The suspense came to an end last Friday.  Those lucky enough to break through the mass of musically inclined students that have been clogging the art hallway for the past week may have noticed an intimidating list of names that was posted outside of the Chorus Room on the morning of September 27th. The list held the names of the 72 students who earned a callback after the recent auditions for this year’s spring musical, Titanic.

“I was pretty well prepared, but I was surprised that I got two callbacks because I’ve never had a main role before,” senior Ben Chamis said.

The spring musical is the most avidly attended auditorium event of the year, with consistent sellout shows over the two-week run. It therefore comes as no surprise that students are eager to nab a coveted role in the show.

“It’s such a great experience,” said senior Maria Cima, who has been performing on the NASH stage since she was a freshman.  “You get to make great friends and be involved in an amazing production.”

As eager as the performers were to land a role, no one left the auditions feeling especially confident.

“The songs were definitely a lot harder, junior Rohan Puri said. “Mr. Schmiech picked more mature music.”

Schmiech, the NASH Choral Director, will oversee the show’s music alongside Mrs. Leckey and Mrs. Davis.  The show’s primary director is Mr. Tozier. 

Seasoned musical performer and NASH senior Zach Brennen had a good idea of what show was selected after the auditions.

“Yeah, we all guessed it was going to be Titanic,” Brennan said.   

It turns out, according to Cima, that Tozier had been giving the performers hints along the way.

“He told us that the second and fifth and/or sixth letter was ‘i’,” Cima said.

For Schmiech, who held the lead role in Les Miserables when he was a senior at NASH, Titanic is a new and exciting direction for the program. Unlike the popular movie, the musical version features multiple stories from passengers who boarded the ship.

“Because there are so many roles to cast, the auditions were very atypical as we were looking for different voice types as opposed to specific characters,” Schmiech said. 

For senior Vincent Raitt, last Friday will likely go down as one of the most memorable days in all of his days at NASH.

“I was thrilled to see my name on the list,” Raitt said, “especially because it was my first year auditioning for a spot.”