26/03/13 - drama lesson

I said that Jan's character movements are very slumpy and childish, i do not stand up straight and do not try hard to look good all the time.

tuesday - 26/02/13 -DFTA

05/03/13 - drama

In this lesson we started act two of the script and started to block the scenes and decided backing dances for musical numbers. We finalised beauty school dropout with simple moves. In my view i feel that by next lesson we should all try and be off scripts because i think thats the only thing that's really holding us back, without scripts the class shows a lot of energy which improves the general feel to the play. I feel like so far what we're doing for the dance scene in act two is very slow and drags on, i think it should be a little choreographed just so it doesn't look so slow moving, i think that one couple at a time should have like a limelight to do like a routine and people should be moving around all the time to show the hectic-ness of a school dance. However i do really like the routine for 'beauty school dropout' and think that once it's been practised a couple more times it will look great.

SINGING - 07/03/13

In the first half we went over songs and showed Lena what we had so far etc and including (if there is any) dance moves for the piece. I found this exercise very helpful because Lena told us that we should cut down a bit of movement in order to keep our voices in tact so it wouldn't put strain on it or ruin projection etc. I sung mooning, but Abbie wasn't there, but i have been listening to the soundtrack for it and have tracked where i need to back Abbie when she sings for example some times i echo 'Roger' for some of his lines. In the second half of the lesson we all sat together with our scripts and helped eachother to become word perfect with our songs, we didn't go over mooning because i don't have much to do in it and i know my words for that so we helped the people with solos, for example Max, Matt and Lyndsey, i thought this was a helpful exercise because it boosted peoples confidence and helped people to come off scripts for their songs.

SINGING milestone 2

PRACTICE ROUTINE COMPULSORY CONTENTS	USE THE EXERCISES IN THIS ROUTINE	AND/OR YOUR OWN EXERCISES IN EACH TECHNIQUE describe each below
POSTURE	Stand with feet slightly apart Gently roll head in a circle and bring to rest upright. Shoulders will be back, you are in the perfect position for singing!	Jog on the spot for say 30 seconds and then jump to a hault and relax the shoulders, neck and arms.
BREATH CONTROL	breathe in for 4 counts, hold for 4 counts, sing out on a single note for as long as you can	imagine there is a balloon full of air in diapragm area, fill the balloon with air, then slowly release the air bit by bit, through a very small hole on the balloons surface. In order to do that breathe out with the sound 'sssss' (not 'shhh') using your breath as well as your teeth and tongue. This trains our diaphragm and its surrounding muscles to be able to maintain a constant amount of tension when we sing, and also trains our breath CONTROL, so that we will be able to manipulate the dynamics or the loud and the soft of a song with greater ease.
VOICE PLACEMENT AND INTONATION	Play any note on the piano in the middle range and sing it back. Try again with 2 notes next to each other then 3 and so on. Try again with leaps between notes.
TONE	Train the muscles with the “yawn” technique to find the best relaxed and open throat and raises soft palate position. Sing vee-ay-ah-oo on different degrees of the scale.	go up the scale with the sounds 'la-ga' but without moving the jaw so to do this place 2 fingers on your chin.
PROJECTION	Keeping the muscles relaxed as above practise exercises at a quiet volume and then with a step taken back	Start on the first note of the scale you want to sing, breathe deeply through your nose and mouth simultaneously, and begin singing the scale, pushing each note out progressively louder. Use the air and diaphragm: Never push with your throat. Practice releasing your breath slowly and evenly behind each note in the scale.
FLEXIBILITY	Practise ARPEGGIOS on different degrees of the scale, or groups of rising and falling notes	Sing “ah” on a note near the bottom of your range, then sing “ah” on the second note in the major scale. Return to the first note, then sing the third note in the major scale. Return to the first note again. Continue until you jump an entire octave.
RANGE	Practise exercises which extend over AN OCTAVE on different degrees of the scale. Practise exercises which include octave leaps	I have been using the same, singing out with sound 'la'.
DICTION	Sing sentences eg “the tip of the tongue and the lips and the teeth” and tongue twisters eg “red lorry, yellow lorry” on different degrees of the scale and at different speeds	I do the same but also with 'unique newyork'.

