On the open audition day, please wear comfy clothes that you can dance in and wear with trainers or dance shoes if you have any. Do remember a water bottle too! Arrive at the registration at the time you’ve been allocated and bring along your registration form that’s been signed by your headteacher, if you haven’t already returned it.

Rebecca, our production supervisor, will be on hand to sign you in. She will have your your details from your online application. Give her your full name and she will check you in and give you a sticker with a number on. Make sure you stick this to the clothing that you will be dancing in, rather than a sweatshirt that you will probably take off. Remember what your number is, just incase your sticker falls off during the day, as this is how we can double check your details.

You’ll need to wait until everyone has signed in and then you’ll all move into the audition room with the choreographer.

We ask all parents or guardians to stay in the building, just incase your child needs you. Although we can’t give you exact timings in advance, we will know more on the day and will keep you updated.

Our professional choreographer will teach all the dancers a routine and there will be plenty of time to ask questions, practise moves and rehearse it until everyone is happy. We will then break up into smaller groups so that everyone will have use of the space and to give you time to go over it again.

If ,at any point, you’re not sure of anything please just ask or if you’re feeling unhappy at any time, just let us know. We want everyone to have a fun time and to be happy and enjoying themselves.

We will be looking to cast around 16 performers (plus 8 for the reserves team), depending on the show. Once you have performed your rehearsed piece for Rebecca and the choreographer, we will have to reduce the number of auditionees.

Once we have made the group smaller, we will then start thinking about casting the teams. We cast for three teams, a Blue, a Red and a Reserve team.

There are many factors that we have to think about when casting, so please don’t get disheartened if you don’t get cast this year, it could be for several reasons, so please do come back next year!

The reserve team is cast alongside the performing teams, and individually act as standbys in case anyone in the red or blue teams are unable to perform. We will ask for your details and if anyone drops out from either team, we will be in contact with you before the first day of rehearsals.

Please don’t be disheartened if you get cast for the reserve team, it’s still a great accomplishment to be cast and sometimes there are just other factors that we have had to consider. Whilst there’s no guarantee that you’ll end up performing, we have had times where we’ve needed to call upon a reserve team member.

Before coming to audition, please do bear in mind the rehearsals and performances that you will need to commit to. It is a fantastic experience and a lot of fun to be involved in, but we do understand it is a big commitment.

For those cast, a detailed schedule will be handed out on the day of auditions.

However, as a general guide:

• You will be required to come to rehearsals from 4pm – 7pm every day after school for the rehearsal week and all-day Saturday and Sunday. This is to ensure that your schooling isn’t impacted.

• During the Tech week, you will be required from 1pm to 10pm the week before the show opens. You can not miss any rehearsal sessions during Tech week. There are strict health and safety requirements that all young company be present and if anyone does miss a session during Tech week, they may not be allowed to perform.

• You must be available for all shows where your team are scheduled to perform. The schedule can be one or two shows per day. The teams split the shows as equally as possible. We can not allow any swaps or missed shows.

Tech week is where all the technical aspects of the show are put into place in the theatre. This is all the lights, the sound equipment, the sets and any flys if they’re being used. The show is worked through from the start and each moment is “teched” to ensure that it is safe and that all departments know what they are doing. The Company Stage Manager runs the tech rehearsals, and they sit there with a script and writes all the aspects of what will happen in the show down.

Then they can “call” the show. This is where they tell each department what they will be doing and when, so that every show is an exact replica and therefore the same for every audience. This is also the time that the backstage crew get to rehearse the set changes, and the cast get to rehearse all the costume changes.

This can be quite a long process and requires everyone to be patient. The director might have to make some entrance changes; the choreographer may need to space the dances slightly differently once they’ve seen it on the stage; or the lighting technician might need to re-focus some lights. Sit tight and wait to be asked to do something. You may need to repeat it several times until it’s safe and correct.

It’s vital that everyone pays attention to what’s going on, on stage and be aware of your surroundings. Everyone needs to know what is about to happen during a particular scene and where is safe and not safe to be. This is why no one is allowed to miss any Tech sessions. We don’t have time to re-tech to go over what someone may have missed, and therefore if you miss a tech session, we can’t allow you to perform in any of the shows.

Once everything has been teched and the Company Stage Manager is happy, there is a dress rehearsal, which is where the whole show is run together with everything you have just rehearsed.

Both teams will need to be at both dress rehearsals so they can either watch or perform. This way if anything changes, they are aware of it straight away.

We kindly ask that you make your head teacher aware that your child will be auditioning as there have been times that they have not granted permission after the child gets cast.

Whilst not common, we want to avoid disappointment and so request you let them know that they are auditioning and if successful you will be requesting time off school.

It is also an opportunity for them to let you know if there are any reasons that school cannot be missed and therefore permission might not be granted.

We are currently finding that schools are not granting permission to year 11 students who are doing their mocks, please do keep this in mind before auditioning.