On Friday 29th November, students, staff and parents of St Gregory’s Bath came together to celebrate the school’s 40th anniversary with a gala evening of musical entertainment and fundraising.
St Gregory’s sixth form students performing at the fundraising evening | Photo © Patrick Holland
The event raised over £6,000 for the school’s performing arts provision and PTFA.
The school has a long-held ambition to build a community theatre at St Gregory’s and the money raised will be used to support a range of projects across the school as well as supporting the cost of a feasibility study and architectural planning needed to bring this dream to fruition.
The event was supported by students past and present as they wowed the audience with musical performances from across the four decades, 1979-2019.
The school orchestra led the musical ensemble with vocal and dance performances from shows including Fame, The Greatest Showman, Mamma Mia, 42nd Street, Mary Poppins, Miss Saigon and Les Misérables.
Students were also joined on stage by students of the school’s resident theatre company, Curtain Up Theatre School.
The school were generously supported by a huge number of local businesses who supported the event through donations to the Silent Auction and Raffle and also sponsored the beautiful fare of food and wine on offer.
St. James’s Place Wealth Management, through their Charitable Foundation, have also kindly donated £300 as part of their Local Community Grant programme.
Head of Performing Arts, Andrew Psirides, was overwhelmed by the amount of money raised and the generosity of the local community.
He said: “We owe a huge debt of thanks to our sponsors, Bath Building Society, Hobbs House Bakery, Bath Crockhire and Hookways who went above and beyond to help us get this show up and running.
“Their generosity and support meant that we could raise even more money for performing arts at Saint Gregory’s, more than we ever dreamed of being possible.
“The whole event was a real team effort with everyone coming together and working their socks off to put on a show like no other.
“The evening was a great success and to raise over £6,000 in one night is quite staggering, testimony to the dedication and perseverance of everyone involved.”
Performing Arts is a well-established specialism at Saint Gregory’s and the Performing Arts faculty is well-regarded for the high quality of its school productions such as the Les Misérables, The Sound of Music, High School Musical, Miss Saigon and Beauty and The Beast.
Students are already well into rehearsals for next year’s production of Into the Woods, on stage from Wednesday 29th – Friday 31st January 2020.
Headmistress, Ann Cusack, was pleased the success and thrilled to be moving the project forward. She said: “The talent of our students and staff to put on a show like this is quite incredible.
“I was moved by the brilliance of our students and the outpouring of support and enthusiasm shown by everyone.
“The whole school community were behind this event, definitely making it one for the history books and a fantastic celebration of 40 years.”
“We welcomed back alumni who started their performing arts journey at Saint Gregory’s many years ago and who have now gone onto great individual success in their own professional careers.
“Each and every one saw the value in giving up their time and talents to support the event, sharing our long-held dream for a professional theatre for our students to perform in.
“The standard of performances on the night proves unreservedly that our students deserve to have high-quality facilities in which to showcase their talents and I will be doing everything I can to make this happen.”
