Musical - The Sound of Music

Very excited that this year Leicester Curve's Christmas production was the Sound of Music.  What a great choice, especially after our summer holiday in Salzburg.  And just the week before we broke up, the Year 5's had performed it at our school so it was definitely fresh in our minds. 

I had been to see it on stage in London when I was at uni at the time that the BBC and Andrew Lloyd Weber had done their 'How do you solve a problem like maria?' programme and Connie Fisher had won and was performing.  Although she was off for 2 weeks when we went as she had strained her voice!  I remember feeling it wasn't as good as the film as it turned out it was more like the original stage show before the film.  The songs were in a different order and there were extra ones for the baroness and they didn't have the puppet show. 

So in many ways I preferred it this time as I was half expecting those changes and indeed it was very like I remembered in London.  I was particularly excited as it was at the Curve and I dashed to the toilet before it started that I passed some nuns from the cast going in the opposite direction towards the stage!  The children were very good and I was particularly impressed with Captain Von Trapp as he sounded just like Christopher Plummer.  And I was very excited to find out in the interval that he had played Nick Jordan in Holby City who I had really liked!!

There was a funny bit where Maria is surprised by I think Brighitta so she exclaims and her exclamation made me and many in the audience in jump!  It was nice being the audience for the festival at the end though we all agreed that they didn't build the tension that much with the nazis and in the convent.  There was an interestingly huge picture back drop for the convent which was quite startling. 

The songs are so good - what a lot of great ones.  It was after buying the soundtrack last time I saw it that Lonely Goatherd became my favourite and still is.  Although I especially love it with the marionettes in the film.

Thank you for such a great Christmas present!