I AM an avid fan of Les Miserables, having seen the West End production 15 times.

On Friday I went to Thomas Clarkson Community College’s production of Les Mis and to be honest I had low expectations. How wrong could I be?

I was totally astounded by the quality of singing, stage presence, sets, lighting and orchestra. In particular the vocals of Javert, Cosette (young and old) and Fantine equalled many a ‘professional’ singer I have heard.

Les Mis must be one of the hardest productions to stage, but they pulled this off and some. Never have I seen such quality on a school stage before and I will certainly be a regular visitor to any future productions they put on.

For a school which regularly appears in the press with negative criticism, they have shown themselves to be a ‘class’ apart!

DEBBIE CLARK

March

I WOULD like to say that I have never been so impressed with an amateur performance as when I went to see the Thomas Clarkson students in their production of Les Miserables. If you haven’t been to see it you have missed a fabulous show.

All the people who worked hard on the performance should be congratulated. It puts the bad press the school gets into perspective. Perhaps Ofsted should have come to see this, they might have had a surprise.

There are a lot of talented students at the school and I would not be surprised if we see some of them in the West End.

D KEELEY

Via e-mail