It Takes Two: Week beginning: Monday 21st April 2014

Week beginning: Monday 21st April 2014

Unfortunately due to the Easter Break, Perry and I had missed a fair few rehearsals slots so this week we knew we had to nail down on ensuring that we were comfortable with the song and start working on our interpretation and staging of our duet.

We decided to use various week days, this week to ensure that we had learnt the song accurately and in detail. Perry and I felt it was appropriate to ask one of our friends and someone who has already done this project from last year, James D. Fawcett, to sit in and give us some feedback so we know what to develop and improve for the assessment.

I felt that asking James was a useful tool to improve and to gain someone else's opinion, I was also comfortable with James giving feedback which was useful and thoughtful. 

When we performed the song I felt that I was far more confident and was able to remember the words, now that I didn't have to rely on the lyric sheet I could focus more on my singing rather than what word came next. Whilst performing I felt that Perry was also far more confident and this allowed the song to sound far more stronger than it has done before. 

There were various parts of the song that Perry and I would need to work on to ensure it was up to a performance standard, but, overall, I felt that we had performed a good job and we had accomplished the best we could for the rehearsals we've had.

James suggested that we added harmonies to our song to get a more textured feel. He also wanted us to perform it with the full characterisation but unfortunately, Perry and I hadn't gone through the staging of the song just yet.

Perry and I weren't initially sure on what harmonies to add so we asked a fellow classmate to assist us.

Susie offered to add a harmony in the part: 

"Round and around and around and around we go

Oh now, tell me now, tell me now, tell me now you know."

And: 

"the reason I hold on...

...'cause I need this hole gone"

In these parts, I would sing an octave higher to Perry, it was extremely hard for me to get the tune right but once I had accomplished this the song was much more textured and added a nice effect to the song. 

So that I could practise the harmony, I recorded it on my phone so that in the next few weeks I can familiarise myself with it as much as possible.

I felt that the Easter holidays has meant that we started off struggling to get back into the flow of the song but once we had it was much easier to perform. Having James help us was great because it gave us an idea of what to develop in the song. 

James did want to see us perform it using the characteristics but unfortunately we haven't got that far yet, I feel like now we are confident with the song it's time to finalise the characteristic and blocking of the song so we have an overall rounded performance. 

This week there wasn't much emotion added to the song but I feel this will occur when we're adding the staging and characteristics to the song. So far I've really enjoyed working with Perry as we're both artistically and creatively in-sync and share the same passion for producing an interesting performance.

We asked for the opinion of someone else to gain a wider knowledge of how we could develop on the song and made progress.

Characterisation and staging needs to be completed so the performance is at the standard we want it to be. 

Focus on the overall performance of the piece and polish it for the assessment. 

It Takes Two: Week beginning: Monday 31st March 2014

Week beginning: Monday 31st March 2014 

Again, Perry and I felt it was important to work through the vocal performance of the song rather than the blocking. Through this rehearsal we decided to keep going through the song and noting any areas for improvement we have to work on to create a strong vocal performance.

During the rehearsals of the song we applied the feedback we received from each other and any aims or targets we had set ourselves. I often found pitching the first part of the song more difficult but as I begin the song I was determined to make sure my pitch was correct and in tune. As I practised the song more and corrected myself as we went through I began to pick it up.

I tried to add a softer tone to the start of the song I was singing because my characteristics of defeated and weak could be easily shown by the way I sung the song, my singing voice tends to be loud and obnoxious so portraying softness in my voice was far more difficult than I originally thought.

I was really uncomfortable when singing the "Ooooh"'s as I felt I was out of pitch and was embarrassed about sounding bad in front of Perry. I feel like I would need to practise this outside of our rehearsal sessions to gain confidence with that part of the song. 

Whilst we were going through the song I had realised I was far more familiar with the song from listening to it and learning the words to the best of my ability and as fast as I could. I felt this was needed for our rehearsals to be productive and to not let Perry down as he's my partner and both our work efforts should be the same. 

