Homework Task

1. I think that my role is affected my the context of the play because the wolf is seen as the 'baddie' in the original fairytale story and so I have to keep that character in that way so that people know I am the baddie, especially as it is the junior version and meant for kids. As for the prince, I think he is affected by the context of the play because he has to be a typical prince.

2.  It fits into the musical theatre genre because it is set to music throughout and there is lots of songs. We are doing the Junior version of Into the Woods because it is not quite as long and more appropriate for all ages.

3. I need to rehearse my songs more. I feel fine singing them with the CD and the vocals but when it is just the backing track I struggle with hitting the right notes. I think that I can work on this by keep singing with the backing CD. I also think that I need to rehearse when my lines are. I do know my lines but I'm not 100% sure when I come in on some of them.

4. I feel like I am helping by working on lines and songs with people outside of lesson and contributing during lessons with prompting peoples lines.

5. I would say that I am definitely improving my confidence in performing skills. I started off the course very unconfident and was very much holding back in rehearsals, which was really unhelpful in trying to develop my character within the play. But now I fell like I can go into a rehearsal without feeling like I have to hold back.

6. I am independently working on my gesture and tone of voice outside of rehearsals so that when I am in rehearsals I don't have to waste time that could be spent on doing other things.

7. My production role is props. Although me and Paris haven't had a meeting yet, I have been thinking about what props are needed and I had a look in the workshop and found a basket for Red Riding Hood.

8. When me and Ashley worked with Kim on 'Agony' I had the idea of when we are both singing, if I could sing an octave lower because it makes a bit of a difference. There are also other times when little things like exit points and gestures on stage are moved around a bit because of ideas.

9. I think that my energy levels can vary quite a bit. Most of the time I have good energy levels and I am really up for getting through everything and try to really be involved, but every now and then I don't have great energy levels and I am not really trying to move things along. I am trying to stop this as it is a hindrance to the rest of the class.

10. I know all of my lines but when my lines need to be delivered is something I still need to work on. Because we have only just sorted out all of the entrances and exits in the performance area, I need to work on remembering all of these. I am happy that I know all of my dance moves although we have not practiced them in the outside performance space.

11. I am trying to approach everything with my full attention and concentration, but sometimes I find this hard if there is more than one thing that needs my attention. I am trying to improve hitting all challenges that arise with everything so hopefully I will improve.

12. I have been a bit behind on my weekly log, but I am trying to catch up and hopefully once I have caught up, I will regularly post and keep up to date.

Friday 14th November Dance

In todays lesson we warmed up by moving across the studio diagonally, jumping four times and then running four steps before jumping 4 more times and 4 more runs. We did this a couple of times to warm up.

Then we ran through the steps to ‘stay with me’ to make sure that we were all doing it right. I found this helpful because I was getting the order mixed up so running through it slowly a few times just solidified the routine. We than ran it through with the music as well. I find it quite hard to get the timings right a lot of the time because our cues to move are certain words in the song and because it am trying to concentrate on the movements I often end up relying on other people for timing. I think that as I get more comfortable with the routine then I will be less likely to miss the cues because I will be able to focus on them more.

Blocking Scene 2

When we blocked scene 2 my first part was when I meet Little Red Riding Hood. We worked on where we would enter from. I enter from URS behind a tree and creep onto CS where I meet Little Red Riding Hood. In between the parts where there is dialogue, LRRH tries to walk past me but I run in front of her and stop her. We worked on the way I could grab her and turn her towards me so that it shows I want her to stay but she wants to leave. We hadn't worked on the dance sequence at this point so we just worked on roughly where we wanted things to happen. I found it quite hard to fully get into the stalker like character, but eventually I started to get it.

My next part in the scene is the part in granny's house. This involves me doing a granny's voice, which was really fun... I found a few things quite hard in this scene was the timings at the 'The better to eat you with', I found this hard because it involved me and Jess getting the timings exactly right time and also the part when I had to eat her afterwards. I really struggled to give it everything and convincingly 'eat' Little Red Riding Hood.

