Music and Communication Departments Preview Upcoming Productions
Music and Communication Departments Preview Upcoming Productions
Auditions and rehearsals are underway for this year’s lineup of student shows.
Multiple theatrical productions are in the works from both Lyric Stage, a program of the Department of Music, and the Department of Communication.
Lyric Stage will be debuting this year’s annual opera on November 1 and 2 at 7 p.m. in the Jean Pittman Williams Recital Hall in Aven Hall. The performance will include two one-act operas by Mozart, each divided by an intermission. The first will be “Der Schauspieldirektor,” a story of two divas competing for control of an opera company. The other, “Bastien und Bastienne,” was Mozart’s first opera, written when he was only twelve years old. The songs will be performed in German, but the dialogue will be in English.
The opera will be directed and produced by Department of Music faculty member Sarah Pigott. “It should be a really fun night,” Pigott said.
Lyric Stage is making an important change to ticket sales this year. “We’re not doing pre-sale tickets,” Pigott said. “Normally, you could go online to buy tickets before the day of the show. This year we’re just selling tickets at the door. Don’t stress out if you can’t find the link!”
Lyric Stage will also have a musical next semester, set to run from February 27 through March 2. According to the musical’s director Jamie Ertle, more details will be announced very soon through Lyric Stage’s social media pages.
“Auditions will be this semester, and the original story is based on something written in the 1930s,” Ertle said.
In the Department of Communication, Clinton High School Theater Director Sarah Hankins now serves as an adjunct professor. She teaches multiple online and hybrid theater classes following Dr. Phyllis Seawright’s retirement last semester.
Hankins is set to direct “Sherlock Holmes and the First Baker Street Irregular” this fall. The production will be a joint effort between Clinton High School, Mississippi College, and Clinton’s local community theater, the Brick Street Players. Performances will be November 21-24 at the Gore Arts Complex. Auditions are set for the end of September.
“We have a specific audition time for MC students, because I know that sometimes getting off campus is difficult,” Hankins said. “So, that is early afternoon next Monday, September 30. Then we will have open auditions for the entire community, also open to MC students, on Thursday, September 26 and Monday, September 30 from 6-8 p.m. at the Olde Towne Depot, right down the street by Lions Club Park.”
For information on “Sherlock Holmes,” please visit the Brick Street Players Facebook and Instagram pages. For information on Lyric Stage’s fall opera and spring musical, visit www.music.mc.edu or the Lyric Stage Instagram page.
Editor’s note: On Thursday, September 26 — a day after the original publication of this article — Lyric Stage announced on social media that the Spring 2025 musical would be “Guys and Dolls.” See the Lyric Stage Instagram page for more details and future updates.
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