Rock Nativity

This production is a modern take on the biblical story of Jesus birth and is titled ROCK NATIVITY.

It was written by the Director (Ren Forteath) and her father (Ewen Flint) who is also the Musical Director for the Company way back in 1993 as a Sunday School production and over the years has developed into the full-blown musical production seen now. There is very little dialogue in the show which consists mainly of musical numbers.

The small cast of 12 consists of the main principals and the minor roles are doubled up by the remainder of the cast who used the limited space on the stage to the best effect.

The performance takes place on a nearly bare stage with additional pieces of set etc added as necessary and was very effective in creating the scenes. On the night I was at the production there was a few sound issues with mics but this was resolved as the night went on and did not detract in any way from the show.

The choreography was simple but effective and created by Lauren Ashton.

The performance opens with a village square scene with the full cast singing “Something Special” which was very tuneful and a Narrator (Ren Forteath, who has an excellent singing voice) lets us know how the nativity story will develop. The story then proceeds and we are introduced to the characters as found in the biblical story, along with additional family members and villagers.

Act 1 takes us from Mary being told by Angel Gabriel that she is to give birth to God's son and the family dynamics this produces, through to Mary and Joseph heading to Bethlehem for the census. Thereafter in Act 2 we find the baby in the manger and the visitors that arrive to worship him, along with King Herod edict to slay all young children under the age of two. Finally, we see the family flee into Egypt where this part of the biblical story ceases.

Throughout the performance the music for all of the songs was very tuneful and there were some excellent harmonies and ensemble singing. The main principals, Mary played by Emily Williams and Joseph – Rhys Williams along with Gabriel (Holly Titcombe) were excellent with super singing voices. Mary’s father/King Herod played by Neil Webster was also very good with good stage presence and vocals. Cael Scott had a myriad of parts including Herod’s advisor, Melchior, a roman soldier and villager and shepherd. I sometimes wondered who he was but he fitted all of his changes well and had a good exchange with Herod when discussing the child. The other cast members Emily Webster, Lucy Paterson, Elissa-Beth Titcombe, Rosanna Paterson and Rachel Lyagoba, played various roles of villagers, shepherds, wise men and Rachel played an angel as well as Mary’s mother and wise man.

I was pleasantly entertained at this show and was impressed by the singing of the cast both individually and as an ensemble. If anything, I would have liked there to be a little more dialogue between the songs.

Despite knowing the bible story, I found this to be an entertaining version of it and was suitably impressed by the production as a whole and the cast individually.

Well done to everyone involved in this production. Thank you for an entertaining evening

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