The next part of the scene I am in is when I come on as Cinderella's Prince and talk to Bakers Wife. We worked on the entrance and exit points and that we point towards the exit point and go off. 

First Impression of Production Role

My production role is props. This means I am in the team that is in charge of the props used in the production. This invloves, making a list of props that are needed. Then, we have to put the list of props into a scene by scene list so that we know when all the props are needed. Then we have to put where the props are needed on stage or where abouts offstage they are needed, so they can be put in the right places at thr right time. And if they move then we need to write down where they move to.

Homework

Assignment Brief

Anatomy Of The Voice

http://www.singwise.com/cgi-bin/main.pl?section=articles&doc=AnatomyOfVoice&page=1

http://www.lionsvoiceclinic.umn.edu/page2.htm#anatomy101

"Receiving various signals from the nervous system, the diaphragmatic muscles contract and the diaphragm moves downward. As the diaphragm depresses, it creates a vacuum in the lungs and air rushes in to fill that vacuum. During exhalation, the diaphragm relaxes and rises and lung volume decreases, creating a positive pressure difference, and air rushes out."

When the air comes out of the lungs, it goes through the trachea, and into the larynx. This in turn makes the vocal folds vibrate, the vibrations in the vocal folds alternately trap air and then release it. Each of these small releases of air goes into the pharynx. These puffs of air are the starts of of a sound wave. When the sound wave leaves the mouth, it then comes out as sound.

Vocal Warm Ups

Our vocal warm ups normally start of with running scales up and down going up a semitone each time. These are good for stretching my range as I am not used to singing that high. We also vary what vowels or consonants we sing them on. These are good for diction when singing a song so you get used to opening your mouth and pronouncing each letter of the word. Arpeggios are also good for improving range, and they do the same job as scales but also help to work on intervals. We also work on breathing by putting our hands on our diaphragms to help control our breathing which helps how long you can hold on to a note or helps to sing a longer phrase. Singing scales and arpeggios also improve switching between head voice and chest voice.

Hello Little Girl Dance Lesson 2

After learning the dance to a different piece of music, we had to change it around slightly to fit with the song 'Hello Little Girl'. I found this one a lot easier to learn because we had already got the foundations of the tango. We used a lot of the parts from the first routine but put them into a different order and added things like the hold and the half turns. Also, when Jess sings, she breaks away from me and I go over to her and hold her when I sing.

After watching the video of the dance. I think that I need to work on my confidence, facial expression and focus. Hopefully after practicing the dance a few more times, I will be more comfortable with the routine and can start to think about those things.

http://youtu.be/a7CM4b4c-6A

Hello Little Girl Dance 1st Lesson

We started working on the tango for 'Hello Little Girl'. Kat gave us a bit of general information on how the tango has a Slow-Slow-Quick-Quick-Slow rhythm and that it isn't a particularly flowing dance and everything is quite firm. We then listened to a bit of tango music to get a feel of the rhythm before starting to learn the steps. We started off by simply by me walking towards Jess in a Slow-Slow-Quick-Quick-Slow rhythm and Jess walking backwards the same way. Then in the same rhythm we walked around each other in a circle with her hand on my chest to show that she doesn't want the Wolf getting too close. We then lunge across each other and interlock arms before I circle my arm around freeing myself from her and then I spin her around by the shoulder. She then goes to run away, to get away form the Wolf, but I grab her hand and pull her back in and then she leans right back with me supporting her. She then tries to get away from me once more, but again I grab her hand and twist her into me before doing a lift where she hops onto my leg and then off again. We found this quite hard to grasp because we didn't know the best way to do it, but Kat helped us work it out and it looked great. After Jess lands, she does a roll on the floor as I slowly and creepily turn to look at her. Then similar to the beginning, I walk towards her in the Slow-Slow-Quick-Quick-Slow rhythm and Jess walks backwards the same. It took us a few attempts to remember the routine and fit it in time with the music but we did it in the end and we were both very happy with it.