Although we've started applying emotion to the way we're singing the song I feel like we need to develop this more to truly show our interpretation of the song to the best of our abilities. 

I am really enjoying working with Perry and I feel the progress of the song we're making so far is really promising and I am looking forward to performing it when it's polished! 

We have both been working independently to work on learning the lines and the parts we find more difficult. 

Add more emotion to the way we're singing the song so that our interpretation and characterisation is strong. 

Starts blocking the song and singing it the way we need to stage it in the assessment. 

It Takes Two: Week beginning: Monday 17th March 2014

Week beginning: Monday 17th March 2014

Last week we explored and interpreted the song we would be performing for this duet project, this week we decided to start practising and rehearsing the song with a run-through of it and then deciding on what we needed to work on.

We performed the song the whole way through to discover what areas would need work on and where we could enhance the performance with harmonies, etc.

When going through the song both Perry and I gave each other some notes on each other's performances and what to look out for as it's important to be detailed and accurate in the performance from the start and avoid any routines/habits.

I realised that I was singing slightly too loud at parts and over taking Perry's voice by being too loud. Therefore, I will make sure to use an appropriate volume. I also realised that Perry had already learnt most of the song, where as, I hadn't so I felt that for our rehearsals to develop and for productivity to be strong I needed to learn the song as well too. I felt if I didn't I would be letting my partner down from all the hard work he had put into the song.

From the last project, I learnt that familiarising yourself with the song provides greater help during the rehearsal process and makes you feel far more confident. As this is a duet piece I rely on Perry and he relies on me so for that mutual respect it's important for me to have self-discipline.

In conclusion, I feel that this week was quite productive and we're quite relaxed with our performance at the moment, I do feel that we need to increase our productivity soon so that we're at a comfortable position and the performance isn't affected by us being stressed or frustrated with each other. 

Perry has managed to learn his parts of the song so I feel that I am obligated to learn my parts as soon as possible, I did make it an aim for last week to learn my lines so to stop this affecting our rehearsal process I need to take responsibility in learning my lyrics. 

I think the song we have chosen is a good choice for both our voices and is a reachable challenge for us. Some parts of the song are higher than others and I am quite a low singer so I feel that when it comes to the "Oooohs"I need to make sure I'm comfortable and confident in performing them by continuously practising them. 

After discussing other people's duet ideas, I feel that Perry and I have taken a unique turn to the project and worked together well so far. This gives me confidence in the project and I am taking full advantage with working with someone who I feel happy and comfortable when discussing ideas with. 

I think the more we increase the dynamics of the tones we used the far more impacting the performance will be and vocally challenging for us. The vocal quality we perform could really benefit our performance and help our interpretation of the song. 

I imagine that overall it will benefit us most to continue working on the vocal sides of the song before exploring the blocking in detail. 

I feel like we're utilising our rehearsal time efficiently and are working together well. 

I need to learn my lines to the song so that I feel more comfortable when performing the song. 

Continue with the vocal aspects of the performance and using more emotion in the way the song is sung. 

It Takes Two: Week beginning: Monday 10th March 2014

Week beginning: Monday 10th March 2014

This was our first session for our last project in this unit. For this project we need to get into pairs to perform the unit.

Perry and I decided to partner up as we feel comfortable working with each other and share a great chemistry from working together outside of this unit. We also had similar abilities so we felt we would be perfect to work with each other.

We discussed various songs we could chose and had equal parts for both of us and decided on the song "Stay" sung by Rihanna and Mikky Ekko. We felt we could interpret this song to explore two characters relationship and to develop characteristics of the song which isn't set in stone as much as a musical theatre number would be.

Here are the lyrics to the song "Stay" By Rihanna and Mikky Ekko: 

Red - Me
Black - Perry 
Orange - Both  

"All along it was a fever

A cold sweat hot-headed believer

I threw my hands in the air, said, "Show me something,"

He said, "If you dare, come a little closer."

