Holy Family School’s annual music program can be seen at 7 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 8,  at Barton Community College’s Fine Arts Auditorium. The program features songs from all classes, with the fifth and sixth graders presenting the musical, “Dr. Newheart’s Christmas Cure.”
“It’s time of Christmas, and the students are helping us get into the Christmas spirit,” Holy Family School Principal Karen Moeder said. “It’s so nice that Barton Community College lets us use this facility.”
The program is open to the public but with nearly 200 children in the school performing the auditorium is expected to fill quickly. The doors will open at 6 p.m.
Joann Suchy, the music instructor at Holy Family School, said the public is also invited to attend a run-through of the program, which will take place around 9:45 or 10 a.m. Thursday, after Mass.
This is the first time that the school has done this particular musical, which was released in 1991. Suchy, directing her third musical at Holy Family School, is familiar with the program.
“It was one that we performed when I was in grade school (at Central Kansas Christian Academy in Great Bend). It was one of my favorites,” she said.
“It’s lots of fun music,” Suchy continued. Like a Broadway show, it incorporates more than one style of music, including blues, Caribbean and rap. It is set in the present, with patients coming to Dr. Newheart to learn what they need to fill the Holy holes in their hearts that are causing the Christmas Day Dumps. (Spoiler alert: They need new hearts from Jesus.)
The musical ends with the traditional Nativity scene. Following school tradition, the evening concludes with the audience joining the children in singing “Silent Night.”
Before the musical, younger students from grades K-4 will take their turns on stage to perform holiday music.
The musical features the entire sixth grade class, with fifth graders joining in the chorus. Sixth graders and their roles are: Brecken Carroll as Mary; Noah Jerke as Joseph: and Colton Cross, Kyler Czarnek, Dylan Ferguson, Neal Keller and Bailey Reed is wise men and shepherds; Ellyson Somers as Dr. Newheart; Kaiden Esfeld, Mathew Moeder and Blake Suchy as “The Disorderlies”; Reagan Frandy, Brynn Miller and Sahara Rziha as The Pink Ladies; Reagan Huslig as the nurse; Ian Jennings as Dr. Fric and Maddix Pokorski as Dr. Frac; and Madelynn Gregg, Haley McCormick, Ashley Reddig and Brendyn Schroeder as the patients.