As Elon University celebrates its annual Family Weekend, its musical theater department will put on a different time-honored event — one that, like the university, is an ever-changing standby the community has come to love.
“Collage” is a performance that includes every musical theater student and takes more than just creativity — it takes a great deal of time as well.
Since the performance is on the Family Weekend schedule, students have the opportunity to showcase their work to their visiting families.
“It’s really just a great opportunity for parents of incoming freshmen to come see the work that the department is doing,” said junior musical theater major Dan Lusardi. “I feel like that’s the purpose, to give the visiting parents and idea of what [the department] is all about.”
The title of the event hints to audiences that they should expect a vast collection of different student performances, which faculty director Linda Sabo, associate professor of performing arts, calls a “revue’” or a series of sketches, songs and dances, dealing with issues satirically.
“‘Collage’ is a musical revue of numbers put together mainly by the students,” she said in an email. “Most of these numbers come from our spring revue called, ‘A Grand Night for Singing,’ and a couple are from last spring’s freshman showcase.”
Because these songs are originally performed during the spring semester, students begin conceptualizing the performance for “Collage” very early. According to Lusardi and his “Collage” partner, sophomore Drew Redington, preparation for “A Grand Night for Singing” begins mid-October the year before. Auditions are held just before Thanksgiving break, and rehearsals begin in late February or early March for the late April show.
This means work on the pieces to be performed at this weekend’s “Collage” started nearly a year ago. There is one major difference between “A Grand Night for Singing” and “Collage,” though: roles held by the department’s recent graduates need to be recast.
Lusardi and Redington understand this shift first hand.
“The fun thing about this was a senior originally did our duet with me, so since he graduated, [Lusardi] had to learn it in two days,” Redington said of his tap performance to “Moses Supposes.” “Another fun thing about ‘Collage’ is that a lot of the seniors that were in numbers aren’t here anymore, so a lot of underclassmen get to take their place and also get to perform in the numbers.”
For senior Jillian Hanna, performing her fourth and final “Collage” doesn’t seem emotional — until they get to the finale, which is the same number each year. Each class takes their turns singing verses of “I Will Turn to You,” a song written by two Elon alumni. Seniors start the song off, but that isn’t the part that gets her teary.
“There’s this part at the end where the seniors sing to the freshmen, and then the freshmen sing back to the seniors, and it’s this really touching moment,” Hanna said. “That’s always the part that makes me start crying.”
Beyond the sentimental moments, “Collage” is a staple of Elon’s Family Weekend and is usually sold-out shortly after tickets go on sale. What many may not realize, though, is “Collage” is unique to the musical theater program at Elon.
“No other music theater program does [“Collage”],” Redington said. “It’s very, very Elon. It’s one of the unique things about this program.”
It is not the idea of a revue that makes “Collage” so special, but the fact that students lead the performance each step of the way. When preparing for “A Grand Night for Singing,” music theatre students of all years conceptualize, audition, direct, choreograph and musically arange their own components of the show and Sabo acts merely as a guiding hand for the event.
“The faculty person in charge of this show is not the director, but acts more like an artistic director, someone who keeps an eye on everyone to maintain quality of production,” she said.
Sabo also works with other faculty members to offer an outside opinion.
“We all take notes and give the performers feedback in the rehearsals during the weeks preceding the performances of ‘Collage,’” she said. “We help clean the vocal and movement work so the performances are well rehearsed and ready for an audience.”
For those not familiar with Broadway tunes, the audiences will also enjoy some popular hits. Redington said there are more popular songs included this year than usual.
“There’s a lot of people in the department this year that are very contemporary singers, so there’s a few pop songs,” he said.
Lusardi is also excited about the movement in this year’s “Collage.”
“This year our department is very strong dance-wise,” Lusardi said. “The classes we have right now are pretty strong movers so I feel like there’s a lot more dancing in this collage than years past that I’ve seen.”