Stagecoach

After the boys appearance at Her Majesty`s Theatre in the West End in June, several people sent e mails to me praising them for their performance.  I kept them all until I had time to set them out so here they are at last:-

Dear TrudyWhat a wonderful weekend you had!  Congratulations to you, your boys and their teachers for a memorable performance last Sunday and also to you for so many successful performers.  You certainly seem to attract heaps of talent in the North East.

Steph   (Stephanie Manuel - founder of Stagecoach)

Hi TrudySorry to hear one of your fabulous boys has a foot injury. Hope he will be fit and well soon and back dancing. It was great to have you all there last Sunday and I was really impressed with your boys.
Sounds like you made the most of your stay in London, and that you
caught up with your talented students.

Well done to everyone who performed at Her Majesty’s last Sunday. Everyone agreed the standard this year was very high and it was good to see how well the students behaved and how they supported each other. Congratulations to all your students- I hope they had a fantastic time.

Viv Parsons (Head of PR Stagecoach Head Office)

P.S. I thought your boys were fantastic 

I thought the boys were wonderful.

All the Best,

Clare  (principal of one of the other Stagecoach schools performing at Her Majesty`s)

On a more up to the minute point, many of the parents attending “Stardust” on Friday said that they thought that the boys stole the show. The audience reaction, of all ages, was fantastic

Well done boys - you consistently work hard, stay focussed and make Claire and me forever proud!

Last term STARE entertained at a Ladies` Fellowship meeting in Darlington and received a cheque for £75 to donate to the Hands of Love Orphanage in Uganda. Here is the letter from the organiser thanking the group.

Paul Harbron - a teacher at Middleton St George Primary School helps us by manning the light and sound when we do our performances there with the Thursday School. He took time out to e mail me across the holidays to say that in his opinion, it was the best performance of all the ones he has seen. We will have to treat him as an impartial critic as he does not have any children with us at Stagecoach - so well done Thursday school you didn`t have an easy ride into that performance but you pulled it off!

At Christmas, STARE and a handful of Early Stages students sold programmes at the annual Christmas concert in aid of St. Theresa`s Hospice. They have sent a souvenir copy of the latest newsletter for each student, in which they are pleased to announce that the event raised £2,500 for their hospice in Darlington

Every year we send entertainers to a party organised for disadvantaged children, which isheld in the Tall Trees Hotel, Yarm. The organisers have sent us this letter of thanks

I received this e mail from Joanne King who organises a lot of Youth Service activities to Darlington last week

Hello Trudy,

Just to say I thought your young people who preformed at the Vibe awards last night were wonderful!

Many thanks,

Jo King

I was stopped by the Vice principal of the Queen Elizabeth Sixth Form College on Friday to say how impressed she was with all our students at the Holocaust Memorial Service. The 6th Form College had 2 students giving a presentation about their visit to Auschwitz, which was very harrowing.

STARE performers braved the cold on Saturday night to  entertain,  live, in the town square, in Eston, for their Christmas Festival, organised by the residents` committee. Our students enjoyed it, and by all accounts, so did the audience. They performed two sets - one from “High School Musical” and the other from the new film “Mamma Mia”. Over 20 students were involved.  Thank you particularly to the parents for taking their children so far on a Saturday night.

Dear Trudy,

It was a smashing night - we thought it went off really well and Stagecoach were fabulous, everyone enjoyed it (think we all  enjoyed the Abba singalong - well i know i did!).  Some say it was the best night we’ve ever had.  Its a long day for us as we are out there all day but well worth it - and the  weather was kind to us, thats something we can’t book!  many thanks once again for all your help  - and please give our thanks to Janie, teachers, helpers, all the children and young people and parents.

kind regards

kim

Alison Tilley, organiser of the recent  Awards Night, held at the Gateshead Hilton rang today to say how well our STARE group had performed. “Everyone loved it” she said “It was a perfect start.” She wanted me to pass on her thanks to Janie, the chaperoning mums and all the performers.  Well done everyone!

The Joseph choirs were in rehearsals with the company today and the Red Team opened the run this (Monday) evening. The Musical Director looked a bit glum when he discovered that none of the choir had done Joseph before. However, he was soon blown away by their sound. He told me that he had just come from Dartford the week before. They had brought in the children from the West End version of “Joseph” to perform and they were excellent he said. He said that as a result, he was worried about what he would find when he came to Darlington but he said that he was very impressed with the students and would be happy to congratulate the teachers personally, if they came into the theatre, for the standards that they achieved. Well done Sue and Pippa - a great job - as always!

“Joseph” choir members have been so dedicated that in order to get up to speed with their Singing, they came in on Halloween night to have their final run-through rehearsal. We let arrive in Halloween outfits to test if they could ignore distractions. Here they all are snarling at me on their way home!!