Round and around and around and around we go

Oh now, tell me now, tell me now, tell me now you know.

Not really sure how to feel about it.

Something in the way you move

Makes me feel like I can't live without you.

It takes me all the way.

I want you to stay

It's not much of a life you're living

It's not just something you take–it's given

Round and around and around and around we go

Oh now, tell me now, tell me now, tell me now you know.

Not really sure how to feel about it.

Something in the way you move

Makes me feel like I can't live without you.

It takes me all the way.

I want you to stay.

Ooh, ooh, ooh, the reason I hold on

Ooh, ooh, ooh, 'cause I need this hole gone

Funny you're the broken one but I'm the only one who needed saving

'Cause when you never see the light it's hard to know which one of us is caving.

Funny you're the broken one but I'm the only one who needed saving

'Cause when you never see the light it's hard to know which one of us is caving.

Not really sure how to feel about it.

Something in the way you move

Makes me feel like I can't live without you.

It takes me all the way.

I want you to stay, stay.

I want you to stay, oh."

We had quite a long discussion on how we could split up the lines to the song to get a sense of conversation between two characters and decided that the most effective way would be what we finally decided. 

I felt that fully discussing this was good as we were listing to each other which is extremely important when working in partners. 

We then informed Alison of our song choice and she gave us the thumbs up so we could then discuss the relationships dynamics of the characters and how we were going to interpret it. Alison informed me that my vocal skills and ability in this project would need to have a bigger focus on and this song would be perfect for me to challenge myself but be a reachable and easier goal to achieve. This meant I wanted to strive for the best and make sure that Perry and I really focused and rehearsed the song so it was a strong vocal and acting performance. 

Perry and I were quite active in discussing our ideas for the staging and background story of the song to enable us a clear understanding of the characters' relationship. We finally came up with the idea of Perry playing a Doctor/Psychiatrist and a patient, played by me, falling in love but due to professionalism and to suppress their feelings for each other. 

We came up with their interpretation by exploring the text in detail and discussing what we thought of it. 

Lines such as: 

"Not really sure how to feel about it"

Could be interpreted as the confusion and frustration of not knowing what to do and how to explore the feelings when it's not accepted for the characters to do so. 

Or: 

"Round and around and around and around we go" 

The character's relationship can't be fully developed and the emotions they're feeling aren't being explored and the professionalism they have to keep is destroying them. 

After spending this session exploring the text and creating an idea of the context to the song and how we were going to perform it meant that now we could focus on learning the song and practising it. 

I felt this session was really productive and doing this interpretation of the song early will help us keep our rehearsals as sustained as possible. 

I'm really excited to work with Perry as I feel that our creativity will help us perform the song to the best of our ability and create an interesting performance. 

We know how to interpret the song and we can begin working on specific characterisations. 

We need to start learning and practising the song as soon as possible to make our rehearsal process as stress-free as possible. 

Begin learning the song so that rehearsals with Perry can be efficient and we can develop the song as much as possible in the following weeks.

It Takes Two: Monday 10th March: Project Brief

Monday 10th March

Project Brief 

"It Takes Two" is our final project for the unit "Singing Skills for Actors and Dancers". In this project we will have to imagine we are a successful member of a West End show and have been asked to take part in a charity event entitled "It Takes Two - The Top Duets of All Time".

The event will be widely publicised and will feature in the national news so costume and props may be used.

We will receive guidance in the choice of partner and song as it is vital that the song chosen will suit both performers and enables each of us to demonstrate our independent ability to characterise the song. We should also think about the relationship between the participates and use a wide range of physical and vocal expression to communicate our interpretation. The song may be from any genre and may be sung either accompanied or to a backing track. We must take responsibility for providing either sheet music or backing tracks in the correct key. The website www.musicnotes.com will be very helpful to us.

We will perform the duet to a public audience.

