Matilda- "School Song" Performace Evaluation

After our performance of School song we got to watch back the video that had been recorded of us performing it. The performance was in front of an audience which had our family and friends in. Before watching the video back I feel as though the performance went really well and I had done my best with showing off all of my skills which I had learnt and developed. The audience gave us feedback and also told our teachers what they thought we had done well. Some of the audience feedback which we got was, "they were all really aggressive" they said this because they hadn't seen the song before so they didn't know what to expect and thought we all presented our characters well.  Another piece of feedback we got back was "Good use of the boxes" again they hadn't seen the song before so didn't know how the boxes were going to be used but they though the boxes were a really good addition to the performance. 

Whilst watching the video I made notes on what I personally thought I had done well. I thought that we all had really good starting positions and it really showed are aggressiveness and it showed off our characters really well. I was behind the bard for the beginning of the song and I though that this looked really effective and it worked well with the theme of the song. I also though that we had really good volume from the first word that we sang and we maintained that throughout. Singing and dancing at the same time is sometimes hard from some people as they struggle to keep up with the timing of the song and will loose breathe quickly. I felt as though the whole group managed this really well and we was able to stay in time and in tune for the whole performance. Linked to this, I think that we all had really sharp movements and everything looked precise and on time. One negative is that I think we was all starting to loose facial expressions throughout the number, this may be due to focusing on getting the movements right or just because it was our first time performing in front of an audience. I also feel as though we was all in time with each other and not one person missed anything or looked out of place. This also links in with the fact we all had good interaction with each other and we performed it all together and didn't just focus on ourselves we focused on everyone. Having good interaction with each other shows that we work well with each other and we can all contribute with new ideas and we can all listen to each other. Also, i think that we all had good interaction with the audience and we all at some stage made eye contact with someone in the audience. Doing this will make the audience feel more involved in the performance. With audience relationship, we was all acting intimidating so that even the audience would feel more intimidated and scared of us. During the song, i also feel as though we all had good spacial awareness. This is because we used up a lot of the stage and we always balanced it out so there wasn't always lots of people on one side of the stage.

As a group, i think that we had good harmonies in most parts of the songs. Through some parts of the song we could hear that the harmony was lost and you couldn't hear it at all because the tune was really loud. I also think that we had really good diction throughout the song and everything was pronounced really well and it made the song sound even more effective. Also as a group, i feel as though we worked well together and we all picked choreography up well. We all remembered all the choreography for the whole song which is really good. Another area which went really well for my group was that we got all of the box section spot on and sharp. Due to getting new boxes that day, some of the letters had changed places but as a group we managed to figure out quickly what we had to change. Thankfully we didn't have to change much and on the actual performance we got all of it right and dint mess it up. 

We watched back the performance video again and we had to watch someone else. Lara watched me and gave me feedback. One piece of feedback she gave back to me was "You had good positions behind the gate at the beginning" she said that she said this because i looked menacing and more intimidating. She also said that the use of the gate was good because it looked like i was locked in jail and it fit really well with the theme of the song. The next piece of feedback she gave me was "Throughout the song i had good strong movements" she said that she said this because i was always on time and every was sharp and looked really effective. The next piece of feedback she gave me was "You knew the choreography really well" she said this because she said that through out the song i didn't have to look at anyone to see what we was doing and what was coming next. She said that i made everything look confident which was really good. Lara said that her favorite part of the performance was when Claudia and i was using the box and pulling it about between us and then had to change it sharply to G, she said that this looked really effective and it drew her eyes (from the audience) straight towards it. The next piece of feedback she gave me was that everything was really exaggerated. Lara said that she said this because the whole group looked exaggerated and it wasn't just me and she think that this made the performance look even better. The last piece of feedback Lara gave me was "you had good projection" she said that the whole song was really loud but it wasn't to loud so we wasn't shouting. She said she could hear me singing throughout the whole song which made me think that i had good projection and i was opening my mouth which would make em sing louder and in tune. 

