St. John the Baptist schools foster art in Draper

Intermountain Catholic

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Students from the St. John the Baptist Middle School Performing Arts Class stage a production of ?L'il Abner? for the students of St. John the Baptist Elementary School Jan. 18. Based on the world of the nineteenth century comic book character by the same name, the story takes place in the town of Dog Patch, U.S.A.IC photo by C. Gray

DRAPER — St. John the Baptist Catholic Elementary and Middle Schools offer a variety of arts programs. In the elementary school, all students take music, dance, and art as normal curriculum. In the middle school, students can choose from art, band, dance, and performing arts.

Middle School Art introduces basic concepts of drawing and illustration. Teacher Nedzad Pasalic instructs students in techniques using primary drawing media from pencils through pastels.

For students who want to learn how to play an instrument in a group setting, Middle School Band offers a great opportunity. The band performs many exciting pieces and styles of music including movie music and popular songs and performs at assemblies, concerts, parades, and holiday events. Students learn to produce a good tone, listen to each other, understand harmony and rhythm, and gain confidence while performing for others.

A specialty at St. John the Baptist Middle School is the Performing Arts Class, which combines drama and choir. The course emphasizes developing student communication skills through singing, improvisation, play building, dramatic forms, and scripts as texts for performance, as well as technical aspects of production, the experience of dramatic presentation, discussion, and reading and writing about choir, drama, and theater. The semester culminates with a theatrical performance that is open to the public. Because of its special commitments, students must be in good standing and recommended by a previous year teacher to partake in the course.

This semester’s Performing Arts Class presented the musical "Li’l Abner" Jan. 18 and 19 at the Skaggs Catholic Center auditorium. Past play performances included "Grease" and "Anything Goes." Lisa Dimond directs the plays and teaches the Performing Arts Class.

For performance dates and times, contact St. John the Baptist Middle School office at 984-7614.