Church Musical

[Phan#24601]

Posted: 12/17/11 at 7:32pm

What would be a good musical for a high school church choir to put on? The decision is not in my hands, but I just want to see some ideas. The musical can be as obscure or well-recognized as it gets, but it has to have some type of message to tie into the Christian faith. We find out which musical we will be performing in on the 24th, and I will be sure to let you all know.

[LegallyBroadway2]

Posted: 12/17/11 at 8:26pm

umm.. cats.. maybe? It has a religious elements.. not Christian exactly but basic elements if interpreted as such..

[gvendo2005]

Posted: 12/17/11 at 8:33pm

Godspell and Jesus Christ Superstar fit the bill. Les Mis could be forced as well; after all, the moral of the show is "To love another person is to see the face of God." Cotton Patch Gospel could fit.

[SporkGoddess]

Posted: 12/17/11 at 8:45pm

Godspell or Joseph.

[darquegk]

Posted: 12/17/11 at 9:10pm

It's A Wonderful Life, if they are comfortable ith some experimental music.

[SeanMartin]

Posted: 12/17/11 at 9:26pm

CABIN IN THE SKY

[SondheimFan5]

Posted: 12/17/11 at 11:49pm

Depends...what's your budget and what's your talent like?

[Phan#24601]

Posted: 12/18/11 at 4:38pm

I don't know exactly what the budget is, but I do know that we have lots of talented people in our choir this year.

[brian.klimowski]

Posted: 12/18/11 at 5:47pm

Joseph
JCS
Godspell

Church-specific Christmas musicals that are great:
Two from Galilee
The Christmas Post

[SeanMartin]

Posted: 12/18/11 at 6:38pm

Joseph, JCS, and Godspell are the three most obvious contenders. Anything beyond that will require some knowledge of your congregation.

To be frank, this is what I hate about threads like this. "Can you recommend a play for one-act competition this year?" Sure, whatcha got to work with? "Oh, you know: high school students." — or — "I need a song for an audition." That's nice; I need a date with Brad Pitt. I mean, without telling us much to work with, anything we suggest is going to be shooting blind.

So let's get to some specifics: who all is in your church that would be performing? Age? Gender? Ethnicity?

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 12/18/11 at 7:02pm

Not that it's a great show but Two by Two might be an interesting choice to consider. There are some nice songs and as a telling of the Noah story I can see its old fashioned cuteness working well for a church choir provided you have the right people, especially an endearing comic lead who can play old for Noah (the Danny Kaye role) a sexy funny soprano (Madeline Kahn) and a great tenor (Walter Willison). It should also be fairly inexpensive to mount, although I don't think it has a chorus to speak of, so that might scratch that idea.

If you wanted to do something non-biblical but with great values and wholesomeness there are many choices but you might want to look at A Tree Grows in Brooklyn, Oliver, Lost in the Stars, Peter Pan, The King and I, The Sound of Music, Dear World, Les MIs (as suggested), Anyone Can Whistle and Once on This Island (the age and ethnicity demographics of your choir and the politics of your congregation may play a role in your choice).

[After Eight]

Posted: 12/18/11 at 11:46pm

^

Anyone Can Whistle??!?!?!?

[Phan#24601]

Posted: 12/19/11 at 5:31pm

@SeanMartin
The people who would be preforming would be young women and young men from the ages of 14-22. Our church is primarily white.

[Phan#24601]

Posted: 12/19/11 at 5:35pm

@gvendo2005
As much as I LOVE Les Misérables, we would probably have to preform the School Edition, which-to me-would not be worth it.

[SeanMartin]

Posted: 12/19/11 at 5:37pm

Okay, now see, there's something to work with.

Yes any of the Big Three would do just fine. If you want to go a little outside the box, yes, TWO BY TWO, which has a pretty decent score. There's A TIME TO STAND, which is the Esther story. There is LES DIX COMMANDEMENTS, but try to get the original French and translate it rather than that piece of garbage done with Val Kilmer in LA. And of course CHILDREN OF EDEN, which has some pretty spectacular moments.

[BirdOnWing]

Posted: 12/20/11 at 12:20pm

ho nk!!!

Posted: 12/20/11 at 12:47pm

This could be the thread of the year! Please suggest musicals. I won't be picking, and the person who is won't see this, but please suggest away.

[Gothampc]

Posted: 12/20/11 at 12:48pm

I wish more people would do Menken & Rice's "King David"
Link

[Rabekriegerin]

Posted: 12/20/11 at 1:03pm

You could try one of the original pieces by Lights Up Productions; they're all essentially Christian musicals. "The Passion of the King" and "Lost in Vegas" are, IMO, the better of the two. Passion has a lot of catchy ensemble numbers that might work nicely for a choir.

However this would rate pretty far into the "obscure" side of music.

[gvendo2005]

Posted: 12/20/11 at 3:51pm

And if you want something more obscure, Passion Play Ministries International has been pushing a semi-musical passion play in several countries since 1985. They're pretty good with licensing terms, unlike the price-gougers at the major houses.
Passion Play Ministries International

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 12/21/11 at 11:16am

'Anyone Can Whistle??!?!?!?'

Certainly it's a show with good values. But to SeanMartin's point, for all I knew phan's church might be hip, green, anti-establishment, specialize in community work with the mentally ill, and be filled to the brim with aging socialists and gay theater people. In other words, Phan could be from the Lafayette Avenue Presbyterian Church Choir in Fort Greene (which puts on quite a Christmas show by the way). I was really shooting in the dark.

[Ed2]

Posted: 12/22/11 at 2:27pm

Check out "The Gift" from a company called ...of all things.... WWW.CHURCHMUSICALS.COM The show is a musical adaptation of O. Henry's "The Gift of the Magi". While it's not a Christian story, it's overall theme is sacrifical love, which is the perfect tie in to the Christian faith via God's sacrifical gift of his son, Jesus, for the redemption of man. This illustration has to be made in program notes or by one of the cast members,pastor or other person at the close of the show,but it works very well that way. There are testimonials to its effectiveness in that regard. Good luck.

[raulmark]

Posted: 12/22/11 at 3:03pm

Big River
it has some Gospel in it..besides it's about a journey of someone "unlearning" racism. finding real friendship in someone from another background

[broadwaybabytn]

Posted: 12/22/11 at 3:18pm

I would suggest Children of Eden... Do you have some women with big gospel voices?

[Phan#24601]

Posted: 12/25/11 at 2:27am

The results are in...(drumroll please)
my church is doing JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR!