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 Founded in 1976 by Jeremy James Taylor, the
National Youth Music Theatre’s beginnings were at Belmont,
the Mill Hill Junior School. Here, under Jeremy’s direction
and inspired by Ben Jonson’s moving epitaph on an actor
who died very young, an 11-13 cast created and invented The
Ballad of Salomon Pavey. Following its school performance,
an adventurous and enlightened headmaster allowed his ambitious
director to take the whole thing to the Edinburgh Fringe
where it won fine reviews, excellent audiences, a Fringe
First Award and an invitation to bring it to London as part
of Her Majesty’s Silver Jubilee Celebrations. (The
visit by a school company also started the ‘trend’ for
schools and youth groups to take shows to the Edinburgh Fringe
- a development which has grown to mammoth proportions over
the years).
The company quickly became “The Children’s Music
Theatre”,,
using young performers auditioned and selected from schools
throughout the UK, creating a centre of excellence with many
new productions, rave reviews, awards and plaudits which
meant a high profile in the arts. With this profile, which
by now included invitations to perform at The National Theatre
and to create new music theatre works for the BBC and Granada
Television, came the opportunity to inspire and educate young
people through preparing for and presenting performance at
the highest level. The NYMT was, as always, rich in all but
funds and moved from strength to strength.
In 1985 there was
a change of name and, in the same year, the first residential
workshops took place, producing strong casts for summer productions.
In 1984 Frank Dunlop, the new Artistic Director of the Edinburgh
International Festival, invited the company to present an
opera on the Festival programme. Such was thew success of
this that in 1986, he presented two more NYMT productions
whichbraised the profile of the company to new heights. Then,
in 1987 Richard Stilgoe offered NYMT the opportunity to premier
his new musical, Bodywork and, as a result, Edinburgh 1987
was, in Jeremy’s words, “crazy, hilarious and fantastical”. Huge audiences and rave reviews were followed by a Royal Gala Performance with HRH The Prince Edward in the audience and, emboldened by prestigious new associations, Jeremy invited HRH to become President of NYMT. In the same year, 1988, NYMT found a new sponsor and moved to Sadlers Wells, providing an annual 3-week “season” and
an office with a telephone. Success indeed!
An excellent first
season at Sadlers Wells led to the BBC broadcast of The Ragged
Child the following Christmas, a host of productions across
the UK and others as far afield as Tokyo., Norway, Greece
and New York. During this time NYMT’s new President attended at least one performance of every single production; an astute, honest and perceptive critic, who contributed hugely to NYMT’s
development during these busy years.
In 1992 the company was
bursting out of Sadlers Wells and it moved its offices to
The Royal Opera House.The President informed the company
that Andrew Lloyd Webber would support NYMT, which move coincided
with invitations to New York, Hong Kong, Toronto and New
York’s Broadway!. , In 1996, NYMT was at last recognised
by the DfEE with a 3-year grant.
The following busy years
saw NYMT spread its workshops into Northern Ireland, the
North East and East Anglia and, during this time, Messrs
Goodall and Hart gave NYMT The Kissing Dance and followed
this with The Dreaming which enjoyed a Christmas season at
the Royal Opera House’s Linbury Studio Theatre.
Over
30 years NYMT has had a huge cast. It has also, as well as
staging some of the great classics of musical theatre, created
a considerable and important body of new music theatre works
for performance by young people. Some of the brilliant and
inspirational young performers have gone on to enrich the
professional stage whilst others have decided upon other
careers. All have taken with them exceptional skills, memories
and a drive to support education in the arts which bodes
well for our country’s development.
Long may this all
continue!! |
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The Children's Music Theatre Ltd. Trading as The National Youth Music Theatre.
Company Registration No: 150676. Registered Charity No: 281159. VAT No: 426 608254
Registered Office: 2-4 Great Eastern Street, London, EC2A 3NW
© National Youth Music Theatre 2005-2007. All Rights Reserved |
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