen Denman---it's been a hard year this year---but I think we would all say "it's been worth it---to God be the Glory!"