Talented youth take to the stage for Talentfest 2015
CVR students had a blast showcasing their talents while discovering the style and lingo of the 80’s and 90’s to present this year’s Talentfest under the umbrella theme of “Kicken’ it Old School”.
The Talentfest coordinators, teachers Jessica Barrette, Melanie Beaudin, Sia Georgaklis and Lynn Harkness all stress that though they are there to offer the students guidance throughout the process, the show is really all about handing the ownership over to the students and letting them shape the show. Lynn Harkness states of that aim: “Talentfest is the kids’ show, it’s really where they get to shine in their own way and flavour [the show] the way they want to.” Elizabeth Séguin, a grade 10 student who composed the choreographies says of working with her peers to teach them the dances: “I think everyone cooperates once they know this is our show.”
Inherent in Talentfest is the opportunity for the personal growth of the participants. Jessica Barrette sums this up by explaining: “You see them come in with their talent in grade 7 and then each year they build on it and their talent definitely gets more refined as they grow as performers.” Elizabeth Séguin and Callan Forrester, who was an MC, have each been in Talentfest for four years and look back with a sense of pride at how much they have evolved since they first started participating.
Having grown up being accustomed to listening to their music on small electronic devices like iPods and MP3 players, the opening sequence featured a comic routine of a mash-up of music from the era which was driven by students discovering a boombox on stage and being confounded at how to work it. It was a scene that appropriately set the tone for the rest of the evening which played with their awareness that they were oblivious to some of the trends of the day being that the oldest among them were only born at the tail-end of the decade.
Drama teacher, Donna Babin, recalls when the students first found out the theme and raided her office to put their costumes together. The enthusiasm with which they embraced the theme really impressed her as did their curiosity about the era which was not all that long ago. As they put on flashy fluorescent attire and began to think about the characterization required, they asked her: “How did you guys act back then?” Babin chuckled as she explained, much to their surprise, outside of the questionable (in hindsight) fashion trends “not much different from you guys.”
The MC’s for the night Callan Forrester, Jeremy Béland, and Michael Bryntwick admit that the theme posed a challenge for them in terms of coming up with material for their skits between the acts. Although, in some cases the material came to them organically such as the instance where Michael’s genuine obliviousness as to who the Spice Girls were served as inspiration for one of their skits. And with good reason, seeing as how when the Spice Girls were formed, the students weren’t even born yet. They possess a shared enjoyment in making people laugh and right from the beginning of the show it was clear that they fed off of the energy of the crowd and as such their skits built momentum as the show progressed.
The entire cast, tech crew and coordinators put tireless effort into honing and perfecting the performances in the prior months of preparation, which more than paid off come performance night. The show boasted a jam-packed array of diverse performances which made one thing abundantly clear to the audience members: there is an impressive youth talent pool in the Valley and CVR helps to cultivate that in their students. Principal, Brigitte Barrette says: “these teachers have a knack for igniting the flame within the students and feeding that fire.”
By the end of the last show, both students and coordinators alike were left with a reciprocal feeling of wishing the show could have lasted longer; a feeling undoubtedly shared by the audience members as well.