Music & Mayhem

A real mix of both modern songs and ones that are well known, made for an interesting evening with the Orchard Players.

I was pleased to see so many young people involved within the show, singing dancing and contributing to the production in helping with choreography,which retains the interest for future productions.

I found the selection of songs different, quite challenging and most of them worked quite well.

One or two solo’s for younger people were in low key settings at the start, and the content of the songs in some were more suited to adult voices but all the young people gave good interpretation to their numbers.

The mix of youth and members that are more senior worked well and it was good to see the experience coming through with strong voices.

To pick out all the soloists would make for a very long report, so many gave good performances but I must comment on Bex, Cheryll and Adrian for their solos, all beautifully sung,and Susan Marcus and James in the youth section did especially well.

I would like to suggest in some of the solo numbers, where an interval of music occurred, it might have added to have a dancers cover music when the soloists just stood waiting for their next entry.  That would also give interest for the audience and less time for solo people to just stand and feel rather exposed.

I enjoyed “The Flood” sung very well by the gents and “Price Tag” was fun.

The inclusion of two sketches also was a good idea and gave another aspect to vary the mood in each act, which the audience did enjoy.

I could see where the penultimate number was leading, and good to remember all the triumphs of the Olympics, but I was not sure if it fitted well within the show.

As always,the costumes were super and gave brightness and life to the songs.

The finale was a real up to date version of “Gangnam Style” and closed a most enjoyable evening.

Thank you for inviting me, it was good to meet up with you all again

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