Induction to Into The Woods Dance

We started to learn the dance for the end of scene 1. We started by warming up with some movements that involved moving forward at the same time to work on not just dancing on the spot. We then started by learning the first part of the dance. This was stepping back on the left foot and bring the right foot backwards and then a large step forward whilst also doing a similar movement with both arms. Then stepping forward on tip toes and then back again, at the same time as circling with the right shoulder mirroring the movement of the right foot. I struggled with adding the shoulder in so I worked on getting my feet right before worrying about the arms but by the end of the lesson I had managed to get the shoulder as well. The next part of the dance was lunging on forwards on the right foot, turning on the left and lunging again with the right foot in the opposite direction, then twisting again before taking 3 steps and on the fourth beat putting both feet together and hands on hips. This whole thing was then repeated. I struggled with remembering the routine at first but after running it through a few times I got the hang of it and could then work on focus and extension and generally sharpening everything up.

Solo Singing With Kim

Hello Little Girl

We started off singing it along with Kim playing the melody on the piano. At first we had to decide which octave I would sing it at because I am more comfortable singing lower although we decided that the song would better sung in a higher octave. After running it through a few times with the piano and working intonation and breathing especially, we then sang along to the CD with the vocals on it. This helped because hearing somebody sing it correctly meant that I was more and more aware of what the right notes were. When I was singing along with the CD I realised that another problem that I was having was the timing of the speech and singing at the end of the song. I made notes on my music of how long I need to count so that when I practise on my own I can make sure I get the right timing. We then moved on to sining it with just the backing track. It took me a few attempts at hitting the first note at the right pitch but eventually I got it. After writing in how long I need to wait at the end, I managed to get the timing right although I did struggle to hit the note at the 'and goodbye' part of the song because it is after dialogue but I worked on it and got it in the end. 

Agony

We started off with playing the melody on the piano with us singing along so that we knew the tune properly before singing along with the CD. We then had the dilemma of wether I would sing it in a lower octave or higher octave. We decided that I would sing the higher octave when I am singing by myself but when I sing with Ashley I will drop it down an octave so that there is a contrast between the two voices. We then sang it along with the CD with vocals so we were gradually getting more confident with the song and then we sang it without the vocals and just the backing track. There are points in the song which I find quite hard, the main bit is the first 'agony'. I find this hard because it is higher than I am used to, but the more I am practising the easier it is getting because I am improving my range.

DV8 Enter Achilles Video and Peer Assesment

Cup Dance Video

Character Profile

The characters I am playing in Into the Woods I am playing the Wolf and Cinderella's Prince.

The wolf is described as like Fred Astaire. So I would imagine him being suave and sly as well as creepy, this is because in the script he is asking her some pretty normal questions but with a motive that is more than just asking her what's in her basket. I think that the creepy side of the world comes hand in hand with the sly side. I think that the Wolf helps to symbolise Little Red Riding Hoods change from being an innocent young girl into adulthood. I think that the wolf is also just out for food, eating Granny and Little Red Riding Hood. Because the Wolf is very sly, I think that his movement will be quite slow and smooth, quite bent over and not upright.


When I looked at the two pictures below from different performances of Into The Woods, I thought about how I could look at taking parts from the two characters and adding them to mine. I thought that the sly nature from the picture of Johnny Depp and the smartness, with the almost dominating nature of the second picture. From taking these I hope that my character is sly when he first enters, but I could also use my size to show how I am in control of the situation.





