Ceilidh dance training, what could go wrong?

Here's a couple 360° videos of our cast working through some ceilidh dance steps with our local Scottish dance experts. The tunesets are pretty traditioanal, we start with "Miss McLeods Reel", then transition to "Willajford" and briefly hit "The High Road to Linton. What a great tuneset!

360° video of Eigg troupe dancing to Miss McLeods Reel

Next, the troupe wonders into some waltz moves and the band joins in with "When Irish Eye Are Smiling". What a memorable moment! Man oh man, that was a fun night!

360° video Eigg troupe dancing to When Irish Eyes Are Smiling

Kickoff celebration for Edinburgh Festival Fringe

We had an informative kickoff meeting for our Edinburgh performance run on Tuesday.  We met at First Baptist Church of Denver and did a walk through of the facility and went through the status for the show and played through some of the music. The building has several smaller rooms for logistical meetings, table reads and vocal rehearsals and most of the rooms have a piano. Miller hall is downstairs from the sanctuary and has a full blown theater with a proscenium stage and a large area for choreography and blocking.

Kickoff celebration for Eigg the Musical

It was nice to have most of the talent under one roof for the first time and everyone was super excited; afterwards, we all found time to unwind at City O' City, a nearby watering hole. We'll be spending a lot of time together over the next few months in preparation for 2 weeks in Scotland this Summer.

Tickets available for Eigg the Musical

We're live! The Edinburgh Festival Fringe has updated their website and tickets are now on sale for our show Eigg the Musical. The Fringe Society has done a great job and this year's festival is sure to be one of the best ever. Come join us in Scotland.

Tickets available for Eigg the Musical

The Edinburgh Festival Fringe is the world's largest performance arts festival, which in 2019 spanned 25 days and featured more than 59,600 performances of 3,841 different shows in 322 venues. Established in 1947 as an alternative to the Edinburgh International Festival, it takes place in Edinburgh every August.

Logo and marketing collateral for Eigg the Musical

We've been hard at work with messaging and branding for our upcoming show at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. To start our art director put together a creative strategy for the graphic designer to work from. There's plenty of back-and-forth at this stage, but at the end of the day the period between the initial concepts through the final design went relatively smoothly and took about a month. Here's the final design, we'll plan to use it on our marketing collateral moving forward.

Mark your 2023 calendars!

The time has come! We've confirmed our participation in the 2023 Edinburgh theater festival. The show is now scheduled for the first week of August (7th-12th) with previews (4th-6th) and we are right on the royal mile. It's been a lot of hard work, but so fun and rewarding too. Over the next few months you'll probably see a variety of announcements here and on the festival's fringe site about the show and how to purchase your tickets, so please stay tuned.

Hopefully, the pandemic is behind us now and everything will go smoothly in Edinburgh. The extra time has allowed us to refine the script, enhance the music and put a bow on it. We're all so excited to come to Scotland and perform the work for everyone.

Script development and Cèilidh dance training

This was our first Cèilidh dance event! Here's what happened; some local theater friends volunteered to learn how to dance at a Cèilidh while April played the accordion. Back in 2019, after a short visit to the Isle of Eigg, we decided to incorporate Scottish Cèilidh music into the show. April worked with several professional accordionists on Skype during the Pandemic. Mike Aman owns Monarch Accordions and he worked on her repertoire and technique. Sandy Brechin is in Edinburgh, he's one of Scotland's best known Cèilidh accordionists and he helped with the overall Scottish Ceilidh genre.

Cèilidh Dance Training

In any case, earlier this year it felt like it was time to come out of the woodwork so I reached out to several local organizations specializing in Scottish dance and one of them connected me with a Scottish couple living in Colorado who were involved with Cèilidh dancing in Scotland. We had a Skype call to discuss the specifics and penciled in a date to get together. Everyone was eager to participate and learn more about the dances and the culture behind them too. Playing the music was the easy part and everything seemed to flow naturally. We played tune sets for a Gay Gordon, a Reel and a Jig and it was so much fun! 🎭

Creating an authentic musical score for Eigg

Here's a short article about composing for musical theatre works. The publication is based in Los Angeles, but they have a Colorado connection too. The interview touches briefly on "method composing" and the nuances of creating a score that supports the musical atmosphere found on the main islands of the Inner Hebrides. To read the interview and see all the pictures select the link below.

Read the Interview at:
https://shoutoutcolorado.com/meet-april-alsup-composer-of-musical-theatre/