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REFRENCES

Ausdance. (2018). Warm-up and cool-down safe rules for Dance. [online] Available from: http://ausdance.org.au/articles/details/warm-up-and-cool-down-rules-for-safe-dance [Accessed 6th March 2018] 

Vocal warm ups. (2018) New York Eye and Ear Infirmary of Mount Sinai [online] Available from: http://www.nyee.edu/patient-care/otolaryngology/voice-swallowing/therapy/vocal-warm-ups  [Accessed 12th March 2018]   

YouTube. (2010). Pulled - The Addams Family Musical (lyrics). (online) Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-KlKgcASaY [Accessed 15th March 2018]

YouTube. (2008). Special Avenue Q  [online] Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vttQxqFZQYk [ Accessed 15th March 2018]

YouTube. (2009). Maybe I like it This Way - The Wild Party [online] Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ew8MgKv8kQc [ Accessed 16th March 2018] 

YouTube. (2012). Jesus Christ Superstar (73) I don’t know how to love him [online] Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lS2nX4fuzqc [Accessed 4th March 2018]

 YouTube. (2012). Basic Ballet tendu [online] Available from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHR845MEY1I [Accessed 10th March 2018]

Streeton Jane, Raymond Phillips (2014). The singing on stage: An actors guide Bloomsbury press. (London).

Styan, John. L (1963). The elements of drama. Cambridge university press.

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ATTRIBUTES OF A PERFORMER

CONFIDENCE - As  a performer it is important to have self confidence and confidence is the key to delivering the best possible performance. 

PROFESSIONALISM-  Every performer has to maintain a professional attitude throughout any experience they may encounter whether that be shows, rehearsals, or auditions. 

DETERMINATION- Determination and drive is the key to a successful career.

PASSION- A performer needs to understand how to be passionate about everything they do. 

punctuality- On time for rehearsals and auditions 

POSITIVITY- Performers need to stay positive at all times, in this industry of work performers need to  be prepared for the success and rejection. 

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HEALTH AND SAFETY AS A PERFORMER

The knowledge of health and safety is vital to know as performers. Health and safety procedures avoid any sort of injury or damage to our bodies. Everybody must be made aware of these procedures in order to maintain a safe environment.

Before we begin a rehearsal we must be aware of our surroundings at all times ensuring that the rehearsal space is clear, clean and tidy. By instilling cleanliness and tidiness were are preventing any accidents that may occur throughout the day. 

singing

The warm ups may increase blood flow to muscles and other tissues, thin out thick secretions, and decrease use of excessive muscular tension, but of course we are not positive. Perhaps there are certain patterns of coordinated motor activity that are most optimal for performing a specific vocal task, and perhaps the vocal warm-ups allow us to "access" those patterns. And again, we are not certain. So we are left, at the moment, with carefully considering hypotheses and subjective experience. With that caution, we believe that warm ups improve the performance of the individual muscles of the thorax (chest), larynx and upper vocal tract (throat, mouth), as well as the coordination between the subsystems of voice production, namely the lungs, larynx, and upper airway articulators. Every warm up routine contains a number of different exercises to focus upon different muscles and different movements. Warm ups are hypothesized to improve performance and to contribute to the prevention of injury.

http://www.nyee.edu/patient-care/otolaryngology/voice-swallowing/therapy/vocal-warm-ups 

In classes we perform various vocal warm ups before we begin a day of rehearsals. 

Yawn-Sigh

Inhale slowly on a yawn Feeling  the air hit  the back of the throat. Keep the jaw hanging and relaxed. 

Exhale slowly. Keep your head and shoulders still but relaxed, not stiff.

Repeat the inhaled yawn – vocalize as you exhale. Repeat again and vary the pitch as you vocalize.

Using ‘hmmm’ 

Produce a gentle “hmmmm” on an exhalation at a pitch that is comfortably positioned to you moving up the scale, you then repeat and change the hmm to “ahhh” halfway through the exhaled breath trying to change nothing but the opening of the mouth.