We will also complete Blog entries for this project and it is here that our singing coach will be able to look over all the work we have done in this unit and assess the improvement in our vocal technique over the entire unit. It is important that we include either video or audience evident of at least two rehearsals on our blog and that we keep a practise diary in which we reflect on strengths and weaknesses and set ourselves SMART targets supported by specific technical exercises.

I'm looking forward to gaining experiences with working another performer to produce a performance fit for an audience and explores relationship between two characters. I'm really excited to start his project and I can't see what this project has to come!

Auditioning: Monday 24th February 2014: Singing Assessment

Monday 24th February 2014

Singing Assessment

Today was the day of our singing assessment for our solo project "Auditioning". 

I began the session by performing some warm ups which I knew would help and aid my performance for the assessment. 

Warm Up

Assessment

Here is the video for my solo assessment: 

During my performance I felt that my characteristic were the strongest part of my performance as it was the part I was most comfortable with. 

I started the song with strong diction and articulation to reinforce the character's frustration and new-found independency, I struggled with the performance slightly because it wasn't to an audience where I could bounce of them but to a camera, this showed me that I shouldn't rely on the audience's reactions all the time because it might not always be there. Performing to the camera was slightly weird at the start but as the song continued I gained my confidence and was happy overall. 

When singing "It's me and not you" I felt there was a new found passion in the line and it was far more effective than I had ever performed it before. This then allowed me to sing the next line with more sincerity and heart ache. 

I started to lose my timing slightly and the acoustics of the room made me lose a lot of confidence as I was used to practising in one of the sound-proof rooms. I tried my best to pick up on the timing but throughout the song I had lost it and I feel this strongly affected the vocal performance of the song for the worse. 

I managed to catch up with the timing but I was continuously losing it throughout so the precision and detail of the song was lost, even though I knew this I had to keep up my performance and continue as best as I could. 

When I finished the song I felt that it could have gone much better and was slightly dis-heartened as I felt I could have practised and rehearsed more to produce an overall stronger vocal performance. Although this was slightly frustrating I can take this experience and use it in future experiences. 

Overall, the assessment could have gone much better but I felt that I had a strong acting performance and as an actor this is the part I found easier anyway. I feel that singing a solo was a big step for me to gain confidence with singing and to gain new experiences.

Evaluation of Auditioning  

Warm Ups and Workouts allowed me to gain new knowledge of using and protecting my voice to fulfil it's full impact, Singing Showcase enabled me to start gaining a wider repertoire of songs and for me to learn what works for my voice, I feel that Auditioning as helped me to gained a lot of confidence and motivation to achieve more in singing and to explore different types of performances but still applying my knowledge and passion for acting. 

Through this project I had to rely on my own independency through rehearsals and knowing what to work on to improve and develop my skills and to produce a strong performance. This experience of being independent will help me in the future when it comes to auditioning for drama schools and rehearsing for shows. As a performer, self-discipline is extremely important so exercising this in the discipline of singing will provide me experience for the future. 

I have also been setting myself aims each week to develop my skill and then completing those aims the next week, target setting allows you to develop skills and become more aware as a performer so setting and completing these targets has meant that I now have a better knowledge of my own skills and what works and doesn't work for me. 

I feel that I could learn a song independently confidently and explore the song to produce a strong performance to show to an audition panel or to an audience. Performing in front of the class as especially allowed me to grow in confidence because before I would feel too awkward or too self-conscious to perform full-out. 

Through this project I've added a song to my portfolio which I could perform strongly and efficiently which is important for the future of my performing career. I feel like I would benefit from adding more songs to my portfolio to ever increase my versatility and skill as a performer. 

By choosing a song I could characterise well, I feel that this helped my performance and knowing what works is important when performing a song as a character. I would love to explore a different song where there isn't so much information already given and I can take my own personal spin off it. 

