Our first Singing practice

(posted by Craig)

We are currently the supporting cast, which means we are not on stage much yet. We all join in on the finale, which means there are about 300 people on stage (150 people from each cast). I obviously can't see it, but it feels impressive.

Yesterday we had our first singing practice. It was seriously one of the most spiritual experiences of my life. Very little was said about parts, volume, projection, technique, etc. Rather one scene after another was setup for us as we took positions and sang the accompanying music. Members of the Core Cast were there reading their lines from the pageant, including scenes like "Gathering to Nauvoo", "Healings in early Nauvoo", "King Follett's funeral", "The Martyrdom", and "Raising the Temple".

It did not matter that we were standing in the middle of a High School gym, and no one was in costume, and most of us did not really know was we were doing or what was expected of us. The music director gave us a few simple instructions and these scenes became completely real for us. We lived these moments in Nauvoo's history and it was quite overwhelming.

We have been gone less than a week. We are hot and tired, but we are thrilled to be here.

Our family (at least the women) has the most costumes of anyone in the family cast. We will share more later about our parts, and I will try to get some pictures.

Craig