Calgary company hosts youth virtual musical amid COVID-19 pandemic

As many organizations move their services online amid the COVID-19 pandemic, one Calgary-based performing arts school is hoping to bring art to the masses with the first-ever virtual musical performed solely by children.

Music and Play is calling on all young performers in the city to be a part of the upcoming production. Co-owner of the company, Darryl Lindenbach, said this performance aims to help all kids in the city whose theatre dreams have been sidelined amid the pandemic.

“The entire theatre community is intimately acquainted with the situation we’ve found ourselves in closing down shows,” Lindenbach said in an interview with 770 CHQR.

“Every theatre kid in the city has kind of lost their identity at this point.”

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The show was created by Beat by Beat Press, a company out of the United States that writes musicals specifically for youth and schools.

“It’s the first of its kind in the world, and we saw this and thought, ‘why not?'”

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The show features 21 cast members and each performer will be given a two-minute scene or song to contribute to the musical.

LISTEN: Music and Play hosts an online musical for youth in Calgary

All the individual scenes will then be strung together to create a fun and youthful storyline, Lindenbach said.

“The show tells the great story of a group of kids trying to save their school musical by putting it online,” he said.

“The show is called ‘Brushes with Greatness: The Dental Hygiene Musical.‘”

Being a part of the musical comes with a $20 fee that Lindenbach said goes towards employing other theatre workers in the city during the pandemic.

“That goes towards royalties and mainly paying some of our theatre artists in the city to work as directors and musical directors on this show,” he said.

“They kind of lost their livelihoods too, so whatever we can do to bring the community together is really what the show is about.”

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Lindenbach said the musical is open to all young artists wanting to take part. He added the show can be performed several times to encompass all performers in the city.

“We thought, why not open it up? We can do as many casts as we have kids.”

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Sign-up and production information can be found on the Music and Play website.