The National Student Drama Festival (NSDF) is held in Scarborough each year, students some of which have never touched anything technical in their lives, have the opportunity to attend seminars and training sessions, meet industry experts and showcase their often newly discovered talents.
Stage Electrics has been involved with the festival for the last seven years, supporting the NSDF since 1999. The company supplies the festival's technical requirements and helps to deliver the workshop programme.
Chris Patton from Stage Electrics explains, "We have run various courses from basic moving lights workshops to sound workshops. These facilitate the download of valuable information held by today's industry professionals to the industry people of tomorrow. It's not easy to seek career advice in any specialist industry. Being able to offer this is often all that's required to kick-start an enthusiastic techie's career. NSDF is not just about the festival, it is a massive training ground for the next generation of the entertainment industry."
Matt Chisholm won a pair of Sennheiser HD650 headphones for his hard work and enthusiasm at the festival this year. He is currently a third year student at LIPA (Liverpool Institute of Performing Arts) studying theatre and performance technology. "This was the greatest high of the festival for me. When my name was called out I was actually operating both sound and lighting for the ceremony," he says.
Chris Patton sums up, "NSDF really does work. There are people I speak to on a regular basis in the course of my daily working life that I met at NSDF six years ago. For me, this proves that it is always worthwhile to support this festival."
(Jim Evans)