I also play Cinderella's Prince who is the brother of Rapunzel's Prince. He is very proper and posh, which you can tell from the actual text as well as the way he reacts with Rapunzel's Prince  Throughout the first part of his story is is trying to find Cinderella. He isn't often on for long periods of time other than the song 'Agony'. He often pops on and is then off again. He eventually finds Cinderella after going through her family to see if the slipper fits. All he wants throughout the play is to find Cinderella. In the part when he is with Rapunzel's Prince, I see him as being quite jokey with him as brothers would be, even though he is sad about not having Cinderella yet.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2AJLCFHeRY
I like the way that the brothers joke around with each other in this version although I think that they do go a bit over the top with it. I thought that I could take aspects of it such as the horses and the comedy side of it and put it into my performance.




I thought that Cinderella's Prince needed to be really over the top and exaggerated very much like a pantomime prince. In all of the research I did for this character he is very extrovert and extreme in his movements and voice and so I wanted to mimic this style in my performance.

BHM Video

Black History Month Performance

Scene 1 Blocking

Because my only part in scene 1 is bringing on the cape on page 46 and 48, when we weren't rehearsing this part I was working on my blog. I come on from down stage left both times and will have a spotlight on the object. I will have to make sure that I do not show my face. I think I will be putting my arm out of the curtain holding the object so that would hopefully hide my face well.

BHM Rehearsal Schedule

BLACK HISTORY MONTH REHEARSAL SCHEDULE

 

date	rehearsal content	script improvements	staging/lighting	comments
	I chose to perform 'Hurricane' By Bob Dylan so I worked on the chord sequence and putting the lyrics with the chords.	I wasn't going to sing the whole song because it is very long. I wanted to include the lyrics that had relevance to black history.	I wanted just general cover throughout the stage and just a microphone on stage.
	I joined with Holly and Jess to sing 'Aint No Mountain High Enough' by Marvin Gaye. We started by all singing together throughout the whole song before deciding on how we would split up the parts. We eventually decided how would would split them and worked on practising them.	We decided not to sing the whole song as we did not have enough time to rehearse it and we wanted to do the first section well rather than the whole thing at a lower standard. We decided to repeat the first verse and the chorus twice because we felt these carried lots of the message of the song.	We wanted general cover on the stage and for just to have microphones for us with no extra staging or lighting. We did this because we didn't want to detract from the song.
13th Oct	Technical Rehearsal
14thOct	TECHNICAL REHEARSAL	We sorted out the lighting with Katie and where we would stand on the stage. We also tried to sort out guitar amplification but the amp didn't work and there wasn't enough time to sort it out so we would put it through the PA system on the performance.
15thOct	PERFORMANCE
16TH  Oct	PERFORMANCE
17thOct	PERFORMANCE

Rehersal 6th November

Rehersal 4th November

In today's rehearsal we worked on developing scene 2. In the parts I was involved with I worked with Grainne on improving movement with Jess in that part. As well as where about on the stage I was moving, we worked on how I actually moved. Because I am a wolf it has to be like an animal, but also human like as well. This meant there was a lot of low down movements that are almost like stalking. I struggled with getting the hang of this but after trying lots of different ways, I found one that worked for me. We worked on the way I move around Jess to get in front of her. We tried her going downstage and me running around the back and we felt this didn't work so well so Jess went upstage from me.

After college we had another rehearsal. In this one we carried on with scene 2 and I worked on the next bit with the wolf, little red riding hood, granny and the baker. I found it hard to convincingly 'eat' little red riding hood, because I didn't feel confident enough doing it in such a dramatic way, but after thinking about it I knew that it had to be done it that way. So i just had to go for it in the most animalistic way possible and once I had done it like this I immediately knew it looked better and from then I was happy with it and my confidence in that scene increased  And being strangled by granny and making it look realistic but again after trying lots of different ways of doing it we settled on leaning against the bed and falling to my knees, and instead of dying and being dragged off, I would walk off with Granny being held at the collar by her.