Experiment with the pitch. Produce while varying the pitch from high to low and then low to high, exercising the vocal chords.

Lip Buzzing 

Put the lips loosely together and exhale by vibrating the lips as though like a motor boat.

Repeat the inhaled yawn, and vocalize as you trill your lips.

Repeat again, and sweep up in pitch then back down. If this begins to tickle your lips and nose, then it is being done correctly. 

HUH! 

After a slowly but deeply breathing in , expel sharply by contracting the abdominal muscles hard with a loud “HUH!” The larynx and throat should stay relaxed and open. This is a difficult exercise and  focus must be maintained on separating the contractions of the abdominals with the maintenance of relaxed upper airway. 

Tongue trills 

Lightly place your tongue tip behind your upper teeth and exhale while vibrating your tongue tip in a trill.

Repeat the inhaled yawn, and vocalize as you trill your tongue each time moving up a scale. 

Dance 

A thorough warm-up begins with exercises and stretches followed by more specific steps and movement combinations that gradually build to cause perspiration without becoming out of breath.

As muscles get warmer, they also become more flexible.

The best muscle warmer is your circulation, so the trick is to increase your blood flow by slowly exercising. In addition to tuning your body, this also cuts down on muscle soreness after exercise.

http://ausdance.org.au/articles/details/warm-up-and-cool-down-rules-for-safe-dance 

Before any sort of exercise it is important to warm up our body muscles to prevent injury. 

Jogging on the spot 

This is a good start to a physical/stretch warm up this eases our body into being prepared for more vigurous exercise. 

neck Isolations 

Isolations is a term used to describe a series of warm ups in dance class that help your body to feel more agile. This warm up is usually performed with the feet slightly apart standing in a neutral position. 

The aim of isolations is to focus on one body part at a time. With  hands placed on your hips and the rest of your body is to be  perfectly still, we then begin looking to the right  and then left. This warms up the muscles of the neck. You can also slowly circle the head by dropping the head down, to the right, back and left. Repeating this in a circular motion. 

Heel raises 

To warm up the calves and hamstrings, we place our  feet together with the toes facing the front of the room.  With a perfectly straight spine we  raise our heels off of the floor, balancing on the toes we Then lower the heels to the floor and keep repeating this movement until the calves feel warm.

Hip swings 

The hips are another part of the body that can be  warmed  up during isolations. Holding the same stance as in the neck isolations,  we move our hips to the right and then left we need to make  sure to keep the rest of our  bodies as still as possible. You can also circle the hips by pushing them to the right, to the back of the room, to the left and then front. Reverse this motion to the opposite side keeping our centre completely still. 

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As part of our  module we have one of our last up coming assessments which involves two filmed performances of our choice. I decided that I am going to perform a song and a monologue. While searching for various musical theatre songs that I am going to use for audition material I came across the song above which is ‘I dont know how to love him’ from the musical Jesus Christ Superstar. This is the song I am going to perform for my assessment also. I feel as though the range is varied in this piece and it will give me a chance to showcase my singing ability well through the pace of the song. ATS (acting through song) will also have to be used in this performance in order to have an effect on the audience watching, this will also help me as a performer to show and feel emotion in my piece and give a good performance. I understand that when I sing I have a tendency to not put my  diaphragm to its full use and in result a smaller vocal sound comes out of my mouth. However in this performance and in any up coming performances I am going to focus on using my diaphragm as this will create a louder sound it will also help if I bend my knees slightly and anchor. When attempting to anchor we stand with our feet slightly apart knees bent and hands together depending on which way you want to do it, we then tense/squeeze our diaphragm while singing a note  and that note  that comes out is automatically louder than it was before our diaphragm was engaged. I need to pay close attention to this technique and use it in my performances. 

