What's it All About?

Stars on the Rise is an "X-Factor" style talent competition held between six secondary schools in the Rossendale Valley. Each school holds its own auditions, open to all students, with a place in the school heat at stake. Around 10 acts from each school then battle it out in front of an enthusiastic crowd. The two highest placed acts, as voted by the audience and judges on the night of the heat, enter a grand final to compete against performers from the 5 other schools. One overall winner is chosen by the grand final judges.

When Did it All Start?

Stars on the Rise was originally held in Rossendale at All Saints' Catholic Language College in 2003.

The first inter-school competition was held in 2004. Five schools took part; Alder Grange, All Saints, BRGS, Haslingden High School and Whitworth. The event was so successful that the final was held at King George's Hall in Blackburn in front of around 1,200 people. 10 acts took part, with Tom Hyatt from BRGS emerging as the overall winner.

In 2006, Fearns also joined the competition, and so this year 12 acts will compete for the title at King George's Hall. It's promising to be bigger and better than ever before.

What Makes Stars on the Rise Special?

Alex lights the show

John provides the noise

We've all seen the school talent competitions that are held over a wet lunch-time. Stars is nothing at all like that! We use professional lighting and sound companies to create an amazing display of moving lights and colours accompanied by clean, crisp, loud sound.

Each of the acts goes through months of rehersal to create the best stage-show that they can. Some acts bring along a stage full of dancers to add extra visual impact.

This year Wigwam provide the noise! They're the company behind the sound to some of the biggest gigs going. You might have head them at a Westlife or Radiohead gig, or perhaps at the Queen's golden jubilee celebrations!

A company called Light-Alternative are used to create some of the breathtaking lighting displays that you might have seen at the heats. They might be seen at gigs by The White Stripes, Keane, James Blunt, Beastie Boys, Belle and Sebastian... etc etc

All Saints own media studies students provide the live video wall. There's nothing amateurish about this either, 4 professional-quality cameras are used to cover every angle. The show opens with an impressive video introduction, and each act has it's own brief video. There's also live recording and editing of the show so that an on-the-fly replay of the acts can be seen at the end of the show to help the audience decide who to vote for. All the shows are recorded to DVD for future enjoyment!

Watch this website over the next couple of weeks for some interviews with the technical people behind the show.