We started off by planning what we were going to do for this performance, as we knew we would only have a few rehearsals for this performance we would pick the songs that we were most confident with, we chose to do the songs that we were mainly working on at the time, these included two songs that really utilized everyone as an ensemble, which were 'We are the champions' and 'Radio Ga Ga'. and then the next three songs in the set were songs that showed off all of the characters and helped show a ruff story-line of the show, yet still had the potential to involve others of the cast. In this first rehearsal we split off into groups that we were performing songs in. I was in a group with the other Galileo in the show and the two Scaramouche. I made the suggestion that we should perform the song 'Under Pressure', we choose to do this as we had already worked on it vocally in the past, so for the demands of this performance all we would have to do is adapt it to fit in with the ensemble feel of this performance. We planned out that we would have to split it evenly in the middle of the song, so Megan and Amber would take the first half and then myself and Holly would take the second half of the song and then we would come together at the end of the show.
When it came to rehearsing to number we began by just running it a couple of times with just a simple backing track off of YouTube, this worked really well where we decided to split the song in half, as it fell on a softer part of the song. However we began to develop the number more we looked into parts of the song where we could incorporate the other couple into the other sections, one part that we found would work was the underlying bass line to the song, as for this performance we wouldn't have a full band, and just a piano, it worked really well when having the other performer singing the bass line under the song as it kept the rhythm going throughout the song, this also made this song that is traditionally just sang as a duet, more of a fitting ensemble number. This then developed to having the whole cast singing this bass line under the duet and bring the song to life by utilizing the whole ensemble. Me and my partner Holly explored different things to do during the song, this came into two different actions that we would be doing, one would be aiming the song at each other and really bringing the focus in on the two characters and then others making the intense sections of the song out into the audience to make them feel really involved in the song.
Thursday
This was our last rehearsal of this workshop piece before we were to perform it to the high school audience. We were in before our scheduled lesson to work on sections that we felt were weaker. On that we felt really wasn't at the same level as the other songs in our set was the song 'Radio Ga Ga' the vocals for this song were strong yet the over all performance didn't match our vocal performance. In this morning short rehearsal we also spent some time working on how we were going to run the workshop section of this performance. We all worked out who would be doing what part of it, when explaining it and also who would be working with who. When in a normal rehearsal we would often work with our double cast or our partner in the show,so mine would be Megan or Scaramouche. for this i suggested that i thought that it would work better if we were all mixed up a bit more as we always tend to work with the same people, as it works well with the flow of the show. For this workshop exercise i thought that it would be good for me to work with one of the Killer Queens as my character never has any interactions with them in the show, so both of us would have a different look at the show.
When it came to rehearsing the song 'Radio Ga Ga' two of our cast members took a lead on this song as they had came up with most of the choreography for this number before. We began by going through the dance and making sure that everyone in the song was happy with what they were doing. We felt that it was valuable that everyone was at the same level, as if some people in the performance was less confident and that came across to an audience, this would drag down the quality of the performance as that would be all the audience could focus on. This didn't take too much time out of our rehearsal, as we were all working together and everyone was paying attention so we could work really quickly through the song and get it done. Also in this morning rehearsal we got the opportunity to sing through all of the songs in our set, i was really happy to do this as this was my first chance to sing my song with all of the ensemble support, of them singing the bass line, this really helped me as i could then use my peers to work on my timing and really hit the marks in the song that were in direct correlation to the music. We also got the chance to add some harmony lines into the song 'we are the champions' this really showed off our vocal skills, which i felt for this performance was key,as for this song there wasn't much going on physically as it was just basic blocking, of walking around the space. So with the technique of harmony it just added something else to our technical performance.
Over all for the performance at Durrington High School went really well, we all worked really well as an ensemble, this really showed in the opening and closing songs, where it was really clear that we were all working together, when on stage we had great communication on stage, for example something went wrong when someone was in the wrong space during a dance number, but where we had communication and when everyone was on the ball, so we could work our way around it. Where everyone was really paying attention to what everyone was doing, people were less likely to go wrong, whereas if i was only focusing on myself i could have been out of time with everyone as i would have been in a world of my own, but where i was really on the ball i could keep in time and make everyone's performance seem really slick and professional. Personally i feel that i performed with flair and professionalism, i really made the effort to give it my all, this i felt gave a lot of people in the cast an extra boost as they tried to meet my energy.
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