I feel like I have gained a lot of confidence as a singer in this project and used a lot of the techniques and knowledge I have learnt from previous projects to aid me in my performance. I am excited for the next and final project of this unit so I can explore my singing ability even more!

Auditioning: Monday 10th February 2014: Dry Run for Singing Assessment

Monday 10th February 2014 

Dry Run for Singing Assessment

Today was an opportunity for us to perform our solos in front of the class and get some peer feedback and also watch others and give them some constructive criticism. 

I felt it was necessary to take part in this dry run to enable me to prepare for next week's assessment. 

For the dry run I had actually prepared a backing track to use but unfortunately the CD didn't work and I had to sing it a cappella. I was slightly embarrassed by this and felt that it impacted my timing of the song and pace as I didn't have anything to follow. But I carried on as best as I could. 

During the song, I felt that I added a lot of characteristic and confidence that the character of 'Fanny Brice' would have herself. I kept standing in the same place but used gestures to aid my performance and to keep it upbeat. I also felt that reacting and directing comments to the audience allowed them to be absorbed in my performance and be far more responsive to what I was singing. 

As this was a musical theatre number, and a very famous one at that, I wanted to give it as much justice as possible. I did start out quite nervous but as the song developed and I felt people were enjoying it, I was far more confident and happy. 

When I got to this part of the song: 

"I'm gonna live and live NOW!Get what I want, I know how! One roll for the whole shebang! One throw that bell will go clang,Eye on the target and wham, One shot, one gun shot and bam!"

I stumbled on the words but I kept my performance up as much as I could, obviously I should have gone through the lyrics more so I knew them completely and this would not have happened, unfortunately I didn't but I was glad that it carried on with the rest of the song. 

When I was finished I received some feedback from my classmates: 

Positives: 

• Max Wilkinson - "Strong characterisation and performance which was enjoyable to watch!" 
• George Hyde - "Projection was strong which led to a confident performance."
• Shannon Allen - "Confident performance and hit some of the bigger notes with the same confidence throughout!" 

Improvements: 

• Freya Hunter - "Make sure to practise with the instrumental as some of the singing was slightly out of tune." 
• Stephanie Ridge - "Breath out before breathing in so you're taking in as much as breath as possible and that will aid your vocal ability and strength." 

It was really helpful to get some feedback from my class about my performance because they were helpful and gave me a boost of confidence too. I'm not really a singer so having some positive feedback about the song and how I used characterisation to aid the performance was fulfilling to me and gave me a boost of adrenaline to really focus down on the song and rehearse so next week was even better. 

It would seem that the acting side of my performance was stronger than the vocal performance so this meant I need to truly focus on practising the song with the instrumental and focusing on my breath intake so the notes were performed to the best of my ability. 

In conclusion, performing to my class and gaining feedback before my assessment has given me a confidence boost and allowed me to know what to practise and rehearse. 

I have never been that confident with singing so singing in front of my class was a big step for me to take and I am happy that I took it because now it's given me that motivation and realisation that maybe with more work and effort into singing I could actually become stronger and a more rounded performer. 

Even though I had gone through the lyrics of the song, it was obvious that they needed more work as I stumbled on the words. I, of course, can't do the same in the real assessment so practising the words and completely knowing them off-by-heart is essential for the assessment. 

I performed the song in detail through my performance but to be fully confident in the song then I do have to work more on my singing ability. But overall, I was happy with the performance and I felt that the audience enjoyed it!

The assessments next week so I will focus on going through the song and the detail of the vocal performance so that next week I perform confidently and as accurately as possible. 

I feel confident in the acting side of my performance of the song and I feel like I've successfully used my research to portray a character which the audience enjoys watching. 

I stumbled upon the words of my song so I need to make sure that I know them before the assessment by just going through the lyrics and listening to the song. 

I hope that next week I take in the comments I received this week and apply them to my rehearsals, most of the comments are just reinforcing what I've already been practising and applying to the song but by doing this it should aid my performance.