After this performance i feel as though i still have a couple of areas that i need to work on in future performances. One main thing for me is charcterisation, i know that i need to become a lot more confident in this area and just exaggerate my character a lot more and not be small and afraid of performing it. I also feel as though i need to become more of my character quicker and not wait until the last few lessons to get into character. I also feel as though i need to work on keeping facial expressions throughout the song as well. Whilst i was concentrating on singing and dancing i wasn't focusing on charcterisation or facial expressions which i really need to do so this is the main area i need to work on. 

Matilda- Tuesday 28th February 2017

Today is our last lesson before we perform our version of "School song" to an audience. We had a longer rehearsal today so we could all make sure we knew exactly what we was doing. In this lesson we also was running through our other songs which would be in the show but were not getting marked. I feel as though running through some of the older numbers which we have done makes me see how much I have progressed and allows me to see what new skills I have developed.

We began the lesson by warming up. We started with a physical warm up which would make us all feel energised and ready to perform the song. The first exercise made us concentrate really hard and it was to make us focus on our listening skills and not to watch what other people were doing. Then we began to warm up our voices. We focused on diction and pronunciation. We done this by singing things that were sort of tongue twisters to see if we could do it or not.
After warming up, we then began rehearsing. For the first hour and a half of the lesson we was working on School Song. The whole of my dance group decided that we wanted to rehearse in costume so we could get used to it and we could become more of our character. I felt comfortable in my costume. My costume was a white shirt, red tie, black school skirt and black trainers. I think that by all of the older children wearing black trainers it made us look more rebellious.
We had one problem this lesson which was that one of the younger children, Imogen, wasn't there which made it really hard for us all to rehearse. This made it difficult when it came to the black section as we all have to work together to ensure that the blocks are always where they should be. However, we all learnt to work round this for this lesson and we knew we still needed to rehearse as well as we could so we could have the best performance possible.
Whilst wearing my costume today, I felt as though I was more of a character and not just myself. I personally feel as though I have done a much better job today at showing the audience who my character is as I feel more rebellious and more like my character than I have in other rehearsals. This rehearsal, I felt as a whole group that we had pulled it together really well and we put a lot of energy into it and we all done the best that we could with one person missing

My target for this lesson was to run through the song as many times as possible so I knew it really well and so I could focus on my characterisation which I have. I feel as though todays lesson I have progressed a lot with characterisation and I fee more confident with performing it now I have that skill better.

Matilda- Monday 27th February 2017

Today was our music lesson. To begin the lesson we started to warm up our voices and our bodies. We began warming our bodies up by doing small head rolls and small ankle circles. The small ankle circles were to ensure that we had strong ankles so that we could have a good stance and posture. Then we began to warm up our voices. We done many different warm up which would help us with singing School song. We worked a lot on diction because we knew that the song is fast and we needed to pronounce all of our words properly. We wanted to make sure that we wouldn't strain our voices throughout the lesson and keep the warm all the time. 
After fully warming up we began rehearsing through the song. My group decide we wanted to just keep running through the number so that we could make everything sharp and precise. All of our group today rehearsed with ties so we could get use to them so we could get use to them and we could see how we could use them throughout the number. We figured out that whilst we was in the section when we are bullying the younger children we could pull their ties about and make them look scruffier like the older children. Whilst wearing the ties i think that we all felt more in character and we could work on building up our characters more. Today, i wanted to work on my character more and i feel with using the ties and using them effectively with the younger children i could get more in character. 

After we had talked about costumes a bit more we decided we need to work on the song and keep running through it.  The first time we ran through it i felt as though i personally didn't put as much energy in it as i could off and i could have been more in my character. After this we decided to run through it with out the music so we could sort some sections out. We all knew we should run through the ending a few times without the music because we had only finished that part on Friday so we needed to go through it so that everyone knew it well and could show their character whilst doing it. Whilst rehearsing some people were becoming out of breath quickly which meant the singing was lacking. From previous experience in performing i knew how to breathe whilst singing and dancing at the same time so i knew where i had to breathe so i didn't get out of breathe quickly and i could stay in time with the music. As other members of the group were struggling we decided that we should go through it and decide where to breathe so that everyone could keep the energy up throughout the whole number. We got close to the end of the lesson so we decide to just run through the number as many times as we could. 

