Erik's Messiah in America (Millennial Choirs and Orchestras)

The Easter celebrations continue! Every Thursday evening, Erik would get off work a little early in order to drive 45 minutes to Mesa for his Millennial Choir practice. This year, they decided to do something different than their normal program. The MCO founders (Brett and Brandon Stewart) revamped their original composition of Messiah in America for a stage show, and they hired Gentri to sing the solos. As you can guess, the show is about Christ's visit to the Americas, and the choir was supposed to look like Native Americans from 2000 years ago. The first thing they encouraged the men to do was to stop shaving. Next, they gave everyone some basic fabric and tasked them with making their own costumes. The set was constructed and sent to each locale for each performance. Gentri also travelled to each venue as well as the other soloists. After over three months of rehearsing, it was time for the rest of us to see the show.

https://youtu.be/5GxE6F5q9CU?si=Jn4H3gJtEMx_egJq

This is the link to the YouTube ad for the show.

In the balcony for the dress rehearsal

Backstage for opening night

Erik and Dan outside the auditorium before the show. I think they look like two prisoners.

Grandpa drove us all down to Mesa April 19th to see Erik's Messiah in America show. I had made an attempt to listen to the soundtrack a few months back, but I didn't care too much for it. Erik said that they had changed a lot of the music for this performance to be more Broadway style than operatic. Plus, Gentri would be singing along, and there would be costumes, light effects, and, of course, Jesus. Not the real Jesus of course, but an actor. If I were a kid I might have thought he was real, haha since they really lit him up well. We sat really far away since there was a mix-up when Erik bought the tickets, but I brought the binoculars along, and using those, I could make out each individual face. There sure were a lot of people on stage! Especially kids. I don't think they needed that many kids. Anyway, I thought the show was fun, even if I wasn't too familiar with the music. Having Jesus all lit up was pretty cool too. Here are some pictures from the show. I don't know if we were "allowed" to take pictures or not, but not to worry I didn't take any videos!

Erik is in the rusty orange, top middle. This was as far as my phone camera would zoom in.

So many people on stage

The angel soloist. She was really good. Hilary is in the Arizona choir, but she traveled around the country with Gentri. Brett said that he composed the angel solos with Hilary's voice in mind.

Bradley, Monroe, Brad, and Casey were the other featured soloists.

In total, there were 8 performances and 3 dress rehearsals, and Erik performed in all of them! Unfortunately, he lost his voice after the fourth performance. He spent his days in a vow of silence and tried to sing as well as he could for the last 4 shows. Dan and Makayla gave him several home remedies, but his voice didn't come back completely for a couple weeks.

They handed out gummi bears during the breaks.

Erik stood next to his fellow bass and new friend Brian every rehearsal and performance. Unfortunately, this was Brian's last year with MCO. Fellow bass Brandon did a nice photo bomb.

Between performances on the last 2 nights, the guys from Gentri spoke to the choir and thanked them for the experience of singing together.

After the last performance, the actor who played Jesus hung out with the youth and allowed them to take selfies with him.

Here's a note from Erik: At the last performance, Jesus walked over to the men's section. He looked at me and said, "I'm coming up there." I didn't know what to do, but Jesus was walking right towards me. He had told us earlier to just do whatever we would do if we were meeting Jesus for real, but that didn't help me much. I didn't know if I should feel guilty, sad, or joyful. Some men had broken down in tears and gave Him a hug, and I wasn't sure if that would be me. I got down on my knees as Jesus came up to me. He showed me the wounds in his hands, so I stared at them for a while as if convincing myself that this was really Him. He knelt down in front of me, and I looked up into His face. He just smiled and put His other hand on my shoulder. Instead of feeling guilty or sad, I just felt joy. It felt good. I smiled at Him and put my hand on His shoulder. He said, "thank you for being ready." All I could bring myself to say was "thank you." We both stood up and he walked away. I watched him walk around the rest of the stage, but I knew that I had just experienced something that words can't describe. I know we were just acting, but the emotions I felt confirmed that this is similar to how it would feel to really be in His presence. Needless to say, this was one of those unforgettable moments in my life.