Erinna’s Experience

Erinna is in her second year of Bsc Food Science and Nutrition at the University of Leeds

“I’ve made so many great friends through this society, and got to do a lot of things I never imagined myself doing.”

The past year with the LUU Backstage Society has been amazing and it definitely made up a huge part of my first year at Leeds Uni. I’ve made so many great friends through this society, and got to do a lot of things I never imagined myself doing. I worked on various events throughout the year with Backstage, such as musicals, dance shows and awards shows, doing everything from set building, front of house and stage crewing, to sound engineering and lighting designing. I was lighting designer for the Rileys 2016, and that was easily the highlight of my year. It was my first designer role and everyone on crew were very helpful and supportive. I got to play around with different lights and also a smoke machine, creating different lighting effects that suit each performance. We also won Best Performance Society!

“Seeing a show turn out to be successful makes all the hard work worth it and makes me feel proud that I was part of the team that made it happen.”

Backstage puts in a lot of work into ensuring that the shows we work on are phenomenal, and all the late nights we spend at the Union making sure everything is ready for these shows are a testament to that. Seeing a show turn out to be successful makes all the hard work worth it and makes me feel proud that I was part of the team that made it happen. It’s what makes me keep responding to the crew calls and coming back. The lovely people in the society are also very welcoming and are joys to be around, and our socials are always fun-filled. We really do work hard and play hard! I spent most of my time in first year with Backstage, and I hope to continue to do so until I graduate from Leeds.

By Erinna Salim

Posted on 8th October 2016