grease is the word

one of the fun parts of being a middle school pastor is watching students perform live at a school program. i try to go to these things each time i’m asked, which isn’t very often. middle school dance recitals or school plays are usually pretty choppy, but there is always one or two performances that are truly inspirational. there is a certain protocol to these things. you have to listen closely, because the mikes usually don’t work very well, you have to stay to the very end, so you can tell the student and their mom that they did a great job, you have to be ready to shmooze with parents and grandparents, and you have to bring cash for cookies at intermission.

tonight my friend bruce and i went to go see my 8th grade friend trevor play danny zuko in grease. yeah, the sound was bad, the mikes were picking up police radio, and and it was hard to hear, but it was grease- and i love grease. its got such great music. when i first saw grease on video, i thought that kids in high school broke out in song all the time. i was so disappointed to discover that this wasn’t true.

grease has some group-songs just can’t be messed up; and sadly, it has some individual songs that can be butchered. but hey, its middle schoolers- so you get over it. one little red haired girl nailed my favorite grease song, “those magic changes.” she could seriously have made american idol. here is sam harris singing it on broadway:



it’s a little awkward seeing middle schoolers perform grease. its pretty nasty. they cleaned up the lyrics, but the basic message remains: if you want to land a bad boy, you’ve got to become a bad-girl. and seeing a middle school girl dressed up like a “bad girl” is awkward to say the least.


all in all, it was a great night. i got to enjoy some ribs and some sports with bruce, i got to see some parents, and i got to support some students. there was another student from the ministry, tiffany, who played rizzo. she owned it. trevor did great too. AND as danny zuko, he got to kiss a girl (woo!)