STUDENTS at St Mary's Primary School staged their biennial school musical 'The Hunting of the Snark' on September 16.
The production involved students from every year level and was organized by the performing arts department heads Elizabeth McKew and Christine Bulger, who played a lead role in the Ararat Musical Comedy Society's production of Les Miserables earlier this year.
The musical was based on a poem by Alice in Wonderland author Lewis Carroll.
"It was about an odd group of people coming together to find the snark for different reasons," Ms McKew said.
"There was a banker who wanted to sell it to make money, then you had an explorer who wanted to be the first to find it and go down in history.
"It was just a group of odd explorers coming together to find this mythical creature. In the end they don't even find it, but they do find something else.
"It had a really happy ending and a lovely message ... about friendship and family."
The production was the first one the school staff organised themselves from start to finish.
"This is the first time St Mary's has take on a performance internally," Ms McKew said.
"Usually someone would come in and it was quite disconnected to the school.
"We had auditions and kids came in every weekend for rehearsals. It was done by us, for us."
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That included hiring equipment and transforming the school's hub into a performance space.
"We hired staging, brought in lights, microphones and backdrops, and transformed our hub space," Ms McKew said.
"I think in the end we had 300 seats. From what I gathered there were lots of walk in so we were full to the brim."
It was an exciting opportunity for the students.
"Some of those kids that had the opportunity realised they have a love for the performing arts," Ms McKew said.
"I had some boys who do football and basketball and they auditioned, and now they are performing solos in front of an audience."
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