Students at Winston Churchill High School rehearse for their production of Shrek the Musical, set to debut later in the school year.
Fine arts are thriving at a local high school as students take to the stage and prepare to perform through COVID-19.
For many high schools throughout the province, it has been difficult to run fine arts programs as COVID-19 continues to be a part of everyday life.
However, as students are back in-person and restrictions have lightened up, the fine arts department at Winston Churchill High School is taking the opportunity to perform Shrek the Musical.
Emily Morrison is the drama teacher at Winston Churchill High School and the director for this year’s production.
She says the school hasn’t performed a musical production for about 10 years. Morrison and the music director, Kade Hogg, thought it would be fun for the students to enjoy.
“Lots of them come from Wilson Middle School where they do musicals, so they have experience and the kids have been so excited to do something a little bit different at Churchill this year,” says Morrison.
She says the production hasn’t had to deal with many obstacles, but it has been difficult trying to work around students’ schedules with sports and outside commitments.
“It is interesting coordinating so many kids after a year of them not having anything to do after school and I’m finding that all the kids want to do everything after school,” says Morrison.
She says continuing fine arts during the pandemic involved a lot of collaboration with other drama teachers throughout Lethbridge.
Despite the difficult time, Morrison thinks this experience we’ve had with COVID-19 has made people more appreciative of what we have.
“Being around humans again is something that we are privileged to be able to do now and I think COVID really taught us how much we value that and need that as human beings, especially in the arts,” says Morrison.
Along with theatrical fine arts, music has been thriving at the high school as well. Hogg, the music director, says they are planning on doing a Christmas concert in December for the band and choir.
Hogg says COVID-19 protocols are a bit of a pain, but the biggest challenge for music was being able to perform.
“The only thing that we’re really missing is those performance opportunities and we haven’t had a concert since December of 2019,” says Hogg.
The school is fortunate to have a large music room to accommodate social distancing protocols for band and choir students, but it is difficult for the choir to sing through their masks. Hogg says he is looking forward to when they can get rid of the masks.
“When the masks go away, it will definitely be a lot easier in the fine arts department to do what we’ve got to do without masks,” says Hogg.
Hogg works alongside Morrison in Shrek the Musical to teach and rehearse musical numbers with the students. He hopes the restrictions will lighten up so they can have a full in-person audience when the show starts in January.
Although the high school production doesn’t go up until later in the year, tickets for Shrek the Musical will be on sale online in mid-November.