As soon as the curtains opened for FHN’s spring musical, performed on April 4-6 and 12-13, one’s attention is instantly grabbed by the Addams Family standing in portrait centerstage, but as soon as “When You’re An Addams” begins playing, it takes only looking further back to see Choir Director Jennifer Crane, two pianists and Band Director Rob Stegeman with six students picked from his Jazz Band class playing their hearts out to put on the music for the show. With instruments ranging from bass to trombone to saxophone the band worked hard to learn what many described as a complex score.

“I really liked playing ‘One Normal Night,’” freshman CJ Montgomery said. “I really like the tune and how the soprano saxophone plays it.”

This show brought in the cooperation of all three extracurricular fine arts programs, with several members of choir making up the ensemble, drama bringing its talent to acting and technical design and band playing the music. The score was made up of 25 songs and had the band practice the week before the opening night until 6 p.m. after school as well as played for the tech and dress rehearsals till 8 p.m. to be prepared for it. With Montgomery on trombone, junior Grace Sickendick on bass, Alex Crane from FHC on flute and seniors Sam Weaver on clarinet and saxophone, Paige Prinster on trumpet and Cole Hayes on drum set.

“Some of my thoughts before practicing was that it was kind of overwhelming,” Hayes said. “There were 25 songs we had to go through, but we got it done and it sounded pretty good.”

The band had the opportunity to be part of the show by being placed in a platform above the set where they could see all the action. To be able to have the music in sync with the vocals of the cast, microphones had to be used which was overseen by junior Kyle Crow. It only took three days for the band to be able to coordinate their music with the vocals of the cast, thanks to the microphone assistance of Crow and the onstage conducting of Crane.

“One of the things I like the most was getting to hang out with choir and drama kids,” Hayes said “It was really fun and a very interesting experience that helped me grow as a drummer.”