element	progress	target	date	progress	target	date	progress	target	date
Breath control	breathe in for 4 hold for 4 and i sang out on a single note for 29 seconds.	sing out on a single note for 35 seconds.	11/03/13	breathe in 4,      hold 4 and i sang out on a single note for 36 seconds.
Voice placement/ intonation
tone
projection
flexibility
range
diction
other
other

12/02/13 drama lesson

In this lesson we did a run through of act one which we had blocked, but after the break in between lessons we had some character changes, Beth who was playing Rizzo is now playing Miss Lynch, Abbie who was playing Miss Lynch is now playing Roger, Lyndsey who was playing Roger is now playing Rizzo.

Evaluation sheet - The Snow Queen - December 2012

What did you learn during this production process that was most valuable?
From the production of The Snow Queen i learnt that it is most important to cater to the specific audience, because we had young children as our audience we had to make sure what we did was understandable to them and also that it was appropriate for their age group, obviously it varies with the different types of audience you have but i feel this is most valuable because it means they can connect more with what they have come to see, it will keep them engaged and obviously will be more enjoyable for them. I feel that we didn't look enough into research before performing, i think next time it would help us if we got a friend or a family member who was the same age etc of the target audience to come in so we could question them on the type of things they enjoy, how we could keep them engaged etc so that we could get more knowledge before hand.


Which sessions, or part of sessions, were the most interesting?.. and the least interesting?
I found the session in which we decided the initial storyline for The Snow Queen was very interesting because it was a lesson in which the whole class could put our imagination together and we came up with great background stories for characters and factors that made the scenes more interesting, for example we came up with a background story for the crow that he used to be the Finn-man until he got put under a spell by the evil Snow Queen, and also 'Mama-Rose' was allowed by the Snow Queen to keep a couple of the children that she captures (the flower children) to have as her own, and the flower children remember nothing of their past, we made this background story evident, when both the flower children tell eachother of their dream lastnight of families that looked so perfect as if they were their own but Mama Rose gets angry and tells them it's lies.
I also enjoyed the sessions when we made some of the scenery for the set all together, for example the snowflakes which were hung from the lighting rig and the flowers which were arranged around the flower garden.


What skill or production role would you like to explore further/develop next term as a result of The Snow Queen production this term?
In The Snow Queen production my role was costume and props, so for this i created icycles for the frozen children to wear whilst they were in the Snow Queens palace. I created them with silver shiny card which i rolled into a cone shape, i then attached blue wirey fabric to it and then created rings out of garden wire which attached the cones to the frozen childrens arms. I would of enjoyed this role more if we hadn't already had the majority of the costumes already in the costume cupboard and i had longer to make something but i felt that costume for that particular production was not very exciting in my view. So for next term i would like to explore set or makeup as they interest me and i feel that i could have a bigger responsibilty for them and i will get to do/learn more.


How effective was your contribution to the production process of The Snow Queen?
In the Snow Queen i felt that my contribution was effective as i was positive about it and excited for it so i put in my thoughts and ideas which i'm sure helped in some way. I also provided some of the props for the flower garden which was my main area in the production. I feel that i put a decent amount of energy and enthusiasm into the piece and helped in the planning process of the flower garden scene and what 'Mumma Rose' and the other flower child would be saying etc.


Which parts of the production process did you find frustrating/difficult?
I found that when people lost enthusiasm and energy it was a little frustrating and difficult because it held the production process back because some people weren't committing . I feel that in the future this can be avoided if we don't just over-run scenes too much and have different tasks every half an hour for example. I think this would help some people stay on task because it means they aren't just doing one thing over and over again until it becomes boring to them.