POP ROCKS!

Burbank High School students put on a show that organizers liken to Hollywood.

By Zain Shauk- Burbank Leader
Published: May 26, 2009

BURBANK — Students sang and danced through a celebration of Burbank High School’s 40th anniversary pop show Sunday, performing on a jazzed-up stage that was worthy of Hollywood, organizers and students said.

Professional musicians and sound and lighting technicians, many of whom are former Burbank High students working in Hollywood, set the scene for the show, putting $2.5 million worth of equipment to work for the 176 performers, director Brett Carroll said. Carroll, who became the school’s choral director seven years ago, has elevated the program to national prominence, with several competitive teams dominating award ceremonies in recent years. That success has made the end-of-the-year pop shows increasingly important for students at the end of their high school performance careers, he said. It has also transformed the show into one loaded with technology and skill that is unheard of at most other Los Angeles-area high schools, regardless of their proximity to Hollywood, he said. “People don’t expect this kind of professionalism out of a high school production,” Carroll said. “We have as much lighting and more than some Broadway productions.

”The show featured five of the school’s choral groups performing their competitive routines, along with 13 acts from student groups with original music, said Terri Lapwing, co-president of the booster club for the school’s choral programs. More than 80 groups auditioned for the 13 slots in the show, which many students saw as a unique performance opportunity, Lapwing said. “It’s when all of our competitive choirs get to do it one more time for our city, and also our kids get to express themselves musically through individual acts,” she said.

Seniors Seychelle Gabriel and Matt Rosell relished the opportunity to belt out tunes on the Burbank High stage one final time. They both performed with school choirs and their own individual groups, as well as in the opening number, “We Built this City,” a Broadway-style act that incorporated every student performer, with some dancing and singing from the aisles in the audience and others taking on solos from a stage extension.

Performing in the show, particularly with independent student groups, was a special chance, the students said. “It’s our little time to shine,” Gabriel said. “Because it’s where we can try out our own individual acts and where we can show off our own individual talents. ”With the performance area washed in varying colors from an array of moving lights placed above, adjacent to and in front of the stage, students danced in shimmering dresses and matching outfits, sliding from side to side, swirling their arms and singing tunes, familiar and unfamiliar.

The atmosphere of the program was special and inspired former members of the show to come back, year after year, to help with the performance, said Harrison Lippman, a 2004 Burbank High graduate and a lighting designer for Production Resource Group, the world’s leading provider of lighting equipment. Lippman was operating a computerized lighting board identical to the ones used to run the Academy Awards and the Super Bowl, he said. It was donated for the show by his employer, along with the bulk of the stage equipment, he said.“This show is bigger than a lot of the television shows that I work on on a regular basis,” Lippman said of the equipment involved in running the show. That wasn’t always the case, Carroll said, but it made the show all the more special for students gracing the stage for the last time. “It wasn’t like this seven years ago,” he said.