2019
2019 was an amazing year. As well as our daily work supporting communities and individuals, Enter completed 13 major projects from appearing before the BGT judges to working alongside Collator and from performing our own musical about local heroes to providing our music to Durham Cathedral and a 1200 strong children’s Commonwealth Choir.
The Gaiety Afternoons.
January, 2019:
These now well-established monthly afternoon events are a boon to the elderly community and all its participants have gained confidence, discovered new friends and have a new outlook on life. We were regularly oversubscribed, but we made sure everyone got the best experience possible.
Collabro Performance.
March, 2019:
Enter CIC beat thousands of groups and choirs across the country to win a place singing with Collabro, the Britain’s Got Talent winners 2014, at Middlesbrough Town Hall.
Summer School – Legally Blonde.
August, 2019:
Our annual summer schools are almost an institution in the community and we had a blast as Elle Woods proves that she has brains as well as stunning taste in clothes.
Project Without Equal Award.
September, 2019:
We were awarded the Durham County Council’s Project Without Equal award for our project The Gaiety Afternoons, which supports the elderly in isolated communities.
In the course of our award-winning project, we had worked with over a thousand elderly people living in isolation in our communities. We had given paid work to hundreds of local and regional artists.
Shutdown.
October, 2019:
A Social Media Wellbeing project. Working with local children as well as our own students, we created an original performance using young person-led research and improvisation. It brought together a performance which they performed to their parents and carers, showing how much they understood about the impact of social media on young people’s (and families’) well-being.
Lumiere Sponsors’ Dinner Performance
November, 2019:
Enter CIC was specially invited to perform at the sponsors’ dinner in the incredible setting of Ushaw Historic House. Supported by The Gillian Dickinson Trust, we delivered an evening of song, poems and scenes made this an unforgettable event and a great launch event for the Lumiere 2019 Festival of light.
Commonwealth Day Performance – Durham Cathedral.
March, 2019
As well as taking our original composition, Forever Song, written by us to commemorate the visit of King Letsie III to Durham, we gave the song to 12,000 children in 54 schools and each school worked to sing the song at Durham Cathedral. It was a packed event with up to 1500 children and teachers and performers all taking part.
Over 1500 children representing all the countries in the commonwealth sang the song we had written to a live orchestra. 12,000 County Durham children rehearsed the song to commemorate the commonwealth in their schools.
MTI: Xanadu.
June, 2019
We were one of only three groups internationally that were asked to create a special performance for the event, held at the ICC in Birmingham. We performed two musical pieces from the new musical of Xanadu. We also won the National Winners award for The Achievement in Dance Award.
Britain’s Got Talent Auditions.
September, 2019
Enter students decided they wanted to audition for Britain’s Got Talent. They attended the local auditions in Durham and got through to the next round in Manchester. After the Manchester auditions they got through to the London auditions, but Covid put a stop to things going to the next stage.
Settle North.
October, 2019
A major Heritage project looking at the impact the Spennymoor Settlement and its warden, Bill Farrell had on the fortunes, not only of the characters who attended (Norman Cornish and Sid Chaplin), but of the community at large.
Shotton Hall Remembrance.
November, 2019
Shotton Hall performance for Remembrance, which was performed by a large cast. A poignant and moving experience for all who attended.
Santa’s Magical Experience.
December, 2019
The sensational seventh instalment of our annual Santa’s Magical Experience. Children come with families to experience a performance, and an interactive tour of Santa’s Workshop and see Santa. We performed multiple immersive, interactive shows in community venues in West Durham. Each child got a present that fitted their needs and Santa even speaks to them personally.
Charity Shoe Box Appeal Support.
December, 2019:
The excellent eighth of a host of regular, annual support events for the community. A local church, which runs a shoe box appeal all year, invites us to help them back the hundreds of boxes needed to be sent to children across the world who won’t, otherwise, get a Christmas present.
Hundreds of boxes are created every year for children living in poverty. Our staff, students and volunteers support the cause by loading all the boxes into the transport, ready for the long haul to where they are needed most.
Like what we did during 2019?
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For more information about how you could get involved directly, or support our valuable work with disadvantaged groups and individuals.
