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Food, song combine to make ‘feaste’ a hit

By Estuardo Garcia - | Dec 12, 2007

Estuardo Garcia

Queen Kayla Oelschlaeger leans over to talk to the feaste's king, Justin Moss, before the start of Friday night's Madrigal Feaste. Sitting at the main table reserved for the Royal Court were the two princesses (left) Katy Kolman and Lydia Thao, Drew Scates, the prince, and Christopher Jordan, the court jester. This was the first year that the event was held at the Tonganoxie Middle School.

Nothing really looked different Friday on the outside of Tonganoxie Middle School, but with the help of many volunteers, the school’s interior was transformed into a medieval court for this year’s Madrigal Feaste.

This was the sixth year the Tonganoxie High School vocal department put on the dinner show for guests.

“It was wonderful entertainment, and it made it even more special that our kids provided us with that nice quality of music,” said Cindy Korb, TMS fifth-grade teacher. Korb attended the feast for the first year with her husband, John, a TMS social studies teacher.

The wassail was flowing for both performances of the Madrigal Feaste on Friday and Saturday night. Despite losing their only rehearsal day on Thursday because of school cancellations, the cast felt pretty confident in Friday’s performance.

“We lost our practice because of the snow, but I think we did pretty good considering we didn’t know what we were doing,” said Alex White, THS junior and one of that night’s servers.

Justin Moss, senior, who played the King, agreed that the lack of rehearsal got the feast off to a rough start, but everything worked out in the end.

“We were kind of running crazy, but we pulled it all together somehow and it was really enjoyable,” he said. “This was a fun time.

Besides the wassail and songs from the Chieftain Singers, the TMS seventh- and eighth-grade choirs, and the high school’s concert choir, guests enjoyed a bountiful fare.

The menu included such medieval fare as rosta cured wilde boare (ham steak) and royal cherrye tarte (cherry tarts).

Tom Gifford, THS vocal instructor, praised the effort of volunteers in helping create the kingdom Friday afternoon.

“It was a huge effort coordinated by Mrs. (Carolyn) Day. They assembled the stage that we hadn’t even built – it was just a concept and they had that sucker up in about an hour and it was ready to go.”