TWELFTH NIGHT Features Rats & People Orchestra at Shakespeare Festival St. Louis, Now thru 6/16

In a first for Shakespeare Festival St. Louis, live music will be featured during the performances of "Twelfth Night," which is scheduled May 24 through June 16 in Shakespeare Glen, Forest Park. Preview performances are scheduled tonight, May 22-23.

The Rats & People Motion Picture Orchestra, a St. Louis group known for composing and recording soundtrack music for silent films, will be creating the music for the Festival. The group's first accompaniment to Buster Keaton's "Go West" (1925), debuted at the Webster Film Series in St. Louis in 2007.

"Music is such an integral part to the storytelling in 'Twelfth Night,'" said Rick Dildine, executive director of Shakespeare Festival St. Louis. "Rats & People have been using music to tell stories for quite some time. I was amazed at their inventiveness, quirkiness, and skills. They are the perfect group to help bring live music to Shakespeare Glen."

"Twelfth Night," considered one of the Shakespeare's most beloved comedies, honors the historical holiday tradition which closes out the Christmas season, in which servants and masters switched roles for one night of raucous fun. It's the only play of Shakespeare's that literally begins and ends with music. The first line of the play is "if music be the food of love, play on" and the final moment is the Fool's parting song. In between there are numerous songs, all of which will be played on instruments by the actors performing on stage, another first for the Festival. In the past, all music featured in the Festival productions has been pre-recorded.

"The audiences are in for an incredible treat this year with the music and set design," Dildine said. "We will be creating a party in the park by changing the dynamics of how the audience relates to the stage. This year the stage will come out and wrap around the front center picnic section creating our very own groundlings-style seating. This will bring the actors closer to the audience than ever before."

Hanging lanterns and other unique lighting techniques will be used to create a celebratory atmosphere throughout Shakespeare Glen. And, of course, live music played by the actors.

"For 'Twelfth Night' we're not just crafting tunes, but imagining an entire local music culture," said Brien Seyle, one of the composers of Rats & People. "Rick Dildine's Illyria is a place where people make their own music. It's thrilling to get to help create those people and their world. It's certainly a different sort of collaboration."

The group is made up of six musicians: Seyle, Matt Pace, Emma Tiemann, Heather Rice, Matt Frederick and percussionist Rob Laptad. Composers Pace and Seyle expect to create more than a dozen songs and tracks for the show.

In 2003, Rats & People started out as a rock band, releasing a full-length record, "The City of Passersby," in 2007. The same year, the group premiered its first silent film score, for Buster Keaton's "Go West," at the Webster Film Series. Commissions for scores began to arrive with such frequency that the group stopped playing as a rock band. They have written and performed scores for Murnau's "Nosferatu" for Vanderbilt University, Lubitsch's "The Wild Cat" for the St. Louis International Film Festival, and a series of films by Georges Melies for the Classic French Film Festival, and many more. A new score, for Eric Von Stroheim's "Greed," will debut with a free screening of the film in April at Webster University, as part of the St. Louis Humanities Festival.

In addition to Rats & People, Dildine will be joined by a creative team whose members are also St. Louis-based, and include Dottie Marshall Englis (Costumes), Scott Neale (Scenic Designer), John Wylie (Lighting Designer) and Rusty Wandall (Sound Designer).

Neale's set will include a 20-foot high moon that will illuminate the stage throughout the performance. The classical set will also feature a two-story Mediterranean seaside house. Neale was most recently nominated for a Kevin Kline Award for his 1950s-style set design for the Festival's 2011 production of "The Taming of the Shrew." Neale has designed for the Chicago Children's Choir, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, Off Broadway, the Galway Theatre Festival, Lookingglass Theatre Company, The Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, Upstream Theater, and various others.

Other set features will include a 16-foot-tall tree, intricate wrought iron work, and a nod to the horizon and the night sky. Set construction in the park will begin on Wednesday, May 8. The performers will have their first rehearsal on the full set on Wednesday, May 15.

Pre-performance backstage tours and 20-minute post-show talkbacks will continue this season. As in previous years, the pre-show Festival activities will include a nightly Green Show at 6:30 p.m. The pre-show will include a 20-minute adaptation of "Twelfth Night" which will introduce the characters and plot to children of all ages; musicians, dancers, singers, jugglers; and a craft table for kids.

In the past 12 years, the Shakespeare Festival has attracted more than 550,000 people to the performances in Forest Park. The organization has reached an additional 250,000 students through its educational touring productions, school programs, summer camps, and community partnerships. For more information, visit www.sfstl.com or call 314/531-9800.