Upper School Performing Arts

Our theater productions are known for the superb quality of their acting, directing, and set design. Whether it is Shakespeare’s “Merchant of Venice”, or the little known musical “King of Hearts”, art and ideas are wedded as students engage with the very finest scripts. Over eighty students are involved in three faculty directed productions (two plays and a musical), and a senior-directed show. In addition our outstanding tech crew builds professional level sets and runs sophisticated lighting designs for each show.

In music four singing ensembles engage 65 or more students each year. The Chorale, with 52 male and female singers, the two smaller single-sex a cappella groups, and the ninth grade chorus, perform at assemblies and at two major concerts during the year. In addition, singers travel to regional chorale festivals, and out into the community to sing at senior citizen centers, hospitals and shelters.

Members of BB&N's Upper School Chorale toured Italy in June 2004. Students gave concerts at various churches, cathedrals, and schools throughout the country; they also performed informally in central squares and piazzas.

The Orchestra and Chamber Groups explore a varied repertoire, including in recent concerts Schubert, Bach, Beethoven, Bartok, and Copeland. Our Jazz ensembles perform not only at concerts throughout the year but at special school functions. Fully 25% of the student body is involved in some aspect of our music programs. From Mozart to Miles Davis, music plays into lots of the life at BB&N.

In Film and Video, where performing arts and visual arts meet, students can take either the introductory Filmmaking in ninth grade or the full year full credit course in grades 10-12. Dance is our newest program, offered to ninth graders as part of the ninth grade arts, and to 10th through 12th graders as an afternoon athletic elective. With an emphasis on Jazz, students engage in the rich history of twentieth century vernacular dance traditions.

Past theater productions include:

• Fiddler on the Roof - Winter 2006
• Metamorphoses - Fall 2005
• Anton in Show Business - Spring 2005
• Man of La Mancha - Winter 2005
• The Skin of Our Teeth - Fall 2004
• Boy Gets Girl - Spring 2004
• Shel's Shorts - Spring 2004
• Once Upon a Mattress - Winter 2004
• Iphigenia in Aulis - Fall 2003
• The Cripple of Inishmaan - Spring 2003
• King of Hearts - Winter 2003
• Merchant of Venice - Fall 2002
• The Little Prince - Spring 2002
• The Bald Soprano - Spring 2002
• Saturday Night - Winter 2002
• Caucasian Chalk Circle - Fall 2002
• The Pajama Game - Winter 2001