Scotch College

The people sang superbly

OSMaD’s successful concert in March set the scene for this year’s major musical.

MR RICHARD BEVERIDGE (’62) – OLD SCOTCH MUSIC AND DRAMA CLUB

The Osmad Concert Cast And Crew

 

Suzi Cossar, Ros Turnley, Normie Rowe And Rhonda McMurtrie celebrate

If you come across someone who was in the audience for the Old Scotch Music and Drama Club’s concert, Hear the People Sing, on 24 March, ask them about this happy night of entertainment. We know they’ll agree it was a special night.

There were 19 singers drawn from cast members of the past four OSMaD productions, and an orchestra of 24 under the baton of John Ferguson. They performed 23 show-stopping songs from musical theatre repertoire, and there was a special performance from our guest artist, Normie Rowe, who relived his role as Valjean from Les Misérables with a very emotionally charged reprise of Bring Him Home. Normie also joined the ensemble in a rendition of the people’s song from Les Mis – Do you hear the people sing?

The involvement of Normie Rowe was to announce that our major musical for November this year will be a world premiere season of a new Australian musical, Normie – sometimes subtitled as Northcote Boy and sometimes as Australia’s First King of Pop. You will see and hear it here first at Scotch.

Normie is based on the 1960s experiences of Australia’s first King of Pop, Normie Rowe, who had a stellar pop music career until he was drafted for compulsory military service in Vietnam in late 1967. The storyline focuses on Normie’s roller-coaster ride through arguably the most explosive, creative and tumultuous decade of the 20th century.

While Normie Rowe has expanded his performance achievements into TV and musical theatre, he still performs the hits which made him famous. However, in this production he will be playing the role of Prime Minister Harold Holt.

To maintain the spirit of youthfulness so much part of the music scene, the production will be directed by young director Simon Eales with an equally young music director, Davis Wiskin. The scheduled opening night is Friday 23 November.

In each year since we took our first step into musical theatre production in 2008, OSMaD has been nominated for several non-professional theatre awards, and has won many. The 2011 production of Sweeney Todd was nominated for 10 Lyrebird awards and won seven – best musical production, musical direction, lighting, sound, best actor, costume design, and best ensemble.

OSMaD is an alumni club of the Old Scotch Collegians’ Association which draws widely from across Melbourne among those interested in theatre performance and production. The company is not restricted to the Scotch College community. If you’re interested in taking part and in supporting what we do, be sure to stay in touch.