logs

Friday 1st of February 

Today we decided to change our idea of creating our own piece because the idea behind it was to hard. We had written our own script but it didn't come out very well because it did not sound like something people would say, our speech was not very good and we realised that we needed to focus on our skills more then anything. We decided to make a new proposal/idea and we are all going to do different things and different ideas and make a show out of that, it is like out unit 8 show but we need to make it better to show how we have progressed as performers. I like the new idea because it comes around full circle and we can examine how we have changed since last year.   

Problem solving

Our old idea was the problem so we had to solve it by changing the whole thing to make it show all of our skills. We all agreed that it was the right thing to do and we all agreed to make a deadline for the following Monday to have an idea of what we wanted to do.

Goals

• Have an idea of what we want to do 
• By next lesson talk about our new idea
• Make a new rehearsal scheduled 

Monday 4th of February 

In the lessons today we all sat down and spoke about what we wanted to do, we all decided that we wanted to not just do solos but that we also wanted to group pieces and different duets because we thought we never got the chance to do duets. So far we only had a basic idea of what we wanted to do but we had no theme or style to try and bring all of the pieces together at the moment we were just thinking of putting them piece after piece but that idea was to similar to our old unit.  The problem was that we had to come up with new ideas but also update it from out unit eight, we wanted to show that we have gained more skills since fast year and that we could put on the show with the four of us.  My plan was to do Mr. Cellophane from Chicago but then I thought it would be a lot better to do a song that I find complex to show off my skills, range, abilities.  I wanted to do this the Mr cellophane but also a song that spoke to a complex character and had complexity in the song it’s self so I went with and I am telling you, both songs are big character songs and they both speak to an emotion that I think I could get into.

Problem solving
we officially changed our idea from the play that we made to a cabaret themed night so we needed to really knuckle down and think about what we are doing and when we are starting we did this by all writing down the pieces we wanted to do and then set deadlines. We agreed that since the mid point assessment is 15th of march that we will have everything done by the 8th.

goals

• look at all of the pieces people want to do 
• try and think of start points 

Wednesday 6th of February 

We started by giving ourselves a deadline to all have an idea of what we wanted to do because we thought we were thinking to much about it and we had already wasted a lot of time on our other idea so we didn’t have a lot of time before we would have to start getting on with it. I then spent the rest of the lesson looking at the different versions of ‘and I am telling you’ because I wanted to try and find a style I liked and try and do it like that I also wanted the audience to feel moved because it’s such a big powerful song and everyone has once in their life felt hopeless in the situation where someone is leaving them.

Problem solving
Although i know both of the songs i still don't know the words so what I did was i listened to the songs on repeat and looked at the lyrics to all of the different songs we might be doing

goals

• learn the lyrics 
• think of different ways to sing the songs

Thursday 7th of February 

Today we all took our teachers advice and we chose to go with the theme of cabaret themed show we thought this would work because it creates a good atmosphere and it’s not really something that has been done in our college and maybe it will make other people want to go out and watch them. We really struggled  today because we wanted to find the perfect last song but we couldn’t find any we wanted the song to wrap everything up in a nice way because this is our last year so the last number should have impact. We needed up looking up last numbers but none of them had the feel that we were looking for and if they did they related to the story they came from so it wouldn’t work at the end of a cabaret. So far we had 4 solos 4 duets and 2 group pieces but for me it felt like something was missing ( besides the last number ).

problem solving

Friday 8th of February

Today we made a dance to All That Jazz from Chicago we wanted to  start right away on choreographing one of the great pieces, we for all that jazz would be amazing to start of our show as its in  cabaret style.  Whilst making the dance I kept thinking of different lightings that we could use because we wanted to use this for our opening number I was thinking that we could have smoke and red lights to set the tone for the whole show. In the film version you can actually see Velma getting ready to go on stage and perform and I like that intimacy it has with the audience so I suggested that we used that at the beginning. Then some of my class members spoke about using the instrumental at the front to hand out food to the different tables so it’s like we are regular waiters then it begins and we are performers.

goals

• Learn all the lyrics for All That Jazz
• Focus on the movements 

Wednesday 13th of February 
In the lessons that we had today we continued to try and find a song that we could do as the closing number but still no luck we thought about you cant stop the beat but we thought it worked better as a number just before or after the interval, so what we did is we kept going with the 'All that jazz' dance trying to make it our own style that we thought would work for the cabaret theme.

problem solving
we need to find a song for the last number it's been hard because we all have different ideas of how we want to end the show. I suggested either 'Hard To Say Goodbye' from Dreamgirls because it goes with the message we are trying to get across.

