Pop Musical took place on Saturday the 20th of December, at the Musaeus College auditorium.

Presented by the students of The Ashanthi School of Music and featuring guest performances by Voiceprint, Umaria, Randhir, Bathiya & Santhosh and the ‘Queen of Hip-Hop’ herself, the show didn’t lack for entertainment.

The star performers were the students of the school themselves and the venue was packed with friends and family enthusiastically singing and clapping along to hits from popular Broadway musicals like Matilda, The Lion King and Grease.

Tots from the junior choir opened the show with an endearing performance of a compilation of nursery rhymes such as the ‘The Teddy Bears’ Picnic’, ‘Raindrops’ and ‘Five Little Monkeys.’

They were soon joined by the intermediate choir, belting out classic hits by The Beatles, Abba and Michael Jackson.
The songs were delivered with perfect pitch and resonance for performers so young, and their credibility as singers shone.

The choreography was not executed as well as we’d liked to have seen, but this could have been due to the short time period in which the show was organized. However the students sang and danced with passion and you could tell that they enjoyed themselves up on stage.

Students collaborated all night with the artists, beginning with a toe tapping performance of ‘Price Tag’ by Jesse J, sung by Seheli and Umaria. This was followed by a goose-bump inducing performance by Umaria singing ‘I will always love you’ which certainly blew the audience away.

Ashanthi took the stage along with her students singing her original song ‘A Walk in the Park’, followed by a powerful performance of ‘Girl on Fire’ by Alicia Keys.

Special note must be made of Julius and Deneli who stunned the crowd with an amazing beat boxing performance that left heads reeling.

The night also featured Randhir taking a step away from his rap roots with the ballad ‘If I Was Your Man’ by Bruno Mars.

The crowd went wild for Bathiya and Santhosh who took the stage with a string of recent hits but the limelight was never far from the students who backed them up. The show concluded with ‘White Christmas’ sung by the junior, intermediate and senior choirs.

All in all, for a production that was put together in under a month, Pop Musical delivered well in all aspects of the show. There were some technical glitches with the sound being a bit too low but this was promptly corrected by Ashanthi.

The lighting was spectacular but a little bit harsh for those seated at the front. The show was a bit too long for some with a duration of 3 and a half hours and people with young children started leaving before the finale.

But the students of the Ashanthi School of Music must be applauded for some powerful performances and impressive show of talent. The proceeds from the show were given in aid of charity to fund education for underprivileged youth in Sri Lanka together with the Gamini Dissanayake Institute of Technology & Vocational studies.

Comments from the audience:

Honourable Cabinet Minister of State Management Reforms,  Mr. Navin Dissanayake

“The show was very good. The amount of talent in Sri Lanka is incredible. There’s a lot of potential in these kids”

Michelle

“The show was very good. Ashanthi has done a great job. There were some fantastic performances”

 

Yusuf

“The hall was very nice. The performances were very good. Umaria has such a strong voice.”
 

Mrs. Wickramasignhe

“Really beautiful. Nice to see the kids performing so well.”

 

Himashi

“We first thought it was a BnS concert! But the kids were very good.”

By Ashanthi Navaratne
Pics by  Kushan Pathiraja