If you're looking for a challenging but rewarding musical to do with your KS2 pupils, then this could be the one for you. My mixed-age, rural primary school performed Matilda last summer, with Years 5–6 pupils taking the lead roles and Years 3–4 pupils taking the part of the choir. We had around 70 pupils performing all together.
This production was a Broadway Junior show and came from Music Theatre International. There are many shows to choose from, but we decided to go for something familiar as our first one. The website is great and easy to navigate – you can click on a show and immediately see the cast size, number of lead roles and a synopsis, as well as being able to listen to snippets of all the songs. The audition samples were very helpful for the singing and acting auditions, and the choreography videos were also excellent and helped us with some of the movement on stage. There are many other extras such as a customisable poster, a logo pack and digital backdrops, but we didn't use any of these.
Matilda follows the very famous story that all the children will know, with the well-known songs and main characters, although some of the songs from the recent film were not in it, much to their initial disappointment. There is something for everyone, with enough main roles for our Year 6s as well as plenty of opportunities for children who wanted a smaller role.
The director's guide was very helpful, with lots of stage directions for those teachers with little experience of drama. The play didn't have an obvious interval, but we split it into two acts to give time to change Matildas (we had two pupils playing the role) and to make more of an event of the evening.
With regard to the music, the songs were all very familiar, so I didn't necessarily have to teach from scratch; however, there were a lot of harmonies which I chose to include, and a lot of two-part singing, or sections when the soloist and choir sang different parts (e.g. ‘The Hammer’ song). There were so many solo or small group parts that we spent a long time working out when the choir could take some of the lead singing parts, so that they felt included and important. Some of the songs were really complicated, but don't be put off! Be brave and have a go, you'll be surprised at what your children can do.
Some of the pitching is a bit too high for primary voices. I had to change this on a few of the solo parts, but the more practice we did, the more confident the children became, and the higher parts sounded great by the end. Songs such as ‘Miracle’ and ‘Bruce’ were challenging due to the melodies of the different parts being sung at the same time, so we had to work a lot on these.
The backing-tracks are of excellent quality, but the timing in some songs is tricky. You have to know the songs so well that you can predict when the music starts, especially in songs such as ‘Quiet’, ‘This Little Girl’ and the start of ‘Miracle’.
Alongside the tricky and challenging songs were many that provided joy, energy and excitement for the children, particularly ‘When I Grow Up’, ‘School Song’, ‘The Hammer’, ‘Chokey Chant’ and ‘Revolting Children’. All the songs were good, but these were firm favourites.
This is an excellent musical, with songs and characters that the children loved and knew well. You need a degree of confidence and musicality to use the backing-tracks and to teach some of the harder songs, but the children definitely rose to the challenge and really enjoyed the whole process. The end result was an exciting, high-quality musical, which the audience loved and the children felt they'd really worked for. We thought the quality of the whole package was so good that we're choosing another MTI show this year.
Matilda, JR
Roald Dahl; music and lyrics by Tim Minchin; book by Dennis Kelly
Music Theatre International Licence and ShowKit: £495
For further details, and to request a perusal score, visit tinyurl.com/4r9b4p3x