Monologue

‘’Help me!, Help me! I just saw somebody kill somebody! It was Ernie Williams, Ernie Williams just got killed!.. Calm down?? No I will not calm down!.. Wait a minute, I know you..High school that’s right! you had a crush on me you had all this crazy hair I’d come over you’d get all nervous and start sweatin’, sweaty Eddie I called you sweaty Eddie DAMN! You may remember me as Deloris but now its Deloris Van Cartier!…I’m sorry what? Hide me? HIDE ME? you cant hide me! how you gonna hide aalllllll of this! well you better think of a better plan because I ain’t eve.. EDDIE! were you going Eddie?! Eddie you forgot your gun!! (sighs) well ain’t this just my lucky day huh? I got a guy who’s out to kill me and a cop who’s supposed to be protecting me without a gun! goody goody.’’ 

This monologue is from the musical Sister Act and is performed by the character of Deloris. This piece is one of the first monologues that I performed at university. It is also a monologue that I am extremely familiar with and I feel I perform it really well. When performing this I am going to be able to showcase another type of accent that I am good at and feel this monologue will enable me to showcase my acting skills to the fullest potential. I decided on this monologue as I enjoy the comedic yet serious type role of the character. The character in this monologue is also a very outlandish person which I enjoy to play to. I have been given feedback in the past which was to always be aware of making my performances larger than life as this is musical theatre and energy plays a big part in making a performance effective. I will take this into consideration at all times and do this on assessment day.

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Maybe I like it this way - The Wild Party 

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Pulled- The Addams Family 

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Special - Avenue Q 

To help improve our repertoire folders  we were given a couple of songs to learn which we could perfect and use as audition material. These are a few of them. 

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A CHORUS LINE

Advanced practical skills 

 The assessment for our advanced practical skills module consisted of a small studio performance of A Chorus Line. This involved performing two songs with dances together as a class ‘One’, ‘I hope I get it’ and a chosen monologue. 

I chose to perform a monologue from the character of Valerie Clarke. 

‘’So the day after i turned 18 i got on that trail ways bus kissed the folks good bye and headed straight for the big bad apple. Because I wanted to be a Rockette!...oh yeah lets get one thing straight see i never heard about the red shoes I never saw the red shoes I didn't give  a fuck about the red shoes! I wanted to be a Rockette because this girl in my home town euhh? Luella Hiener had actually gotten out and made it to New York and she was a Rockette well she came home this one Christmas and they gave her a parade a god dam parade! I twirled a baton on my head for two hours in the rain!, unfortunately though she got knocked up over Christmas ha! merry Christmas and she never made it back to radio city’’. 

Valerie is one of the characters in A chorus line who initially makes it past the final cut she is described as being very sassy confident and loud she is also known in the production as being the attention seeker and has a very direct approach in the things she says.  Unlike many of the other female dancers on the line for the audition , Val was not inspired by The ‘Red shoes’ as she clearly states in the monologue. She initially wished to become a Rockette after a girl from her hometown by the name of Luella Heiner did just that. After Vallerie found out that this girl became pregnant she  took the opportunity for herself and moved to New York city after she turned 18. However her Rockette audition was not successful and she started trying for Broadway shows instead, to also fund no  success until seeing a dance card which revealed that she was being judged on her appearance. After getting plastic surgery done on various areas of her body job came rolling in.

I chose to do this monologue for my assessment as i felt it  would showcase my acting skills well, one of my strong areas in acting is accents and this is an American production so it gave me the opportunity to showcase that as well. When I first performed my monologue I took a more laid back approach in my portrayal using more arm actions. I figured through the use of lines such as ‘I didn’t give a fuck about the red shoes’ she was that type of character. My tutor advised me to take my approach from a different angle in order to have more of an impact on the audience, he advised me that if i tried my monologue again but this time having less movement and using the portrayal of a more loud and confident character it may work better. I tried again approaching it this way and discovered there were more ways I could go with the emotion of my character and I developed a better way of using different performance styles within my monologue.  

