Junior Theater Festival

This year’s Junior Theater Festival was as exciting as we hoped it would be! Our group of 20 students showed up in Atlanta on Thursday night, January 16. Our Friday rehearsal was energizing and left us time to explore! Saturday morning started off early as we watched the Green Pod (our assigned group) perform Moana, Jr., Frozen, Jr., Seussical Kids, and The Little Mermaid, Jr. One of the most exciting times was when Louisvillian Darian Sanders (formerly Simba of the traveling Broadway company of The Lion King) walked in and sat down at our adjudicator table! Our students did a superb performance and our Student Choreographer, Emily Thomas received a “shout out” for her work with the group. Emily returned to our group as a senior at The Youth Performing Arts School. She had performed with our group when we were at Stopher Elementary. It was so exciting on Sunday, when our group received a trophy for “Excellence in Dance” to see Emily go across the stage with Lucas and Maddie! Olivia Thomas and Alton Niemeier were selected as Allstars from our group. 

JTF is not just about our performing, but also a chance to see Broadway stars, and those who have made significant contributions to the Broadway stage. One of the highlights was to see and hear from Alan Menken, composer of songs from The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Aladdin, just to name a few that we love! There were many other Broadway stars who performed and shared how they got their start–some who were JTF alums! The festival ended on Sunday night with a Disney Celebration of 20 years with Broadway Junior. There was a premier of a brand new musical that was done in high fashion and all the students in the audience were part of the finale! A BIG Thank You to all of our parents who made this possible and who are always there to cheer and support.

I’ve included some of our photos of this fantastic weekend. Start planning now–in July we will hold auditions for our Fall musical from which we will pull our 2026 JTF group! Maybe you will join us!