Gratitude

It's been a little over a month since our last blog post, but that's because we've been so BUSY with our fall events! Here at Rising Stars, we have a lot to be thankful for this year. On the eve of Thanksgiving, we'd like to take some time to reflect on what we're gratfeul for.

First and most importantly, we're thankful for YOU, our Rising Stars! We've come a long way from just seven middle school girls singing, acting, and dancing their hearts out at our very first camp in the summer of 2012, to almost 20 students at a time participating in our programs. We are so gratfeul for the joy, enthusiasm, talent, and creative energy that all our Rising Stars bring and share with us!

Camp 2012

Camp 2013

Camp 2014

Camp 2015

The formation of Rising Stars Productions was inspired by the amazing experiences I had as a kid participating in shows with a youth theater company called Break-A-Leg Productions. Break-A-Leg helped me not onlt to grow as a performer, but also to grow in confidence in all aspects of my life, and to make new friends. With Rising Stars, we hoped to take things a step further and truly highlight the educational aspects of the performing arts. Starting in the spring of 2015, we were thrilled to be able start offering classes and workshops in addition to our summer camp. We held our first Audition Boot Camp, which was a fabulous success!

We also launched our intial Improv Workshop, which we were able to expand into an Improv Series this fall! This workshop is such a fun, positive, and creative experience for our Rising Stars, that we plan to repeat it in the spring of 2016, as well as (hopefully!) expand it to include an advanced improv workshop for upper high school students, as well as...wait for it....OUR VERY FIRST OFFERING FOR ADULTS! When we founded Rising Stars, it was our dream to eventually provide performance education opportunities for students of all ages, and we are so excited that we are one step closer towards that goal!

Emotional Orchestra

Scenes from a Hat: The Scene: A Sleepover. The Problem: One of the guests is a boy.

Gibberish Fairy Tale

In 2015, we also branched out with a new summer camp collaborative with Grotonwood Camp and Conference Center. Bringing Rising Stars to a SLEEP AWAY CAMP was something we had never even imagined, and we were so gratfeul for the opportunity to expand our skills as teachers!

Finally, and this may seem silly...but this year we are gratfeul for NEW SWAG! Thanks to the Hornet Holiday Marketplace, we were prompted to finally get our butts in gear and create some promorional flyers and a banner! They look pretty snazzy, if I do say so myself.

So, it's been quite the year. New workshops, new ventures, new swag, and new talent and creativity from new students. We are so pumped to see what else will come in 2016. So for now, Happy Thanksgiving! We are gratfeul for you and all you do to keep the performing arts alive and well in our community! See you at the next workshop in 2016.