Summer School: ‘Water! Water! Everywhere!’

‘Gale Force Theatre School and their Summer School was an unqualified success, again, in its fifth year, and with their theme of ‘THE SEA’ this year, water was certainly evident in their dance, in their song, in their scripts and in their poetry but as they went to Port Erin Station to sing and dance for visitors and locals alike, it was more like ‘swimming’ but torrential rain didn’t dampen their enthusiasm…only their clothes!! shoes!! Hair!! The staff at the station were wonderful, encouraging them to give an impromptu concert in the waiting room between trains arriving and departing, and hot tea, cakes, lollipops were in great supply, The students aged 4 to 17 sang/danced/played in both Manx and English for over 2 hours and finished their programme with the ‘run-a-way train’ song and locomotive engine ‘Huddersfield’ obliging with ‘tooting her steam’ in all the right places!!!!!!!

In their final Concert at the end of the week they were able to conclude a very busy week with songs/dance/poems/dance all connected with ‘THE SEA’ and some very moving scenes from the ‘TITANIC’ stories, after research by the students themselves, performed with great poise and they moved the audience of family and friends to tears!

The Staff would like to thank all those who gave their time and professional help to these very talented students, John Riley LRAM, Dr Breesha Maddrell, Dr Chloe Woolley, Paul Bradford, Jo Colgan, and Wendy Sutcliffe. Mrs Barbara Gale Founder/Director wanted to thank all her seniors, who, despite ‘waiting with nervous anticipation’ for their exam results, supported all the under 14’s with great enthusiasm and fun, Moira Pain, Torin Lakeman, Katie Gudgeon, Katie Colgan and Lauren Harvey.

Vice President John Riley presented medals to the students and special prizes were given to Adam Corby-Fayle, Tomas Jordan, Serena Bennett, Victoria Hoover, Beth Colgan and top student of the week being awarded to Francesca Warren.