Unit 3 community arts project

22 May  We have began a community arts project at Lord Scudamore primary school. When we first arrived, we met with Sarah Watkins who is the project coordinator. This was to discuss  the advice we could give the children, how the project was doing, and it's aims. The reason why the project is a community one is that it unites teachers, pupils, a director, Estelle Van Warmelo, RNC pupils, and a teenage composer named Livvy who is Estelle's daughter. To prepare, we listened to the river song, and read the script. The project is based on the River Wye, which runs through Hereford and is a local topic. In order to compose the piece, the children wrote poems and stories which Estelle took to base the script upon. The piece also contains historical and geographical information. The aim is to educate, inform and entertain the audience, which is the same mission statement as the BBC uses. The venue will be the Left Bank Complex and due to its current state the building are not making the school pay. Community Arts projects are intitled to getting funding depending on the scale of the piece. However as the school will repeat the project next year the school aren't applying this time. However, they will pay Estelle a small fund for the project.  My first experience of the project was interesting as I was able to watch the children practice their lines. Our main job was to help the boy who played Skipper to learn his lines. So many children had lines, we had to spend a little time on each, helping them to project. The main issue I found was that we had to explain how lines were supposed to be said. For example, the words one moment can be said in different ways with different meanings. I also had to give them inspiration, like to seaze each moment and make their character big. Some were very shy but most were confident and learnt a lot from our tips. Projection was a key skill to work on.  This week, I intend to advise them on looking in to their characters. So what does the Bird Watcher want to say, or how is one of the sunbathers feeling. Also, learning techniques are important, and ways to behave on stage. I may try and sit far away so I can point out that people at the back will not hear. Meanings of words and punctuation will also help the children improve.  6 June  Estelle Van Warmelo, our local director, invited us to help with the community arts project. We planned a rehearsal schedule, over a few Mondays,  to help. Our job was tobe  assistant directors.  We went to Lord Scudamore school to help in different aspects. Some students knew their words, others did not. Some needed to work on the song, and others on their internation.  For example, the bubble children had to work on their timings and organisation of their piece. They had to project the words I am the river, as it was too quiet. Skipper, the  main character, knew all of his lines but needed to work on phrases like   Minnows flicker, and the river is born. It was a chance to help them by motivating them, for example the sunbathers using different internation. For example when sunbathers 2 and 3 said not yet, they needed to sound different to each other, and making their parts individual and special. During the first week we were given the script and got a feel for the piece, and helped the students work to the piece. My responsibilities  were to assist and direct the children. I helped them with their scripts,  and confidence. It was my job to encourage them, motivate them and give them a greater understanding of what they are saying. I also had to help with the song. Not everyone knew how to sing each line, the script, and the internation. I felt I also had to boost their confidence as some were shy or didn't quite comprehend  Estelle's directions. We were able to work with the teachers, children, and with the track from the composer, Olivia.




20 June
Today we attended a rehearsal in the Left Bank buildings, where the children wouldn't be used to performiing. Estelle Van Warmelo did a quick talk to say that the accoustics would be difficult, and as the children were not at school, they needed to project even more. They would also need to get used to the space. She also mentioned that there were a lot ofr challenges to face due to the new space. She advised the children to speak clearer, slower and louder.
Another difference was that there were 7 different performance spaces for the children, the audience woudl travel along through the building behind the actors. When outside and with background noises like sirens this would make the acoustics difficult.
Overall, due to the new setting the children were more distracted as it was a new space with large rooms. This made them very giddy and oftne hindered them as their high enthusiasm made them make mistakes. For example, Skipper played by Paul was so excited he missed bits of text and didn't speak clearly. Also there were so many directors, we did not get as big a  role and it was a little manic. However there were so many children in so many different scenes, in 7 settings we needed the amount of people holding it together. Also when the children would have to perform 3 times in any weather condition. We will view the final performance on Wednesday 29 June so we can see the childrens' progress. However some of the quiet children have really grown in confidence. They seem to have a greater understanding of what their lines mean.   30 June  Yesterday we were able to watch the childrens' final performance. They were very excited, and when I saw the sun bather girls, they seemed nervous. They all performed very well. Certain kids who had confidence problems were much louder, happier to perform, and in character. It was a very great experience, for example, listening to a professional director work with the children, and giving them my own advice. I think I could be capable of taking that role as you need. A mixture of caring and encouraging traits, but with the ability to keep the children focussed. The children used the space well, and the message was well displayed. I think the mission statement was met, and the kids were a credit to their school, and Hereford. I may consider using these skills for a community project in the future. 

First take on my monologue

 https://youtu.be/w3Gr-DU3-Y4
This is my first sight read take of my monologue from When we are married. I was able to gain feedback and ways to improve.

Danielle 2nd take

https://youtu.be/fqsPdP2w6-kThis shows my second attempt

https://youtu.be/fqsPdP2w6-kThis shows my second attempt at reading mty poem. It shows an improvement to my diction, and also shows my skill of listening to constructive criticism

Warm up with relaxation

https://youtu.be/p_e48nU0qPI


I gave a full physical, diction and relaxation warm up to prepare the actors: bodies, minds

Voice character hot seat

Danielle hotseating monologue character  For developing voice, we each have a monologue to learn and read. In preparation for this, we hotseated our characters to try and get a feel for the character and their background, ideas and personality. This really helped me to get a feel for the character I am playing.

