PPERS SHOWSTOPPERS HISTORY by C. Robert Jones Jim Thomas, former chair of the Fine Arts Division at Mars Hill College, asked me to form a musical theatre ensemble and in the fall of 1986, I did. Dewitt Tipton was the first accompanist; Sara Stewart was the first costumiere; Julie Fortney was the musical advisor; and I built/arranged/wrote the material and directed the group for 10 seasons. There were different choreographers as I was able to find/ employ them. Auditions for the first group of Showstoppers were open to any student on campus, not just music and theatre students. In fact, one member of the original group was a business maior. Originally, Showstoppers was an extra-curricular ensemble, but it became too difficult to find common times for rehearsals. In the spring of 1987, it became an official course with one credit hour per semester. The group performed in churches, schools (all of the Buncombe County high schools in fairly short order), retirement centers, conference centers for all kinds of groups, and for conventions (like the Association of College Bookstores in Winston-Salem in the mid 1990s). Showstoppers performed only in the Carolinas during my 10 years as a director. The shows were built to accommodate 30-45 minute slots, particularly for school assemblies and organizational guest stints. By the 90s, the shows—performed mostly away from campus—were brought to Owen Theatre at the end of the spring term where they were given a major production type performance for the campus. These were full-length two-hour shows with lights and minimal sets (which we did not have for the road performances). The shows were built around the individual performers and covered every style and genre, including opera. I devised two segments which we always used and indeed were often Showstoppers. One of these was an arrangement of a group of songs called “Musical Links.” Each following song (at the beginning measure) used the same first word as the last word of the previous song. It was set up to look improvisational. The singer would point to an “unsuspecting” member of the group who would then think up a song which began with the last word of the song just song. It was great fun.
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Top Picture: SHOWSTOPPERS 1989 front: Lisa Atkinson; 2nd row: Erin Owen, Nancy McKinster; back Joel Rogers, Ken Gahagan , Michael Lester Middle Picture: SHOWSTOPPERS 1994: (l-r) Bethany Burgess-Smith, Jeffrey Whitt, Shani Nielsen, Keith Michel, Beth Thisse Bottom Picture: SHOWSTOPPERS 1995 (l-r): Kristofer Geddie, Beth Thisse, Eric Medford, Gina Handy Mars Hill, The Magazine - Spring 2012
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