My target for this lesson was to work on my characterisation and i felt like i have worked on it quite a lot and i think that i have become a lot stronger in my character. My target for next lesson is to keep rehearsing the number and to become fully confident with the whole song. 

Matilda- Friday 24th February 2017

Today’s lesson was my groups dance lesson. To start the lesson, we warmed up with our normal routine to ensure that we were all warm and all of our muscles were ready for us to dance. We also done a vocal warm up focusing on our diaphragm and diction. After warming up, we began to recap the choreography which we had done to make sure everyone as 100% with it and everyone knew where they had to be at what time so that everything would work.  After we had run through the number a couple of times up to where we had choreographed we decided that we would finish it all off. We had thought about the ending in other lessons but none of could agree with each other on what to do. After going through many ideas, I came up with the idea of getting into a pyramid and doing some sharp movements to certain letters. Everyone liked the idea of this so we started to set in a decided where we would be in the pyramid. We decided that we should have different levels in the pyramid. One person kneeling on the floor, two people kneeling higher and four people standing at the back.  For the sharp movements, Sarah, Claudia and I were going through different things to see what would work and what arm movements would look most effective. We also decided that we would only do sharp arm movements on the letters “A,E,H,L,P,S,V,X”. WE figured out that we couldn’t do sharp arm movements for every letter as it would be to quick and we wouldn’t be able to keep up and it would look messy and we didn’t want that. After we had figured out what arm movements worked we taught it to the rest of the group and they all liked it and picked it up really quickly which was good as it meant we could keep going over it so we could just keep making it sharper and sharper because the sharper it is the better it will look. As we were all able to do this, we decided to a slight canon at the end to show more skills and we thought it would look effective.

My target for lesson was to finish of the song and we have managed to do that. I feel as though we know have a strong ending which will look effective. My target for next lesson is to really work on characterisation and to see what sections I need to build up more of a character.

Matilda- Tuesday 21st February 2017

Today’s lesson was our Drama lesson. In today’s class I wanted to work on what costumes we should be wearing and how we should have our hair and make-up. At the start of class, we warmed up like every lesson. For our physical warm up today we done an exercise which made us think about characterisation. Someone was shouting out a certain thing such as water and we had to act that out. I feel as though this is going to help us in Matilda because it would make us think about our characterisation more and how exaggerated our movements had to be. We then done a vocal warm up which would warm up our vocal chords and we could make sure that we wouldn’t strain our voice whist singing throughout the lesson. After warming up, we split into our two dance groups so we could start rehearsing straight away. Most people in my group had brought a small part of their costume with them so they could begin to rehearse in it, unfortunately this lesson I didn’t bring mine. However, I did put my hair into two bunches to see what it would be like to have my hair hat way and to see if that would portray my character well. I think that by all of us having our hair in different rebellious ways it would make us feel more like our character and we should be able to perform better as we feel more like our character. Our group decided that we didn’t want to use the mirrors this lesson so we could get use to not using them all the time and relying on them to make sure we are all in the correct place. We rehearsed a couple of times without the mirrors and we felt as though it went well because we all have good special awareness and we all knew where we had to be. Near the end of the lesson, we ran through some of older pieces which we had done as we would be performing them to an audience the same night as “School song”. I felt as though I could see a big improvement in myself form the beginning of the school year and I have seen that I developed all lot of new skills.

My target for this lesson was to work on costume and to see what would work. I have figured out that the two bunches looked quite childish and they would be better for the younger children. My whole group decided that none of us liked the idea of bunches for the older children. We said that our hair should be more messy and scruffy. My idea was to have a side pony tail which is messy and would look more rebellious. For costumes, we have said that older children should wear all black trainers/plimsoles because again they look more rebellious and they younger children should wear smart school shoes because we think that normally all new children starting a new school always look neat and tidy and that’s wat we wanted our younger children to look like so it would portray their character well.

My target for next lesson is to keep working on the choreography and to get the final ending part completed.