As a class we focused on practicing the vocals from  the number ‘One’. In a session we were given lyrics and sheet music to help us learn the song. I found reading the sheet music slightly easier as I have been studying my music notations however I need to grasp that fully. I now understand the rhythmic timing of the music through paying attention to the notes on the paper  and I am now able to recognize certain notes by name. The things I struggled with during learning this piece from paper was actually seeing the two part harmony on the page and knowing were to come in because of the way it was set out, I now however understand this due to practicing in lessons and I have looked at other pieces of two part harmony music in order to improve on this and be able to follow correctly in future. 

Choreography 

The choreography in the original performance of ‘One’ is a very stylistic. The movements are very sharp and precise yet rather simplistic. Our choreography for this number was kept quite similar to the original the same type of movements were used. For example arm extensions, patterns, and synchronization were all involved in our piece. If performed with the correct technique the choreography can be really effective to an audience however if not performed correctly the performance will lack intent. Even though the movements used are simple if they are done using the right technique they can have just as much of an effect on an audience as complicated choreography would. I feel I am always aware of my movement and bodily stance as a dancer how ever I am not always aware of my facial expressions as I sometimes focus to hard on what it is that I am actually doing I understand that to give the best performance facial expressions play a big part and I will be so much more aware of this in future performances. 

On the  assessment day I thought I performed my monologue fluently and did a great performance. I felt that I was  focused throughout and gave 100% commitment to everything I was doing. 

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DANCE

Our first session back at dance consisted of performing our set physical warm up from the previous year. The purpose of this warm ups is to increase our heart rate and to help enable our fitness to fully progress, our muscles will also become stronger in result of this. I feel as though my fitness has improved massively since last year due to this warm up and other vigorous exercise.

The main focus today was on our core muscles. We performed exercises such as plié, bar work, and an small exercise lying on our backs moving the abdominal muscles slowly by relaxing when breathing in and tensing while breathing out. This exercise helps to strengthen our core muscles while at the same time making us as performers more aware of our breathing while engaging the center of our bodies.  As performers I feel it is vital to have a strong core as our center is one of the most important parts of being a dancer for example when we turn, jump kick etc our center stomach muscles hold us up and avoid us from losing balance and falling over. Following on from this exercise we worked on plies. While performing a plie we need to ensure that our posture is correct, our  Pelvis is neutral and our core is engaged, however if we do not do this it is easy to fall forward  out of the plie and we will find it really hard to keep balance. I feel as though I have been working hard on my core strength but in order for my technique to be correct  I need to work a lot harder  to make it as strong as it needs to be, to do this I will perform exercises such as sit ups and and  plank which will in result make my centre muscles stronger. 

Tendu exercises are something we pay close attention to in dance classes. 

Without tendu (and its partner tendu jeté or dégagé) there would be no assemblé or grand jeté or entrechat quatre. Movements would lack the finish of a pointed foot and jumps would land awfully hard. But that’s not all that would be missing from classical or contemporary dance technique without tendu.Though it may seem the working leg is the most important part of practicing tendu, you might be surprised to learn that the standing leg is equally critical.Tendu is a dancer’s first experience standing on one leg (at least in a technical and conscientious way). It may not be instantly recognizable, but this is where preparation begins for poses like arabesque. Jazz and modern dancers practice tendu with both turned out and parallel rotation because they balance (or center themselves over a leg) in both turned out and parallel positions.

http://www.danceadvantage.net/improve-tendu/ 

 Tendu  is very small movement yet is also the base upon which all other movements are built. When performing this movement we need to ensure that our weight is balanced out over the three points of the foot. When closing the tendu we need to be aware of our weight and holding our centre msucles together. If we are lingering or leaning over the standing leg, we  may be lifting up  the working hip and not properly creating resistance between the foot and floor. 