Evaluation of Performance for BHM

BTEC MUSICAL THEATRE 2014-15

EVALUATION OF PERFORMANCE

BLACK HISTORY MONTH

PLANNING

Comment on the following –

the number ofREHEARSALS and how effective your target-setting was	effectiveness The rehearsals were good because we managed to get the  performance ready.	how you would improve for NEXT TIME Because I changed my mind on the performance, we did not have as much time together as maybe we would have wanted.
your STAGINGincluding movement around stage	effectiveness I felt that because we did not move around the stage at all and we had no added staging that it worked well and didn't detract from the meaning of the song.	how you would improve for NEXT TIME I think that next time we would do a similar thing as I felt that it worked well, we might have included a little bit of movement around the stage.
your LIGHTING	effectiveness We had general cover on the stage which again didn't take distract the audience from the meaning of the song.	how you would improve for NEXT TIME If we had more time to sort out a lighting plan, then we might have faded in and out of different colours slowly, especially in the chorus when the song is more lively.
your SOUNDincluding your technical use of mics/instruments etc.	effectiveness We only had one instrument, we used an electric guitar which was plugged into the amplifier. We also two microphones. I had one and Holly and Jess shared one.	how you would improve for NEXT TIME Next time we could include some form of percussion, or other instruments such as a piano. We would also have a microphone each instead of having to share.

PERFORMANCE SKILLS

MOVEMENT and VOCAL DELIVERY	effectiveness I feel that my vocal delivery was good and worked well with the song and the parts that I was singing.	how you would improve for NEXT TIME Next time I think that I will be more confident and so hopefully this would improve my tone and my intonation.
EXPRESSIVENESS (facial and physical)	effectiveness I feel that I wasn't too rigid in my movement and my facial expression was relatively confident	how you would improve for NEXT TIME I would want my movement to be even more loose. And because I wasn't 100% confident with the chords and lyrics of the song I would not have the chords and I would look up into the audience more.
COMMUNICATION TO THE AUDIENCE and how your performance was received	effectiveness I felt that we communicated the message of the song well to the audience and we not closed off to them.	how you would improve for NEXT TIME I fell that without the chords and lyrics then we would be able to engage the audience more.
CONSISTENCY OF COMMUNICATION (how well you maintained your chosen persona)	effectiveness I felt that I remained professional throughout the performance.	how you would improve for NEXT TIME I would maybe be a bit more relaxed and overall seem a bit happier! I would try to interact with the audience a bit more.

Into The Woods Rehersals

For the past few lessons in rehearsals, we have been finishing off blocking the play and have started on developing the scenes. I am starting to become more confident with my performance, for example my positioning and the songs. 

Over half term I have been listening to the songs so I can familiarise myself even more and how the dialogue fits in around the song. 

I have also been learning my lines and I am becoming a lot more confident with them. I have learnt them all for the wolf and am almost familiar with the lines for Cinderella's prince.

Black History Month

Black History Month

My initial thought for the Black History Month performance was to do 'Hurricane' by Bob Dylan. I chose this song because it focuses on the topic of a man being wrongly accused of murder just because he was black.

I decided that I didn't want to perform this and joined Jess and Holly to sing 'Ain't No Mountain High Enough' by Marvin Gaye. We chose this song because we felt that people will always be there no matter what, in times of discrimination. We also chose this song because Marvin Gaye was a very talented and well known black performer.

We wanted to keep the instrumentation and staging simple so that it did not detract from the lyrics and meaning of the song. We chose to have the three of us standing centre stage in a line. The lighting was general cover on the stage, again not to draw any focus.

Overall I thought that the performance went really well. I felt that the arrangement of the song suited the tree of us very well and the way we decided to split the parts. As the least confident singer I had less solo singing which I was happy with and Jess and Holly had solos which were very good!

If we were to do it again and improve on it, I think we would have sung more of the song into the part where it changes key. The reason we decided not to was that none of us felt confident enough with the song to sing it, but if we had more time to rehearse I'm sure we would have done.