Extant workshop

https://youtu.be/NphmxkqSSaY We had a visit from a company for disabled people, Extant, who make their own theatre. They taught us about comedia del arte, states of tension, and some emprov and walking techniques as particular characters.


Spatial awareness

Characters Walking

Cake or Death

Relaxed warmup for the actor

I gave a full physical, diction and relaxation warm up to prepare the actors: bodies, minds and voices.

Professional practice, this is a new and better version of the original assignment

This is a report on professional practice in performing arts, and its impact on funding and employment in this field.  There are many claims of sexism in the BBC. Only young women seem to keep their jobs in the BBC but not older women. But, men of all ages seem to keep their jobs because apparently the look is more attractive. This causes much speculation and confusion as the BBC is a leading company and should promote equality. The Daily Mail have commented on issues related to this. There is also the large issue that only certain people can afford places at good theatre schools.  Although thousands of young people will often have the desire to perform and train at theatre schools, only people who can afford expensive fees  are able to study there. This means that equally talented working class people who could be very successful can not achieve their full potential due to money. This gives an advantage to those who have money and do not need the professional outcomes of this education as badly as others who are just as capable, potentially more so. This hands success to only those who can pay for it, and not everyone with the potential. A scholarship or bursary system should be used to help everyone access the same professional and advanced training and experience as middle class people can. Another aspect affecting employment and funding with performing arts is theatre tickets. I wanted to see Chicago this year but cannot due to the high price. Many people who like and want to see theatre cannot afford the high prices of modern theatre. Only those with a lot of money can afford to attend performances. People who cannot can either not go, or rarely attend theatre despite the amount of productions being showed.  There is often reported a lot of racism in the oscars and Brits. This is also the case in many theatre companies. There are however cases where companies aim to stop racism. Cameron Macintosh shows cast some  people with roles  where they play characters from another ethnicity to them.  Other Macintosh shows cast a lot of black performers, many Asian and many white. This is no where near the same in other companies. However, in recent years this is starting to change. This, however leaves black actors and actresses out of work due to prejudices. 

Blog update

Voice: We began looking at our solo monologue parts. At first I was a little unsure about reading my parts, because I have to use a Yorkshire accent. However, I managed to read through very well, and I was told my accent was correct. My target is to research the story, and my part, a young maid, Ruby Birtle, in Being Married.  Singing: We watched our singing performance back to see how well we did. In Rent,  we were well lit, sang very well, and were well presented, but the other stage were not as well lit.  My solo went very well, however, I had a cold and this made it difficult, despite it being unnoticeable.  Ain't no mountain was a very good send off, and most of the time we could be heard. Dance:  Today we did a fast warm up, and worked on a piece for our showcase that was from French Guyana. I worked on my solo part, as I have a solo in the Guyana song. We are piecing together different dances for the final show.  Performance workshop: We are working towards our showcase on 9 June. We worked on individual scenes like Ellie and Zizi's physical theatre, and mine, Lorlen's and Mikey's scene. We also worked  on the songs. My goal is to write my character's monologue, and choose a name for them. 

Blog update for sessions the week of 14 MARCH

This past week I have had he chance to use a lot of skills.  I have began redoing my professional practice write up. This needed work as it was not as discussed funding as it should be, but more on particular events. This blog will go up soon after additional information has been added.  I was able to take part in leading a performing arts workshop for our French exchange students. As I speak a lot of French, Ias able to translate most of the lesson. It was very interesting, teaching performing arts to students who had a language barrier. After the workshop, many said that they had enjoyed it, a lot. I think my teaching skills, by translating French, and my team work skills have really shown here.  After the French group left, we held one of our final practices for the singing performance, which was on Thursday. It was easy to see that nerves were kicking in for many people, including myself. This was mainly due to the fact that I'd missed some rehearsals to no fault of my own. This meant that my song needed extra work. This made me nervous as I felt incompetent with my song. I continued to practice in my own time too.  On Tuesdy, we had dance first. We have begun brainstorming for our end of year showcase. We have discussed which skills or types of dance to use. The previous week we had had a very interesting workshop on the Skinner release technique. This actually made a lot of sense to me because it helps you to release each body part to dance completely freely. This used graphics such as skull strings, and a shoulder routine to loosen up shoulders and remove tension. I think this technique would be very useful in dance as I have a lot of tension in my body and it helps to remove that. We also will focus on our contact improv. Here is my photographic stimulus.  These are photos of my memories and  things that have meaning to me. I'LL use this in an emotion's piece.  In Ucan, we have been brainstorming for our final piece of theatre in June. Donors bad worked with us on Weekends to pull together ideas and pieces for the showcase.  One technique he used was, we can either discard a piece and don't use it,  deliver ititho changes, or develop it for a better use. We have pieced together a brief. Our company is called Tangents, and our piece is on identity. We're idea of  the town with no name, and identities slowly taking shape. This will be discussed every week now. And changes will be made.   The singing performance finally happened, and nerves were so high.  We had a tech run through during the afternoon. Mistakes were corrected. The night went very well, all the performers did very well. My piece rather came together a lot, after many mistakes in performance.