Basic Ballet Tendu movement-  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AHR845MEY1I

Our dance lessons have also consisted on working on a Jazz/commercial based routine from the musical Heather’s. The routine is to be performed to  a song by the name of ‘Candy Store’. The choreography in this routine consists of  a wide amount of characterization and a mixture of different styles of dance. I personally enjoyed carrying out  this routine as I have a lot of experience in various dance styles and especially one that  is mainly used in this routine which is Jazz dance. I found this piece of choreography really easy to pick up on and easy to remember. However I feel I needed to work on my characterization through this piece as I have a tendency to focus too hard on what it is that I am  actually doing rather than the whole performance element as a whole, and I understand that to make a performance effective in anything you are doing  facial expressions and development of character (using the elements of acting) are definitely needed as well as the correct dance technique. Flexibility is something that has always came natural to me however when I watched back a video of the dance I noticed that in a certain part of the routine were a jazz kick was choreographed at one point when performing this move I slightly fell off balance, after noticing  this I realized that even though I have good flexibility I still need good core strength  in order to help maintain the correct technique. In order to achieve this I will continue to do core exercises and build my abdominal muscles to build a strong center which will help me with all dance movement. 

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SINGING

In our first session back we recapped on the various singing qualities used in voice production: Sob, Twang, Speech ,Operatic, Falsetto ,Belt. Doing this helped to refresh my knowledge on how to perform a song to the best of my ability using the correct technique.

 In the first session we carried out a short exercise which involved singing the song ‘Happy Birthday’ while at the same time interpreting the Humanistic Theory of fight or indulge. We paired up and sang the song one at a time then at the same time to one another.  The purpose of this exercise was to broaden our understanding towards the application of theory and how we can make an audience feel through the humanistic approaches. 

ATS - Acting through song 

‘When you sing songs much of the ‘acting’ has been done before you get there by the lyricist or composer. They have directed you as to the rythm, pitch, speed and dynamics. As the singer/interpreter, sometimes all you have to do is connect and trust. At the point you realise that actually, you are the centre of all this- not Shakespeare, not Mozart, not Sondheim! you are at the helm of the ship and now you are free to let your own imagination deeper the understanding of your audience. You must respect both the music and the poetry but you can and must be yourself, bringing your own individual interpretation to the song you are performing’. (Streeton and Raymond, 2014) 

Humanistic approaches link in to the ATS also know as Acting through song. This is a stylistic choice which is chosen by the performer or the composer to enhance the delivery of a song which will then engage and effect and audience in a certain way. In class our tutor taught us about this through using the idea of either ‘fighting’ or ‘indulging’. These two examples are quite obviously shown through many songs. 

‘Fight’

This strategy consists of qualities such as being quick and direct and delivering a message to an audience with a strong and powerful intent. 

Induldge

This strategy consists of qualities such as being light and free the delivery will be shown through flexible and sustained notes. 

Often the choice of whether to fight or indulge will be shown through the lyrics in the song. For example If a character is upset or angry more likely the fighting strategy will be used were as if a character is happy or in love the strategy to indulge would be used. Even though these are just two ideas of how the strategies are commonly portrayed  there are many various ways a performer can use ATS in order to portray a character and deliver a message to an audience.  

Sight reading 

Continuing on from this, once we had studied the humanistic theory as a class we began to look at sheet music dissecting each line and looking much further in to detail. Through looking in to the sheet music we were able to gain a better understanding of it, we could also see the writers intent, and from doing this  I was able to figure out  how I would decide on which qualities I should use in a song order to deliver the lines correctly and give the best performance possible. I now have a wider understanding of musical notation and this will help me throughout my performance career. I have studied and continue to study the picture shown below in order to gain higher knowledge on music notes. 

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ACTING

During our first week back we discussed the elements of acting and how they are used in performance.

Elements of Acting 

1: The given circumstances- the context the character lives in and the evidence that is given.

2: various relationships - who you are as this character and  why people matter to you. 

3: Objective - what the character wants to achieve within the role. 

4: Beat - a certain point within a scene where the characters objective changes. This could be a change of thought or a change in a certain situation.  

5: Obstacle - something standing in the way of the character’s objective 

6: strategy - This is the plan or aim  to get what they want.

7: tactics - moment to moment actions taken to implement your strategy.

8: Evaluation - a moment when an impulsive action is restrained and multiple possibilities for action are considered, rejected or accepted.

