Sapphira Gold Performance Evaluation

My evalutation of the performance:

I feel that the concert was an amazing experience,  connecting with the older generations emotions and joyful memories of music they would listen too. Also having to sing to the elderly made me see a new perspective in life, people of my generation never really get to bond with the older generation, so it was nice having to sing for them, and having them tell us stories of them back in their days, and how the songs related to them.
The transitions of the songs ran very smoothly, apart from a few mini mistakes which I don't think the audience had noticed. The atmosphere was nice and relaxed, which I feel was good for the audience.
We had originally planned to have performed end on, but we had easily adapted our performance to in the round without making any fuss.

As a company, we were very confident, and I feel we gave it our all in our solos and ensemble work.

My evaluation of my own performance:

I've always been confident with my singing, and I have never felt more comfortable performing with the class.
Being part of ensemble I always make sure people are giving it their own, and are comfprtable with what they're doing. I feel I put a lot of performance skills into my singing. For Example, when my group sung 'Wouldn't it be lovely' we all acted out the words as how we feel we would of done if we had wrote it. That was my favourite song, mainly because I love musicals! Sway was another favourite of mine, because of choreography that myself, Rebecca, Cat and Laura had come up with. It was a very fun and laidback atmosphere which made me enjoy it a lot more. It was soo good, that we had two songs repeated as an encore!

Sapphira Gold: Tuesday 15th May - Dress rehearsal for Singing concert

Before any performance, we always do a dress rehearsal with our teachers, to make sure we are used to our props, and our staging.

 

The day of starting the run through, I had told Sapphira that I couldn't do the solo, and it changed the atmosphere for me within the class. It felt like I let the whole class down, even though people didn't mind, because they didn't want me to make a fool of myself.

 

From then onwards, during the dress rehearsal I felt down, and just wanted the rehearsal to hurry up. I honestly thought that the performance wasn't going to go well.

 

Many people within our class got given a speaking part to introduce the songs and tell the audience what the songs about, and how successful it was, and where it had come from.

I was excited near the end of the dress rehearsal after singing 'Sway', and listening to the peers singing their solos. Made me feel a lot more confident, and happy for the show ahead of us later that day.

Sapphira Gold Singing Lesson

I volunteered to do a solo, I've always wanted to throw myself in the deep end. Sapphira agreed to the solo, and we had started making plans for what song I was going to sing. After many sessions of researching what songs were popluar me and Sapphira had decided for me to sing Stormy Weather, Etta James version.

After a week, I realised I never had time to practice my solo, because I was soo caught up with coursework, and my personal life but I never told Sapphira, because I was scared of letting her and the class down, so I tried as hard as I could to put time into rehearsing that song. After trying to practice a few times, I realised that Jazz was way out of my comfort zone, and that I didn't feel comfortable singing my solo infront of people who might of idolised that song. I realised this the weekend before our performance. I couldn't let the class down, but then again I couldn't of made a fool of myself.

Targets for future singing lessons:
- If I volunteer for a solo, make sure I know what I'm doing.

Sapphira Gold Singing Lessons

Over the next few lessons, every lesson we had four different people lead the vocal excersises and explain how it helps you develop your vocals.

Daniella and Nicole were assigned to create some movements for the song 'If I ain't got that swing'.
So while they were doing that, we had the rest of the class carry on rehearsing our songs.

My targets for next week:
- Just keep practicing, practice makes perfect.

Sapphira Gold Singing Lesson 26th April

Within today's lesson we were being filmed to record our rehearsal progress and lesson for our assignment.
We started off the lesson as per usual performing vocal excercises to warm up our vocals, to make sure we improve our vocals, and not damage them. Part of why we do the excercises is to expand our vocal range, and improve our breathing using the diaphragm whilst singing.

We expanded our vocal range by doing a warm uay p of 'Hallelujah' and 'Ave Maria'. I found this warm up quite fun, and it does tend to improve my vocal range, both high and low tones.

We then rehearsing the new songs we had learnt last week, teaking at them and remebering lyrics.
I would say after today's rehearsal sway is our strongest song within the class, seeing as our whole class knows it, and it is quite upbeat, happy, and very jazz style. The best part about all the songs is that we can create our own choreography, and really enjoy what jazz is all about. Arnold has volunteered to start the choreography for sway, as so did I, Rebecca, and Catherine. We will start researching how people would of danced to Jazz styled music.

I feel my targets for next week are:
- Research into jazz dance.
- Stay as focused as possible within singing lessons.

Sapphira Gold Singing Lesson 17th April

Within today's lesson we were introduced to a new assignment called 'Let' Swing'. For this assignment we had to research the eras of music within the 1940s and 50s. We'd also have to rehearse a selection of iconic pieces from that era to perform at Sunrise Nursing Home in Banstead.

In this lesson, we looked at new songs, one of which was 'Sway', the cover Michael Buble had done and another one which was 'If it ain't got that swing', performed by Duke Ellington. The song Sway everyone had known, so it wasn't as hard for the class to learn it, and sing it in different keys. It was quite challenging but fun learning 'If I ain't got that swing' because it was new, and in the genre of Jazz, which our class don't generally sing. It was a challenge that we had succeeded within the first lesson of learning it.

As always, we started off the lesson with our technical excercises, which I had performed with confidence and attention to detail.

My aims for next week rehearsals are:
- Learn the lines off by heart for the new songs.
- Do a technical excercise before practicing the songs vocally.
- Don't let people within my class distract me.