"Grease - The School Edition" by Long Eaton Operatic Society Youth Group.

Duchess Theatre, Long Eaton.

This is one of my all-time favourite musicals, just because of the amazing feel-good factor every song evokes. And I am sure that I don't need to tell you the story of Danny and Sandy either so we can just cut to the praise!

One question though that you may be asking yourself is the difference between the fully fledged musical and the School Edition? Well, let me tell you. There are several scenes that have been left out due to their "adult" content, and of course, you can't really stage a road race on the Turnpike, live on stage. Some of the soundtrack songs are also not included including my favourite from the whole musical "There Are Worse Things I Can Do". This is because Rizzo, who sings this song, has had most of her story cut, again due to her more adult storyline.

Some of the song's lyrics have also been changed to "clean up" the content. I'm sure that everyone knows the soundtrack anyway so will know which lyrics have been cleansed.

The soundtrack is one of the most beloved of the modern musical with songs like "Summer Nights", "You're The One That I Want", "Greased Lightning", "Sandy", "Hopelessly Devoted To You" and "We Go Together".

Can I just say that this group has one of the strongest male contingency in any drama group. Not only are the numbers of male actors high, but the quality of their performance, and it's rare that I can say that as it's normally the females who come up tops. For the record, the females are also pretty good as well!

Billy Sweet (Danny) and Chloe Brooks (Sandy) are well matched and their big solo numbers, "Sandy" and "Hopelessly Devoted To You", were delivered with feeling. I imagine that at their tender age it could be difficult to get emotionally involved with the song, but they both made me feel their character's pain, so their job was done. Away from their songs they both turned in really good performances.

Jude Yellop (Kenickie) and Grace Collishaw (Rizzo) are my favourite pairing in the musical because they have always seemed to be more "human" as characters than the two leads. I'm pleased that Kenickie got to sing "Greased Lightning", as in the original stage musical, and not as in the film where Danny Zuko gets to sing the lead. Jude pulled off the nonchalant Kenickie character perfectly. With Rizzo's character having a reduced role than that in the movie or the full stage version, there is slightly less to comment on, but the aloof Rizzo was brought to life wonderfully by Grace.

Matt McAuley (Doody) always turns in a solid performance and always looks completely at ease on stage. Personally, I felt that a couple of songs were maybe just a little high for his voice. I say this as I have heard Matt sing before in lead and support roles and his register sounds best at a lower level. That said, I always know that with Matt in the cast he creates a feeling of comfortableness with every role he takes on. there is no worries for me that he will not deliver.

Lilly Simons-Clark (Frenchy) plays another one of my favourite characters in the slightly ditsy, beauty school dropout, and I love the wig. Great fun to watch Lilly.

Abe Collishaw (Roger aka "Rump") also gets to play a lovely fun role as the "mooner" of the show, and became an audience favourite, and rightly so.

Holly Douglas (Jan), Phoebe Mellor (Marty) and Kate Whitaker (Patty) played the rest of The Pink Ladies.

Findlay Parker (Sonny) succeeded in delivering the cheeky T Bird to the stage, and I noticed that there is a real groover in Findlay in the choreographed numbers.

Harry Brookes-Ball (Eugene) is a star in the making. He is really comfortable on stage and can deliver comedy really well for such a young actor. Loved his facial expressions and his commitment to the character.

Someone else who really made me gravitate towards their performance was Jake Lightbrown as the rock n roll radio presenter Vince Fontaine. Vince has some tongue-twisting bits in the script, but this did not phase Jake one iota and brought out the slightly smarmy DJ persona with ease and excellence. Let's face it, I should know all about smarmy DJ persona!

Ben Goodlass (Johnny Casino) fitted the role to a T as the heart throb teen idol singer.

Max Fuller (Teen Angel) made his entrance bathed in spotlight as he entered via the central stairway in the auditorium. Singing "Beauty School Dropout" he showcased a really good, controlled voice, which pleasantly surprised me.

Lottie Ludlow (Cha Cha) only played a small part, but completely looked the part and another who also looked the part was Naomi Thomas (Miss Lynch), even though the role was a couple of decades older than Naomi herself. A pat on the back for hair (Carol McTernan) and make up making Naomi look older.

Loved the choreography for the four cheerleaders, played by Roisin Parker, Martha Bertram, Ella Charlesworth and Bella Syson.

The rest of the students were played by Grace Aguis, Niamh Lee, Holly Brooks, Nefeli Fryganioti, Jessica Peel, Lucy Coulson-Jones, Holly Chambers, Charlotte Case, Frazer Brown and Joe Stewart.

Directed and choreographed brilliantly by Siobhan Parker with Molly Parkinson also in the role of Choreographer and Claire Collyshaw as Assistant Director with two Musical Directors in Deborah Norman and Giles Pettit.

The set design (Roydon Charlesworth) was really well planned with a multi-level set allowing the cast to spread over the stage and be in full view.

Loved the costumes and the functional car design for "Greased Lightning".

The only thing for me that let the show down was on the technical side. Again mics sometimes were switched on late and we missed some of the spoken words and the lighting and spots were either slightly off target, either that or the cast were in the wrong place. There was a section after the first section of "Beauty School Dropout" where the next couple of lines of the song was delivered by Teen Angel in complete darkness.

As I said at the start though, this is one fun filled musical and with a cast who obviously loved performing this piece, they pumped plenty of energy into, not only the choreography, but the whole performance.

"Grease - The School Edition" by LEOS Youth Group is at The Duchess Theatre in Long Eaton until Saturday 19 February.