ANDREW Lloyd Webber’s hit West End musical show, Whistle Down The Wind, has now been made available for amateur groups.

The Bournemouth and Boscombe Light Opera Company are one of the first societies in the country to be given permission to stage the colourful show.

Based on the novel by Mary Hayley Bell and the subsequent 1961 film, produced by Richard Attenborough, Whistle Down The Wind follows a group of children, led by a 15-year-old girl named Swallow, who discover an escaped prisoner in a barn, whom they assume to be Jesus and vow to protect him from the outside world.

The subsequent disagreement between the children and the adults over the fate of the fugitive is a struggle between bigotry and innocence, which is updated from the original setting to Louisiana during the late 1950s.

Andrew Lloyd Webber’s emotive score combines hauntingly beautiful love songs, including No Matter What, which became an international hit for Boyzone, topping the charts for six weeks in the UK in 1998 and hitting the top spot in 18 countries, thus making it the most successful single ever produced from a hit musical show.

Whistle Down The Wind runs at the Regent in Christchurch from Tuesday to Saturday at 7.30pm, with a 2.30pm Matinee on Saturday.