The Real Behind the Scenes Look at Choreographer's Showcase

I want to say thank you to all the audience members and performers that attended the showcase. Despite its technical difficulties, it was a beautiful show! Thank you to the performers and crew for all their hard work and dedication. I hope to see this little show grow into something really spectacular in the future.

I did mention technical difficulties, which there were more than many would ever know. This isn't to ruin the magic of performance, but rather to enhance your understanding of what a person or people go through to make a show happen. From my end, this is one of the worst shows I've ever done and you'll see why if you continue reading.

Last week during auditions we noticed our sound board and light board in the auditorium not working the way it had been for the previous show. Sound wasn't working at all and the light board was malfunctioning where we didn't have complete control of the stage lights or the house lights. We spent the week trouble shooting in drama class, or at least I did, and then during all my plan time during this week to have everything running correctly before the show. Thursday, after a near death experience, I did finally get the sound working correctly. The problem, somebody had disconnected the CD player and reconnected it into a channel that wasn't compatible. The near death experience included me climbing on the ledge of the booth that is two stories above the auditorium to find the correct connections. When my foot slipped and I may have slightly dangled from that position for a few seconds, long enough to panic and realize that if I actually fell, there would be nobody to hear me scream and who knows how long it would be before I was found.

Now with the sound fixed, it was time to trouble shoot the light board. I took the manual home and read it cover to cover again, but couldn't find any answers. So I decided to start with some basic re-programming. It accomplished what I wanted it to with the exception that now I had no stage lights no matter what I did. This was 10:30 Friday morning, my show was at 7pm that evening. I think to myself "I've got time, no need to panic". So I called Tech support on my lighting board, on my cell phone where the signal is poor and my battery burns up in process. I get far enough to learn that because my board is a computer, there have been three critical updates in the last six months that I didn't know I needed, but the board could still operate just fine without them. After dragging two of my classes into the auditorium and giving them "busy" work, I met a friend for lunch who happened to know a thing or two about light boards. We found out that those things didn't apply to my light board. I was back to square one. It was now 1:30 and I had made no progress. I decide to go the route for the update from the website. That should be easy enough right? Wrong!!!!

The website is blocked by the school's filters, I can use my quota time in 5 minute or less increments, but this is a 10-15 minute download that can't be interrupted. So I email and call IT, but it is now after 2pm on Friday afternoon. No answer! Now I'm starting to panic a little.

My Academic Resource kids are sitting in the drama room because we have been yet again moved from the classroom we were assigned. This time, it was because my kids vandalized the keyboards in the computer lab we were in. Between my being upset about that and entering the early phases of panic mode, the few students who ventured to talk to me had their heads ripped off.

2:30 pm I still can't get a hold of IT to unblock the website and neither can I get a hold of the light board tech support from the land line in my office. I am making desperate calls to other colleagues in the district and contacts that I have to see if they have any ideas. I am completely desperate at this point and in full panic mode. I begin to look at my options, I am just over 4 hours away from the show and I have no stage lights. I make a call to the front office and get the principal's secretary and explain my plight. She is instantly as upset as I am and begins making calls to IT as well.

Come to find out that most of IT had exceeded their hours and were already off the clock. I was out of luck it appeared. I begin to really look at cancelling the show or carrying on with alternative lighting options, two followspots and the flourescents overhead, yuck! The office makes a frantic call to district office that has to approve a technician working over time. It is now 3:15, school is out.

The tech arrives at 3:42. The clock is ticking and it appears that to make the decision to cancel the show is out of the question. First order of business, install a makeshift landline in the booth so we can contact tech support. That should only take 5-10 minutes. Now we all know what should happen, and what actually happens are going to be two separate things nowhere near being related. This took nearly an hour to get a phone that worked and configured correctly because we were using an internet line. Once that is accomplished, tech support is contacted and the filter is finally disabled so we can download and install the updates the board is lacking. With all the formualted theories that I had picked up about this light board, I was praying that the update would clear the problem. It is nearly 5 pm and my tech kids are arriving, we install the updates and reboot the board. Miraculously, everything comes up in perfect working order. This left me an hour to refocus and gel lights for the show, no time for programming any sophisticated cues for this show. But that was fine as long as the lights were on.

6:45-We don't have quite the turn out we expected, including two acts that were MIA for dress rehearsal. One I attempted to contact had all their numbers and email disconnected. But we have lights, sound and 9 other acts ready to go. Because my sound technician didn't show, and the other students I have aren't trained on the sound board, so that left me to run sound, MC the show and call the few cues there were. I had planned on this happening so during all my hurry up and wait with the light board, I had rewound the cassettes that were being used, (yes cassettes), checked my cues, put CD's in order, ran a couple of sound checks, so when the show occurred, I was prepared. My plan had worked about halfway through when I needed to set a track in the middle of the music. My time signatures on the player matched what I had written down, but when the music started it wasn't in the right place. I tried again, laughter from the audience, I made three more attempts before I realized the time counter was in a different format than what it was in rehearsal the night before. After nearly five minutes of the audience sitting in the dark and 6 attempts, I finally had the cue correct. (This is why I asked for them to have their music cut and ready ahead of time to prevent something like this). The next disaster hits with the second to last piece when I hit play on the cassette recorder and it doesn't work.

We don't have a cassette player in the booth, and the one I brought from home didn't work. We were using a cassette walkman on batteries. You're thinking the batteries are dead right? That actually wasn't the case, in my effort to be prepared, I rewound the wrong side of the tape earlier that afternoon. We sat for 8 1/2 minutes while I waited for the cassette to rewind the correct side and then I prayed the batteries didn't give out. Thank heaven for small favors because, they did make it through even after all the extra rewinding. The performers themselves did a fabulous job. It was an enjoyable show overall. I did some profuse apologizing to the acts and the audience about the show. But at the same time, this is the nature of live theater, you never know what is going to happen.

Choreographer's Showcase

Community Choreographer's Showcase is Friday Feb. 5 at 7pm. Tickets are $5 and will benefit the Vista Grande Dance Dept. The venue is Vista Grande High School Auditorium at 1556 N. Arizola Rd. Casa Grande.

The show will be about an hour long and will be featuring student choreography as well as choreography from members of the local community. We have belly dancers, Salsa Dancers, Lyrical/Ballet, Jazz and Hip Hop. Its a very family friendly show.

Hope to see you there!!