Singing Skills

Friday 19th September

We did some vocal warm ups by singing scales. We then did some interval work. We labeled each note of the scale by giving it a number. We jumped from note 1 to 2, then 1 to 3 and 1 to 4 and 1 to 5. We then did octave jumps.

Friday 26th September

We learnt about singing in the round after splitting into tree groups. Then after listening to All Of Me by John Legend, we were switching between our chest voices and our head voices and feeling how they sounded different.

Friday 3rd October

In todays lesson we started to look at the songs form Into The Woods. We all sang the song at the end of scene one. We focused on the projection, range, diction, breath control, intonation, dynamics and articulation. We focused lots on intonation on the part of the song with the major 7th interval on the word 'festival'. We also focused throughout the song on the articulation throughout, as it is mainly staccato throughout.

Dance Performance

Friday 19th September

Physical Skills:
Posture - The position of the body or body parts, bad posture can lead to health problems.
Co-ordination - The ability to move different parts of your body together well or easily.
Extension - The act of straightening or extending a limb.
Balance - A state of equilibrium or equipoise; equal distribution of weight.
Strength - The quality or state of being physically strong.
Stamina - the ability to sustain prolonged physical or mental effort.
Alignment - A straight line or in correct positions.
Flexibility - The quality of bending easily without breaking.

Interpretive Skills:
Musicality - In dance, musicality is the matching of movement and form to the rhythm, melody, and mood of the music being played.
Focus - To concentrate on a singe point. To connect or disconnect with the audience through the use of external and internal focus.
Projection - Confident presentation of one's body and energy to vividly communicate movement and meaning to an audience.
Facial Expression - Facial expressions are when you describe the emotions of a dance with your face.


In todays lesson, we ran through the routine and then added our own beggining section in the style of the video we watched. We then had the chance to change how we did the actual routine. In our group we had two people doing something different in the back whilst three of us carried on with the original routine.

Friday 26th September

Today we carried on with rehersing our routines and then we filmed them and recieved peer assesment. We then watched the film back and gave ourselves self assesment targets. My targets were to be more accurate and to be more confident. I found these targets helpful becuae it means that I know what to work harder on next time we perform.

Friday 3rd October.

In todays lesson we started to work on the marching sequence from the song at the end of scene one. Before we did this, we did some warm up that helped with moving in a dance like way.
As a class we learnt the dance. I found it quite tricky at first to coordinate my arms with my legs but after running through it a few times and working in smaller groups I managed to get the coordination.

Rehersal for the 7th and the 10th of October

Rehersal for the 7th and the 10th of October

In todays lesson we were working on our developing our character and understanding of their part in the text. We started by having to think about the age of the character, their general mood and their occupation. I did this for the Wolf and I decided that he is around 40 years old. Becuase the wolf doesn't have much interaction with many other characters, there was no need to relate the age of the charcter with anybody else. After speaking to other members of the class, I decided that my general mood would be over-friendly and a bit creepy, I thought this because of how in the script he is very quick to speak to Red Riding Hood but his intentions may not be exactly friendly.  I thought of portratying the wolf like this because he is a bit overly friendly towards Red Riding Hood becuaese he wants to eat her.

Then we looked at super-objectives for our character. A super-objective is the overall objective that carries the character through the whole play. After talking to other members of the class I decided that my super objective would be to fulfil my appetite. The significance of this is because of the relationship between Red Riding Hood and the Wolf, to him it can be seen as both slightly sexual and also its food, but to her it shows her change from being a young girl to a young woman as she becomes more independent with age, and this is her first real new encounter. This could be taken as food or something else like friendship.

We then split into a group of three and devised a short piece that gave the whole story from the point of view of one of the characters. The character we had was Jack. So we decided to have a lot of focuds on Jack's story and less so on the rest of the characters. We used physical theatre aspects such as having to switch characters very quickly and sometimes playing innamimate objects, such as beanstalks.