Rocky Mountain College Scores Twice This Past Weekend

Last Saturday night we saw "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" sponsored by Rocky Mountain College, at Billings Studio Theatre, directed by one of our Wizards in Residence, Professor Gerry Roe. It was good, often funny, nearly always entertaining. For one thing, Roe did not try to make 20 year old students look like 50 something characters.

Music was occasionally odd as the instrumentalists sometimes appeared to be playing in a key different than the singers and sometimes against each other. Not unpleasant really. But it was a surprise to hear an excellent on-key voice on Sunday evening from the guy who was an ex-con supposedly doing his community service on Saturday with sometimes strange high-pitched sounds.

A little unusual was the selection of four not-quite-random people from the audience to join the 6 adolescents. Apparently this is the way the show has been done in the past. See the Wikipedia entry here. 

They did a little improv which usually worked OK. A major clanger was using Denny Rehberg's boating accident as the obligatory swipe at local politicians when Senator Baucus and his paramour would have been much more appropriate. Perhaps there is an unwritten rule about these things.

On Sunday evening we heard the larger Concert Choir and the smaller Chamber Singers, again from Rocky Mountain College, in a concert at St Patrick's Co-Cathedral. This was magnificent, something we almost always expect from another of our Wizards in Residence, Professor Steven Hart. There were some good solo voices at the top and bottom though occasionally some of the sopranos had difficulty blending in when that was necessary.

I like Professor Hart's little talks about each piece. These were a nice mixture of Sacred and Profane as the program suggested. The sounds at St Patrick's are very nice. The audience, fairly large, just a few less than the earlier Palm Sunday masses, were very appreciative. So much so they gave a standing ovation for both the penultimate piece, Benjamin Britten's Rejoice in the Lamb, and again at the end of the program.

These folks usually do something before Christmas and then concerts like this one around Easter, though they may have to call them Holiday and Spring concerts in order to maintain good PC standing and get some ink in the local paper.

Keep an eye on the Gazette for their performances next year.