9:  Inner monologue - constant stream of thoughts, feelings, sensations and impulses that are explained but not always exposed.

‘How is an actor to be judged without knowing what he is undertaking and what demands are being put upon him?. How is the effect of a colour tone on a scene to be conisdered without an understanding of the intention of that scene?’. 

(Styan 1960) 

The elements of acting are used by actors with the aim to develop a better understanding of the piece they may be working towards. By applying the elements of acting to a performance the actor is able to understand a various amount of things about their character that they may not have had a great understanding of to begin with, for example the relationships their character has with other characters, different feelings/emotions, aims, or actions. Over all through using the elements of acting to analyse the piece you are studying you are able to see beyond a written monologue and have a further understanding of how to bring a performance to life. 

As part of our research we were to find and learn a monologue best suited to our own personal abilities that we were then to perform to our peers, at the same time attempting to apply the elements of Acting to our performance. 

I chose a monologue from Sister Act. The character i portray in the monologue is Deloris Van Cartier. In the scene Deloris is rushing into the police station as she needs to deliver news to the police department that she has just witnessed a murder. However further into the monologue she discovers that the police officer she is about to speak to is somebody she attended high school with that according to Deloris had a crush on her. This performance portrays a very confident and humorous character. When attempting to apply the elements of acting to my monologue I noticed more of an in sight in to my characters personality, I was able to understand her Objective, I also understood there was a numerous amount of beats in the piece ( when the objective changes/ thought, or change in the situation) for example she is in a panic to deliver the news and her thought process changes when she notices that she recognizes the police officer which results in a change in the situation. 

 Through carrying out this exercise and researching further into the elements of acting and also having to think about the applying these elements to my performance I have developed a wider understanding of the fact that the elements of acting play a major part in how we chose to portray a character and how we result in performing a monologue as a whole. The knowledge I have gained from this practice will help me in future performances.

‘All the best performers bring to their role something more, something different than what the author put on paper. that’s what makes theater live that’s why it persists’ - Stephen Sondheim  

Working in pairs we were asked to create a small performance, each pair  using the monologues we chose to perform previously mine being from Sister Act and my partners being a short scene from the movie ‘Misery’. Both monologues were to be performed as normal however the opposite person had to respond by answering any sentences that could be used as  questions in the other monologue. This is known as the ‘listening exercise’. Once we had taken turns of responding to one another’s piece we then each took turns to let the other person perform their monologue as normal. After completing this task then performing my monologue as normal again afterwards I felt that this exercise really helped me to understand changes in my thought process and i was more aware of what i was saying the next time around. Carrying this out helped with my emotion through the monologue and in result made the way I was performing feel more natural  throughout. This task enabled me to really step into the scene and bring the character I was trying to portray to life.

Continuing on from this, In lessons  we have been working on an exercise called Point of Concentration. The aim of this exercise is to try and distract the performer by focusing on something other than what they are actually saying in their monologue. The aim of distraction in this task was to fold up  a various amount of clothes on a table. I have tried this exercise using two different monologues my first monologue being the one I spoke about previously from Sister Act and the other which is from the musical a Chorus Line, the character in this monologue is Vallerie is a woman who tells the story of her dream of wanting to become a Rockette and why. When performing my monologue from A Chorus Line  in class previously I have been given feed back from my tutor. I was told that I take too many pauses for the monologue to seem realistic and I was advised to go away and try the listening exercise explained above in order to help with this. I did this and I felt as though it worked to a certain extent but I was still struggling with trying to make my monologue seem natural to myself and to an audience. However when I tried out the Point of concentration exercise my monologue automatically felt a lot more natural to me and according to my peers it seemed more realistic to them as an audience. The sentences became real and I also felt more relaxed. This was due to being distracted and not having to focus so much on the words I was saying. During lessons further on from this I have found that when performing my monologue my delivery is so much better and I feel more comfortable and natural doing so. I will take the knowledge I have gained from my these exercises in acting lessons and use them in future in order to give the best performances possible.