Get ready to rock.
On March 13 at 6:45 p.m., Ecole Lacombe Upper Elementary School will host its annual Mock Rock lip-synching contest.
Eight years ago, teacher Derek Rankin came up with the idea for Mock Rock along with his Grade 6 class at ELUES. Rankin said the program began as a service learning project for the class.
“It was something we always did in my high school growing up,” said Rankin, adding such lip-sync contests were done at another school he taught previously. “I always found them fun for everyone., both the performers and the people in the audience.”
All of the Grade 6 classes at ELUES are invited to participate in Mock Rock.
However, only Rankin’s class organizes and sets up the event, which he said takes about six weeks to put together.
Rankin said that to start, the class puts a long list of jobs on the board and assigns each of the students in the class jobs to do for the organization of Mock Rock. Much of the organizational work for the show is done solely by the students and they even run the show on the night of the event as well.
Three of his students, Madison Johnson, Chase McCrea and Carmen Maris have been chosen to act as MCs for the event and have been involved in the set-up for it as well. Carmen said they have been hard at work creating props and direction, organizing judges and contacting sponsors for the event.
Mock Rock is something that the students enjoy and look forward to. Chase said that he was “Excited, yet nervous,” for the event. Madison said when she would watch the show in years previous, she would start to pick the songs and routines in her head that she would use when she got to participate in Mock Rock.
All three of the MCs said that the event promises to be a fun night.
This year, Rankin received submissions from 30 groups wanting to participate in Mock Rock. As there are not enough spots on the program for all those submissions, each Grade 6 student will choose the top one or two acts to go to Mock Rock as well as a few more to participate in another ‘Wild Card’ show where they will have another chance to compete for a few open spots at the Mock Rock concert.
Rankin said they try to narrow it down to the top 15 acts for Mock Rock. He added that, in his own class, the groups perform a small class concert to determine who goes to Mock Rock.
Rankin said Mock Rock has grown into quite a large community event. Not only does Mock Rock see 500 or so people pack into ELUES for the concert, but several community sponsors have gotten involved to provide prizes to the participants and items for the raffles and such that take place during the evening as well.
Mock Rock is a charity event as well as a social one. Rankin said instead of charging admission, students collect donations for the Lacombe Food Bank at the doors for the show.