Matilda- Monday 20th February 2017

Today was our music lesson. Today was our first lesson back after the half term so we all knew we needed to work really hard as it isn't long until the performance. We did a long and thorough warm up as we all hadn't sung properly in over a week so we knew we need a longer warm up.  Over the half term, personally i had done some warm ups throughout the week to make sure that i didn't loose any technique and to make sure that i could still hold my diaphragm. I also had sung through the song a couple of times so ensure that i didn't forget it. We started warming up by warming some of a muscles up such as moving our head from left to right to warm that up. Also, we did circles with our ankles to make sure they were warm so we could have a good stance and good posture. We than began warming our voices up. Again, we did all the normal warm ups to make sure that our voices were warmed up correctly. We focused on our vocal range to make sure we was all using our vocal range to the best of our ability. We then focused on our diaphragm to ensure we was using that correctly. We done this by doing short staccato rhythms. We also worked on our diction because diction is very important in School Song because some verses are fast so we need to be able to sing them in tune and to make sure that audience can understand what we are saying. 

This lesson, my group knew we needed to work on some verses which we always speed up on and also some tuning. We sang through the song with the backing track and we stopped whenever we was singing a section to fast so we could go over it and work out what the timing was and to make sure we was all in time with each other. After going through the song a couple of times like this we managed to get the timing correct. We then worked on the section where we always speed up, this is the verse which begins "You listen hear my dear". We sang through it without the baking track and with someone clapping the timing so we could sing along to that beat. We all felt as though this helped us because we then was able to sing it with the backing track and without singing to fast. We also had all realised that we would need to project more whilst we was singing because we would be performing in a different room to which we rehearse in and the other room (the stage) is bigger which means we need to project more. This means opening a mouths more to make sure that we could singing as loudly as possible without shouting and so we all stayed in tune.

My target from before half term was to work on some tuning throughout the song and some timing whilst singing. I feel as though i have been able to work on this a lot.
My target for next lesson is to work on costumes and to figure out what works and what we all should wear.

Matilda- Friday 3rd February 2017

Today's lesson was our dance class. In today's lesson we wanted to focus on finishing the choreography. We also wanted to make sure that everything else we had done was sharp and we all knew were we should be.

Before we started that we had to warm up. We began warming up with our normal routine which we do. This routine ensures that we have warmed up every muscle and stretched everything out. In the routine we do side stretches, lunges, small head rolls, working through our feet (through demi pointe to full pointe), small jumps and a few more. The small jumps are to get the adrenaline and blood pumping through out body to make sure we are all warm enough. If we did not warm up then one of us could hurt ourselves and pull a muscle. 
After we had warmed up, we went through the number a couple of times to see where we was up to and to see what bits we needed to work on. We always rehearse in front of the mirrors. We feel as though this really helps us because it means we can see what we are doing and if our spacing and positioning is correct. Before we moved on to finishing off the choreography we wanted to polish the first section. We made sure that the section where we run into a arrow shape was clean and our spacing was correct. I was opposite Darcy in the arrow and i always ran to far forward which then would make the arrow shape look off so i had to work on getting to the right space and being opposite Darcy. We then started to finish off the choreography. We had most of the letters finished we just had a couple more to do. We all wanted to make sure that we didn't copy any movements that we had done before as we wanted them all to be different so the audience wouldn't get bored of watching the same thing. We managed to get up to the letter "X". Before running the piece from the beginning we wanted to run through that section so we all knew where we had to be at what time. Firstly, we did it slowly without the music from the beginning of the letter section. After we had done this, we sped it up to normal speed just without the music. We all seemed confident with it so we tried it with the music. The first time we did it with the music we messed up a couple of letters but we all knew where we had to change. Then we did it again and we did it all correct which made us all feel confident and we wanted to try the whole number. We ran through the whole song and we did get it all correct. We knew that we just needed to keep going over and over it so it got stuck in our head.

My target for this lesson was to work more on the singing side of the song but unfortunately i didn't get to do that. I still feel as though i have progressed in this lesson though because we have nearly finished the song and the singing was okay but still needed some work. My target for next lesson is to definitely work on the timing of some of the lyrics and to make sure we are all still building up our chracterisation.