Thursday 14th of February 

we decided that we were going to do 'You Cant Stop The Beat' so we got some help from one of our teachers to choreograph it. The dance is upbeat and we tried to make it in the style of the 60s but with a few modern twist in it, the thing I was worried about from the start was the fact that we would have to sing and dance to the song at the same time maintaining a high energy level and because of my size sometimes I get out of breath just from doing basics steps so it worried me because I did not want to get marked down for sounding bad. 

problem solving
I need to work on my singing and dancing at the same time.
Friday 15th of February 

today we decided to change the idea of 'what about love' from the colour purple because we couldn't find a backing track and we also wanted to do a song that had more acting in it and one that we could use the audience in and strike their attention. We then decided to do take me or leave me the song from rent that we were originally going to do but changed because we thought it was to complex. we started by listening to the song and thinking about what we might want to do with the piece, we had the idea of doing the scene before and going through the audience acting like its our engagement party because that is what it is in the movie version. 

problem solving
we had trouble with our song from the colour purple so we changed it to another song this helped us because we can do more with the characters

goals

• learn the song 

Wednesday 27th of February 
in this lesson we went through just our solos showing them to our acting teacher she made me perform the song three times on different levels the first had no emotion and then it got more and more emotion it was a little hard because i'm not usually an aggressive person and it kind of made me think if i wanted to even sing the song anymore because i thought i was being angry but apparently i wasn't   

problem solving
i worked on being aggressive by doing a game where someone was walking around and i had to try and stop them and if the did not believe that i was angry enough they would move around till they thought i was at the right level. i found this hard because in my head i think that i am being really aggressive and it turns out i wasn't being upset enough   
goals

• Work on the song in different levels 
• Find my own voice through the song 

Thursday 28th of February 
Today all I did was work on my solo for a little bit in our break I found it hard to hit certain notes because i was not warmed up i need to remember to do it every day not just when we are singing as a class. I also looked into costume and I found a couple of different ideas that I liked

research

And I Am Telling You
 

the characters style is very simple her clothes are blue and they have a flow so i think finding an outfit wont be hard because its pretty basic. and then i started to think about ideas for all of my other pieces

take me or leave me 


in this duet my character is punk rock and she dresses like a rock artists and she is inspired by the grunge movement, she wants to stand and and be the centre of attention
Mr cellophane



 the outfit for this piece is just any broken down clown costume

goals 

• to figure out what im wearing 
• to ask the others if they need help with costume because its my additional role

Friday 1st of march

today we had a mini moc assessment and we worked on all of our different pieces to show our teacher. we started out by going through our individual solos and then doing the group pieces. we then went through them in running order i think this was good because it gave us a small gist of what it will be like when we have to perform. whilst we were all performing we also had to write down on paper what we thought of each others pieces here are a few things i got told to improve:

Mr cellophane

• work on building the character through the song 
• learn lines 
• dont hold back
• to make basic movement for the piece         

and i am telling you

• to be more aggressive
• act more upset 
• try and find my own character  

all that jazz

• be more Fosse
• and to make the piece longer 

take me or leave me

• choreograph what we are doing 
• be louder 
• be more angry

Monday 4th of march

today we worked on the last piece we spent the whole lesson making the last dance for hard to say goodbye. This is going to be our last piece we wanted it to be really cheesy and do something together that represented our time at college. we started by listening to the song and thinking about what different things we could do in the piece and how we wanted to set it out. we then got up and then started dancing and thinking of ideas and we ended up finishing the whole song and i think it still needs fixing but i think it will go very well in our piece   

problem solving 
we couldn't find a song at first but then we found this one and at first we didn't think it would work because its a slow song but as soon as we listened to the music and the lyrics we instantly realsied that it fitted with the message we wanted to portray 
goals

