Saxony Lutheran to perform spring musical March 21, 22

Saxony Lutheran High School will present “Meet Me at St. Louis” at 7 p.m. Friday, March 21, and two shows beginning at 2 and 7 p.m. Saturday, March 22, at the Perry Park Center in Perryville.

Director Tammy Petzoldt announced the spring 2025 musical in December.

“We cast it before Christmas, and then we started rehearsing in January,” she said.

The stage version of this production has been done previously. The unique part about this year is a live orchestra providing accompaniment.

“One of the very first years we had Saxony drama, we did ‘Meet Me in St. Louis’, just the stage version, not the musical, so it’s kind of cool to all these years later to be doing the musical version of it because we can,” Petzoldt said. “We’re in Missouri so we should’ve been doing it before, but this year it finally fit the kids to do it. It’s exciting.”

About 30 students from Saxony will be a part of the show, which is double cast. In addition, a few alumni and children are included.

“This is the first year in a very long time we have double cast like that. We have a lot of girls, but we need more guys, (but) we have a lot of talented girls.”

A Sunday matinee has never been part of the Saxony musicals, though it was something Petzoldt directed years ago as part of a variety show at St. Vincent High School.

“Everybody was also so tired, and they had to go to school or work the next day; I think it’s just a tradition to do our marathon day. We do the 2 o’clock (show), then the 7 o’clock (show), then we take everything down, take it down to Saxony,” she said. “I think it’s better.”

The first musical production at Saxony Lutheran was in 2008. The only year they haven’t had one was in 2020.