Whether you went to the Aspen School District talent show to learn French, watch acrobatics, or hear Chris Ryerson talk about science, it was nothing short of entertaining. Everyone was there to perform and the competition was tough.

At 6:00pm on Tuesday, November 19, ASD held their first talent show. The show was put together by the Aspen High School theater teacher Logan Carter and was sponsored by CP Burger and Theater Aspen. There were seventeen acts in total; each act with student and factuality performers in fifth through twelfth grade, and the top three performances won a prize.

The starting performance was the band Alpha Centauri, with members senior Matthew Ferguson, senior Leliani Rosenthal, and senior Ben Belinski, who preformed an original song. Next followed six different duets or solos; the majority accompanied by guitar or piano played by the student. Senior Alison Woods and senior Joeli Villa Cedeño switched it up with a dance choreographed to a song from the movie, “Step Up”. Students ranging in age then continued to show their talent through singing. To end the show, sophomore Avery Royer preformed an aerial silks routine.

Carter, as well as many audience members, were stunned by the many talented students who attend the Aspen Middle and High School.

“Oh my gosh I was blown away. First of all, the talent in the school is unbelievable and stronger than most high schools,” Carter said.

Finding strong talent was one of the reasons that Carter decided to create a talent show in the first place.

“There are three reasons why I wanted to start a talent show. The first is to give the students an opportunity to show off their talent. Basically to give them another opportunity to give a performance, because they only have one time to show off their talent, and that is in the musical. Then the second reason was because this is my first year as a teacher here, and I wanted to know who was talented in this school before the musical and now that I know, I am kind of excited,” Carter said.  “The third reason is that we needed to do a fundraiser for the spring musical, which is Willy Wonka. The talent show kills three bird with one stone because we raised over $1,000 and the show is no cost to us.”

Without any technical difficulties or no-shows, the show went on with no problems and was very professional, though many of the people running the show were new and had little practice before hand.

“The show ran so smooth and polished. Between the one rehearsal and the show, we put together a great show. Jon Geller is the district theater manger and he is also new this year. All the tech crew was student volunteers. Between the talent and the technical elements, everything was all student run. The girl that did lights had never done lights before. She learned lights the night before,” Carter said.

Chris Ryerson, a senior at AHS, was the host for the talent show. Similar to the student run tech crew, Ryerson had little experience but did an exceptional job.

“He kept the show running and I didn’t give him a script. He put in comedy and all he had was the line up. I contacted him two nights before the show,” Carter said.

Though the show, cast, and crew pulled off a spectacular show, junior Michaela Perau, who sang in the talent show, felt as if she could have used more practice.

“I think the show went well, but it would have been nice to have had more rehearsals,” Perau said.

Modifications to the show will be made in upcoming years because Carter is planning on making the talent show an annual event. There has also been talk about changing the judging so there are different categories, and so that it isn’t as hard to pick the top acts. For this year, however, the show was successful and new talent was discovered all throughout the school district.

“I’m hoping that everyone that preformed will audition for the musical December 9^th and 10^th,” Carter said.