1. make movements sharper 
2. change some of the dances 
3. work on singing

Wednesday 6th of march 

in class today we divided the lesson into three parts

1. Marshall and Faith duet 
2. me and Savannah's duet 
3. group pieces 

when it came time for me and Savannah to do our duet we started to think of different ways we could started the whole piece of and how would we be able to make it look like we are having a fight, its hard because we need to be fighting but in different ways i'm fighting because i want her to see that i'm right but at the same time i have to be over the top and sexy with my movements so i'm finding it hard to play all of these different things. We then sang you cant stop the beat as a group a couple of time and realised that we didn't like the way it sounded we were all getting out of breath just from singing how were we going to be able to dance as well so we spoke about cutting the piece.

problem solving-
take me or leave me
me and Savannah need to actually think about what we want to do and how we want the audience to feel watching our show. we also need to block out where we are going to go and how we are going to move and this is where i think characterisation comes in handy

you cant stop the beat
we were having trouble with the singing and dancing so make things better we separated the two, so we sang the song just on its own with no dancing a couple of times then tried to do both but we found it to hard no one was stable or in-breath to sing. we also need to make up our minds on what we are going to do instead 
goals-

• learn lines 
• think about character 
• block out where we want to go so we are not just walking around 

Thursday 7th of march 

today we performed little bits from our pieces to our jazz teacher and the first years to get feedback. i performed my duet (take me or leave me) an i thought it went very well we were able to go through the song and work with the audience. we also did one of our group pieces (all that jazz) and i think it went ok i feel like it could have gone a lot better but i think we were all really tiered and we couldn't seem to get some of the moves right 

problem solving
take me or leave me-

• we needed to learn the lyrics more and make it more our style then the others we have watched online
• we also need to properly figure out where we are going in the song instead of just walking around randomly
• we need to also fully learn the lyrics 

all that jazz-

• we need to make sure we know the moves 
• we need to look at the Fosse movements and make sure we are sharp 

feedback

1. learn your lines 
2. i really enjoyed the argument 
3. work on making the moves sharper 
4. try to get the last note (there is a note that i cant reach yet)

Monday 11th march 

today we showed our teacher what we have done so far in terms of group pieces she said we need to make sure that the movements are more complex and in the style of the dance. we then also worked on our duet and we still did not know if we wanted to go with the lower or the original key and so we sang the song with both and then decided to go with the original key because that is what we both felt comfortable with.

goals

• work on group pieces 
• all need to sing and dance 

Wednesday 13th march

today I worked on my solos by going through the songs and trying to make sure i'm staying in character and that i'm singing the best that i can. I found it hard because we all wanted to use the stage and use the music but we all had to take in turns. W should have stayed with a timetable.

problem solving 
we all wanted to use the space and the music so we need to set days/times where we work on things that we want.

Monday 18th march 

in today's lesson we worked on the dance for all that jazz the dancer had changed it and they wanted to show us what they did to improve it and make it fit more with the style of Fosse. i think the new dance is harder but at the same time its good because we needed to be more in the style of how Fosse dances. Then me and Savannah went though our duet (take me or leave me) we added a bit more to the song where we stand on the able together, i really like how far we have come since making the first video of us singing the song. then we had singing and we sang all of the songs that we are performing but then our teachers told us that not everyone is singing the songs because the dances will be marked down because they cant sing and they said that we should sing the songs because we are musical theatre students.

problem solving
we solved the singing problem by me and Savannah splitting all the lines of the songs and we need to still learn the rest of the lines for the songs
goals     

• me and savannah need to learn out new song lines 
• change the dances to make it that me and Savannah can sing all the songs 

Wednesday 20th of march

today we needed to go through the new song that we were doing so what we did is we sang it four times once with the people singing with us then three times with the karaoke we know the song very well so when we were going through it we then sat down and spoke about how we want to set the scene and we decided that we want to make it as funny as we could because a lot of the piece are very deep and emotional so we wanted to make sure that we are showing all the different characters we can play and the different emotions are coming across to the audience. Because our other duet involves the audience we want this piece to be more about us interacting with each other

goals   

• learn song 
• act more pissed of 
• go through the song and movement at the same time        

