More photo's at Thomas Cole House

The cast and creators assemble on the porch of the Thomas Cole House.

Release of River of Dreams Cast Album

On September 13 in the town of Catskill at the famed Thomas Cole House the cast of River of Dreams performed selections from the show to celebrate the release of the original cast album.

It was a beautiful early fall day and from the steps of the Cole's original house songs from the show rang out not far from the banks of the Hudson River.

They were joined by Hudson Talbott who narrated between the songs to the delight of the audience.

If you are interested in purchasing a CD please write info@gafest.com

photo: Hudson Talbot and cast on the steps of The Thomas Cole House

More Hudson River Festival

With the mast of the Half Moon in the background.

Hudson River Festival

Some of the cast from River of Dreams performed selections from the show at the River Fest in Hudson, New York. It was thrilling to perform with the Half Moon as a backdrop right on the Hudson River. The cast recording was also offered for the first time. It has all of the songs from the show and if anyone would like to purchase the CD let us know at casey@gafest.com.

We will be performing again at the river festival in Coxsackie, NY on August 8 at 1 pm, and in Hunter, NY on August 29th at 4 pm.

Hudson River Festival

Some of the cast of River of Dreams performed selections from the show at the river festival at Hudson New York. It was thrilling to perform with the Half Moon as a backdrop right on the Hudson River. The Half Moon is an exact replica of Henry Hudson's ship. The cast recording was also offered for the first time!

If anyone want to purchase a CD of the cast recording email us at, casey@gafest.com.

We will next be performing at the River Festival in Coxsackie NY on August 8 and at the festival in Hunter on Hunter Mountain on August 29.

Tall Ships

It seems that River of Dreams continues on.

The cast performed four songs from the show at the Catskill Point when the the flotilla of ships came by on June 11th.

There were around 1000 people in attendance. The Catskill High band performed with nearly 100 instruments.

We have many more requests to do parts of the show this summer.

The next being on the waterfront in Hudson NY on July 26th.

The Banner

The banner that stretches across Main Street in Catskill advertising our show!

Cast Recording!

Yesterday we recorded the cast album for the show.
We all came together in the theater with Frank Cuthbert, the composer, and Bobby his engineer
to sing all of the songs in the show. It was exhausting but thrilling. We had to do each song at least two or three times and may have to go into the studio to do some touch ups.
The CD will be available soon and if anyone wants a copy get in touch with casey@gafest.com and he will see that you get a copy.
The last three shows this weekend!!

We've Opened!

The last week has been very hectic and filled with anticipation.

Getting all of the rest of the props and puppets and the costumes and lights has been very exciting and confusing as well.

But on opening night everything went so well ( except for a few technical glitches) we got a standing ovation and have continued to every show we have performed.

The audience seems to love the music.

Saturday nigh Tara Sullivan who is the head of the entire Quadricentennial for the whole state came to the show and presented us with the official flag and gave each cast member an official gold 400th pin.

Some people are coming back to see the show more than once.

We did a "talk back" after Sunday's show and the audience asked some great questions that we got to answer. Hudson and Frank and David joined us on stage to answer questions as well.

This week we are recording the cast album!

Rehearsal Day 13

We had our first rough"stumble through" today. It seems to be coming together and starting to look like a show! We are at the point that we can start to refine and work on the "acting" of the songs. We will start to add more of the production elements today.

Rehearsal Day 12

It's Getting Closer! We Have All of the songs staged except the last one. It's hard to remember the lyrics, the blocking, and to sing out all at the same time!
Less than two weeks till we open to an audience. Tomorrow we have the "load in". All of the lights and props and costume pieces are brought into the theater. We are looking forward to it.
We were filmed for a public service announcement today that should really help get the word out. We were visited by Catskill superintendant Dr. Kate Farrell and author Hudson Talbott who were filmed for the announcement as well.

rehearsal Day 8

We worked on the singing at the beginning of rehearsal and then Rita Carver brought some of our puppets to work with and showed us how to handle them. It was very exciting! The Eagle and the Osprey look great soaring through the theater.

We then ran the first four numbers of the show. We continue and the show goes on.

Photo- Some actors try out the new Eagle puppet.

Rehearsal Day 7

We are getting closer to getting all of the songs "on their feet".

We worked today on staging the opening of the show and then on the "Ice" number.

Everyone has so much to do and remember on top of singing loud and strong!

It gets tiring but all of the hard work will pay off.

                                      

Rehearsal Day 6

We had a great day working with Regina our choreographer today.

The end of our first week and we have a great start on five of the songs and some of the text.

By the end of next week we will have the whole show blocked!

Also today some of our actors went to Clermont to make an appearance with Hudson Talbott who was doing a book signing of his book River of Dreams. They sang some of the songs from the show in between selected readings by Hudson. It was great fun and a good commercial for our show!

Rehearsal Day 5

We continued to stage more of the songs today since we get to work on the set.

We worked on "Ellis Island Story" which is a beautiful song about the immigrants who came in through Ellis Island and their hopes and dreams.

                       Author Hudson Talbott visits rehearsal.

Rehearsal Day 3

We started to stage some of the songs today even though we didn't have the set yet.

We worked on "The Old Dutch Sloop" which is about the sailboats that went up and down the river and helped get from one side of the river to the other. The song is also about Robert Fulton's steamboat and how it changed the way the ships went up and 

down the river even faster and, as the song says' "The Dutch Sloop died".

Producer Casey Biggs conducting the singers

Director David Little staging "The Old Dutch Sloop"

Rehearsal Day 2

The second day of rehearsal found us reviewing the songs we've worked on and learning the remaining ones. There are 12 in all. It was exciting to start putting in the harmonies. We will continue this way for one more day and then we gat the set and will start blocking and staging the show.

FIRST REHEARSAL

We have begun the official rehearsal process!

We have moved into the large theater in Catskill High School. It is a 700 seat theater and we look forward to filling the seats.

We began the rehearsal by signing in and receiving the scripts and then a vocal warmup with David the director. We then reviewed the songs we learned in the workshops and moved on to some new ones. The set was explained to us and we did a few theater games that reminded us of what "upstage and downstage" is.

The rehearsals will be everyday but one day a week until we open the show on May 15th.

Director David Little working on a song 

with a new cast member from Catskill High.

The Reason

The Reason we do what we do.

The workshops

Working on being a "sick river".

Frank Cuthbert, our composer, playing the cast the songs he wrote for River of Dreams.