Reverie: An Original Musical & How It All Began 🦋
So many times, we are told stories that conclude with a traditional fairytale ending where good triumphs over evil, and we all live happily ever after. The thing is, life isn’t like that. Life doesn’t follow set patterns. What if the magic of life is woven into the story and is not the final destination? What if we tell a new story- one where good things happen, and bad things happen, but in the end, our life is not judged by how it turned out but rather by how we lived? A true story about life: this is the tale of Reverie.
I discovered my great-grandmother, Lorene Grant Piper, in the dusty pages of her diaries. I had always been fascinated by this woman I had never met and for whom I was given my middle name. The recollections my grandmother would tell about her mother, who could listen to a song and immediately play it on the piano, had perfect pitch, and told stories about fairies in magical realms drew me in. My grandmother, Elaine Reussner, has saved Lorene’s abundant stacks of diaries, letters, and scrapbooks in her basement. These prolific documents range from 1917 to 1979 and include daily accounts of her life, personal correspondence, fiction novels in her own handwriting, and even some original music. My grandmother always thought someone should do something with this treasured trove of documents- maybe write a book. I was pondering this idea over when it occurred to me, Lorene was a musician, so her story should be told as a musical! And that is how Reverie began.
In 2019, I began researching Lorene Grant Piper to discover who this fascinating woman really was. When the pandemic hit, I was deep into my archaeological dig, sifting through letters and diaries and spending hours interviewing my grandmother and hearing first hand accounts of the family members who came before me. Through this research, Lorene emerged as a real person with not only aspirations and dreams but also physical and emotional wounds. I began to feel very close to this woman whose life was tragic and magical all at the same time. So often, woman’s voices from this time period haven’t been heard, and their stories not told. I became passionate about bringing her life to the stage with all of its color, glory, emotion, and of course, music! To have more time to devote to this project, I applied to be in an independent study course for the 2021-2022 school year. Fourth hour became a glorious time of day when I sat secluded in the small practice room off the choir room with just a piano and my imagination. I knew that I wanted to contrast the struggles Lorene had in reality with fairy world she created through storytelling. The music came to me first, which seemed fitting as music was Lorene’s primary obsession. The script came together organically and naturally as I tried to remain true to the people I met in the diaries and letters. I created vision boards for the characters, costumes and sets. In a presentation this spring, I revealed my project, which has become the musical, Reverie. Reverie is still in progress and evolving, and I am excited to be bringing it’s first incarnation to the Shawnee Mission East stage in the spring of 2023! To read the synopsis, details about the characters, see the visions boards, and hear sneak peeks of some of the music, click on the Reverie tab on this website. You can also follow along on the journey of Reverie on Instagram @reverie_musical. In Reverie, Lorene escaped into the world of her daydreams. In the musical, Reverie, my daydreams manifest on the stage!