Friday 22nd of march

mid point assessment (look at presentation page)

Wednesday 27th of march 

Today me and Savannah work on our duets, what we did was we went through both of them and tried of add as much characteristics as we can. The thing that I like about our duets is that we can play two different characters even though they are both arguments the characters are completely different. I'm trying my best to act straight and manly but i feel like it's not working, we also want to add comedic values to the piece but we don't know what to do to accomplish this. Another thing we had issues with is what to do on stage if you look up different performances they will just stand their and sing to each other, so we tried it just standing still but for us it did not work.

goals

• Find ways to make it funny 
• try and act more masculine 
• show that the two arguments are different characters

Friday 29th of march 

Today I only worked on my solos I wanted to make sure I get everything down, especially facial expressions I wanted to make sure for both I felt the proper emotions. I did this by thinking of about a time I have ever felt neglected or lonely and I tried to use it through the songs. 

goals

• try and make a character 
• Be more desperate to make the 'man' stay

Monday 1st of April 

in the lesson today what we did is we ran through group pieces i think this was good because we needed it all of the group pieces are good but they still need to be pushed further in our energy im just finding it hard especially with you cant stop the beat because before there was 4 of us singing now its just the two of us so we sing most of the songs and its hard trying to do these full out moves and sing with it sounding good. its been a huge tole on me because im not as fit as the others so i find it hard to keep up anyway let alone sing as well

problem solving
i need to find a way to maintain breath whilst singing and dancing, i read online light jogging whilst singing helps 

Wednesday 3rd of April 

today we worked on our duet and we found it really hard to get the lyrics right we went through it loads of times but kept messing up so what we did was we listened to the original and wrote down the different parts unfortunately it did not help so what we ended up doing was focusing on the characters. my role is Frank and i am a macho man who thinks woman should be lady like i find this role hard because its not one that im used to doing but im also excited to broaden my repertoire. i also went through my solo songs and thought about what kind of message i want to get across to the audience so i wrote myself some questions:

1. why are you singing the songs 
2. how does your character feel 
3. why are they in the situation they are in now 
4. how do you want the audience to feel 
5. what do you want them to take away from it 

and i am telling you

1. i am singing this song because i feel like its a hard song and i think its good to go beyond what people can think i do 
2. in the song my character is feeling upset she has just been told shes to fat and ugly to be apart of the girl group and her boyfriend is leaving her for her old friend so she feels upset desperate and mad 
3. she is in the situation where she is getting kicked out of her group 
4. i want the audience to feel sad and emotional for the character because she is poring her heart out
5. i want the audience to take away the feeling of like WOOAH because its not something people used to see me performing 

Mr cellophane

1. i am singing this song because its a complex song there are so many different levels to the song 
2. right now my character is feeling hopeless, invisible and lonely
3. he is in the situation because his wife cheated on him and killed a man then asked him to take the fall, he then realises that she cheated and he lets her take the blame but then she becomes famous and forgets all about him 
4. i want the audience to feel sorry for me but also maybe a a little bit funny because i am going to be doing little tricks here and there that go wrong 
5. i want the audience to take away the feeling that we all sometimes feel invisible and we need someone to help us to get through it      

problem solving
we still need to learn the lyrics to the songs and we need to (like take me or leave me) figure out what we are doing because now we are just walking around and not really knowing what we are doing so it looks a little off putting

goals 

• learn the song 
• figure out character 
• work on the verses

     

Friday 5th of  April

today we went through different things and showed our teacher as its the last day before our Easter break and then when we get back its our tec week and then its our show, so we were all feel really pressured to get as much done as we could. Me and Savannah found the anything you can do song hard at first because theres so many different verses in the same style so we found it hard to practice the song because we kept switching up the words and the different verses. But when we performed it we were able to remember the lyrics and i was proud of what we had done remembering a big song in a small time.

problem solving
we did not know how to sing the song so what we did is write down the subject of each verse in order so we know what verse coming up is going to be about. this helped because we were finding it hard to sing through it all