Park’s choir performance of Les Misérables closed its doors March 15, rounding out two weekends of profound, emotional performances from choir students. Park honored choir teacher John Myszkowski, who celebrated his last musical with the program. The show was stage-directed by Lillian Zumberge and musically directed by John Myszkowski.
Junior Bailey Schneeberg said Les Misérables can be challenging to perform because the show is musically heavy and long. She said the show expresses deeper emotional topics and to prepare, she explored different renditions of her character.
“Les Mis is a challenging show because it’s all singing. The hardest part of performing was remembering all of my lines and parts since the show is nearly three hours long. It’s also a very emotional show, and I had to tap into my character’s emotional depth and devastation,” Schneeberg said. “I prepared for my character by learning the music and practicing over and over again throughout rehearsals and preparations in class. I watched the movies and different renditions of Les Mis to see how different actresses portrayed my character.”
Choir teacher and Music Director John Myszkowski said students took charge and were the leaders in making Les Misérables a successful show for Park’s choir. He said the pit orchestra required more support and volunteers stepped up to help achieve a stronger performance.
“The set for this show was the greatest piece of evidence on how student-run this show is, and how big of a part the students played in this show’s achievement. It was so amazing seeing them shine when I had nothing to do with it, and I had nothing to worry about,” Myszkowski said. “The pit was harder to work around, especially with its highly demanding brass section. All of these performers are volunteers, and stepped up to help, and it’s a huge compilation of these students’ work.”
Freshman Teraysa Rombalski said she has enjoyed being a part of the community in choir and the upperclassmen have welcomed and inspired her.
“It means so much this being my first time performing with the choir as a freshman. I love the theatre and choir community, and the upperclassmen are so welcoming. It’s an incredible environment, and I know that I will be a part of the future of choir because of how the seniors have inspired me,” Rombalski said.
According to Schneeberg, this show was a goodbye to the graduating class of seniors and choir teacher John Myszkowski, who will retire this year. She said the choir poured so much into the show to make it a special production.
“This production of Les Mis is so special because it’s our seniors’ last show before they graduate in the spring and this is Mr. Myszkowski’s last choir musical at the high school before he retires. You can see the energy and heart that the people leaving next year have poured into this show, and it makes it a much more emotional and impactful performance for all of us in choir,” Schneeberg said.
Myszkowski said this show gave more opportunity to tenor and bass singers in the choir. He said the tenors and basses were especially strong this year, compared to the shortage in past productions.
“Some years, we’ve really lacked in our tenor bass section for choir. This year, we had an overwhelming amount of tenors and basses. For this year, I wanted to put on a show with great opportunities for many solos for the tenor and bass sections. This show gave them more room to shine with their vocal range,” Myskowski said.
According to Rombalski, this show was musically complex and took time to prepare, making it one of the more unique shows the choir has performed. She said it’s a complicated show that requires dedication to succeed.
“This is what choir goes for, and we have prepared for months. We’ve been preparing since the end of the first semester, and everyone dedicates their lives to this show to make it the best it can be,” Rombalski said. “It’s the most musically complex show we can do, and it makes it more unique. Many parts go into achieving success in such a complicated show, and it makes this production stand out for the choir.”
Schneeberg said this show touches on topics that have been around since long ago and still apply today.
“Les Mis is a great show to put on right now because there is so much political upheaval going on in the world. Those topics and issues are represented throughout this show, even though it takes place so long ago in history,” Schneeberg said.
According to Myszkowski, Les Misérables touches on themes and ideas that center around humanity and fixing the problems of the world. He said this show comes from old literature, but the themes continue to be relevant in today’s world.
“This show is based on very old literature, but many themes still apply today. It centers around ideas of things you wish humanity could have taken care of and fixed in the world, but they haven’t. There are themes about poverty, the plight of women and so many misunderstood topics that are still around to this day,” Myskowski said. “The audience will leave thinking about hope for these issues to be addressed, and the show was very depressing but shows an interesting perspective simultaneously.”
