Magical performance set

FORT RECOVERY - The Fort Recovery Friends of the Arts aim to elicit a little supercalifragilisticexpialidocious Sunday afternoon with The Magic of Disney, the opening show of their 24th annual Summer Concert Series.

Fearing the lineup might have become too predictable, concert organizers moved to liven the series up with a homegrown production of song and dance, co-president Karen Meiring told the newspaper.

"Somebody said, 'We need to do something that the kids would enjoy.' And I said, 'Well, why don't we just do something that kids can participate in, not just go watch it,' " Meiring said. "And we did a survey last year and a lot of people wanted to see singing and dancing."

Meiring, a retired Fort Recovery Local Schools music teacher, said she dusted herself off and decided to put together a show.

"It just kind of started small and got bigger and bigger. I'm ready for it to be presented," she said.

Nearly 50 students from throughout Mercer County will dance and sing their way into the crowds' hearts, to the beloved songs from Disney's cannon of animated classics, including "Beauty and the Beast," "Aladdin," and "The Little Mermaid," - "when the music started to become almost as important as the movie," Meiring said.

Meiring oversaw every aspect of the show - production, costumes, sets, choreography, etc.

"It's really neat the way it's kind of panned out though because there's a lot of little snippet solos here and there. And some of these kids are going to be costumed," she pointed out. "We have some beautiful sets, too. We have four different images from different Disney movies that I have some girls working on."

During a recent rehearsal, the show was coming together well, Meiring said, noting the kids were disciplined, paying attention and making an effort to get excited.

"And it's not just standing and moving your arms," she said. "They go to different formations. They get in a wedge, kind of like a Disney-style show that you would see on stage, only probably multiply it by three times the people."

The show will feature two groups, a troupe of about 33 kids, mostly from Fort Recovery, and a team of 14 mostly teenagers, many Meiring's own students. The students began rehearsing in March.

"Some of the kids, there's overlap. Some of the kids are so excited and dedicated that they wanted to be in both (groups)," she said.

That meant double dose of rehearsals - a total of three hours once a week at the Fort Recovery Elementary/Middle School.

"It's so neat because these kids have become friends and we don't get a chance to do that very often," she said.

Meiring made her demands of excellence known upfront.

"For everybody that was invited I told them it's going to be a high level of discipline. Your child is going to be pushed," she said, adding that the students were told others couldn't be in the production because they were hand-picked.

Meiring has been amazed at the sound they've been able to produce as a collective, she said, pointing out much time was spent on singing techniques, a craft that, as far as she is concerned, can only be learned by practicing with others, not from a book.

"I'm super proud of them," she said.

Due to the size of the show and the possibility of rain, the event has been moved from the Hein Amphitheatre in Van Trees Park to the Fort Recovery Middle/Elementary School. The show starts at 4 p.m. but Meiring encourages people to come to the free show at 3 p.m. for face-painting, meet-and-greet and to have pictures taken with Disney movie characters.