*SHR6E032F – MAR23084610 – 001 Project Viability Study*

by

Martin,Brynley (STUDENT)

1. Introduction and Proposed Project

Introduction and Proposed Project

My collaborative project will be writing and performing the music for a play my friend Hope Sandhu has written called “The Other Side Of The Day”. My job in the production team will be the musical director meaning I will be teaching the band their parts for the songs and coaching their performances in the vocals and instrumentation. I will be working alongside Hope and the production team to ensure my music fits the context of the scenes and musically fit with Hopes vision. This project is going to showcase my skills in production within the live events as well as the behind the scenes leading up. The idea is that this will help develop my skills in teaching and live sound as these are related to my desired career path. This will also hopefully lead onto more composition roles not only in theatre but in any kind of media being that games, film or sync.

Goals

  • Write music which fits with Hopes vision for the scene.
  • Teach the band in time for full rehearsals
  • Help out the prod team with anything necessary
  • Develop skills which can be applicable for future work

Personnel – Direct/Indirect

Appendix – Prod team, Cast and Band Headshots:

Production Team:

Band:

Cast:

2. Methodology and Rationale

Methodology and Rationale

I chose this project as I’ve always wanted to work on music for theatre but have never had the insights or connections. This is a good opportunity to not only branch out into a new and unfamiliar field, but also help develop my skills in my career path of teaching. I stayed in contact with the prod team and band through a WhatsApp group chat. The band were essentially students as I had to teach them all their parts and instruct them on queues. To teach them, we mainly met up in person so I could teach the songs face to face with the band. I recorded rough demos for them to practice to in their own time since we had a short time frame to teach. I also sent tutorial videos to the WhatsApp chat so they could go over anything they may have forgotten.

We organised all necessary documents into a google drive which was accessible to all. This would include scripts, stage layout, meeting dates, rehearsal schedule, song demos and anything else that we used. For organising the meetings and band rehearsals, we used an app called TimeTree. This is a shared calendar that allows us to schedule dates that people are not free and also to log important dates like the dress rehearsals or the tech run. This is how I would plan for rehearsals as it has everyone’s schedules lined out which allows me to book studio time without the hassle of arrangements or response time. The rehearsal schedule also served a similar purpose as it had all the dates lined out. It showed who was needed for which days, what we’d be doing on those days, the place and time and any other notes. It was very effective in organising this whole project.

Appendix – Google Drive, TimeTree and Rehearsal Schedule:

Appendix – Script:

Appendix-Communication (WhatsApp):

3. Market Analysis

Market Analysis/Target Audience

This play is based in the 70’s so the target audience would likely be fans of plays/musicals based in that general time period such as ‘Grease’ or ‘Hairspray’. However, the tone of this play is a lot more serious and less theatrical so the 70’s themes will be more present in the aesthetics rather than the music. The stage will be set with posters of bands from the 70’s such as Fleetwood Mac, Velvet Underground, Blondie and Kate Bush. The cast and band will also be wearing 70’s style clothing to solidify the time period. For the first song in the play, I took inspiration from The Rolling Stones song ‘Gimme Shelter’ from the year 1969. Given the time period and its high energy and upbeat tone, I thought this would be ideal inspiration for the first song. I learnt the song and decided I’d use a similar sus4 chord pattern which was a common theme in 70’s music with bands like Led Zeppelin, The Mamas and Papas, The Who and The Beatles. The storyline of the play touches on sensitive issues with sexual assault being normalised in the music industry and society in general within this time period. The general message of this play is to shed light on these issues and show people that their experiences matter. This message would resonate with the 81% of women and 43% of men who have had some sort of experience with sexual assault in the UK. Since this play takes place on a university campus, it is especially important to talk about this subject as 61% of university students have had experience with sexual assault of some kind.

4. Costs and Budgeting

Hypothetical Budget

Costs:

  • Hoodies/Merch
  • Props and set design
  • In ear monitoring rig
  • Videographers/Photographers

Appendix – Merch and Stage Props:

 

Potential Funding

  • Bake sale at student union
  • Promotional gig
  • Grants – e.g. Grow, Inspire and Thrive

Fundraiser:

We brainstormed some ideas to help fund the play. We needed funding to help pay for our merch production, our set design, props and any other equipment we may need, including an emergency fund for any unforeseen costs. We thought of doing a bake sale at the Leeds Student Union or applying to any grants for creative projects. we decided against these as the grants would provide us with more money than we would need for the play. It’s also not guaranteed that we may get any funding as they may decide our project isn’t viable. Not to mention the waiting time it’d take for us to receive the grants. Eventually we decided to put on a fundraiser gig at Hyde Park Book Club. This helped raise the funds for things such as props, set design, renting equipment, buying our hoodies/merch for the play and hiring videographers/photographers. This also helped to promote the play by bringing new people to the gig who may not have heard about the play.​ The turn out was a great success and the society ended up generating around £300 from the event. This covered most of what we needed for the play. We booked three acts for an acoustic set and used Fixr to manage the ticket payments.

Appendix – Fundraiser Poster and Footage:

5. Inspiration and Influences

Inspiration and Influences

To help me understand the style of music Hope was looking for, she made me a Spotify playlist full of reference tracks which I could get inspiration from. I was essentially given a brief to work towards. Each song had to convey the emotion of the scenes so I read the through the script and attended a few of the initial rehearsals so I had some context for the music I’d be writing. Since Hope took inspiration from Fleetwood Mac, Mazzy Star, Strawberry Switchblade and Ellur, I decided to make the second song generally convey the themes of these songs. Since I was given more creative liberty on the first song, I thought I’d have the second song follow Hopes brief, meaning this song would be more slow and emotional which was a stark contrast to the upbeat and theatrical themes of the first song.

6. Contingency/Risk Assessment

Contingency/Risk Assessment

my biggest concern was whether or not we would be able to hire a videographer to record the showcase. After discussing it with Hope, it seemed unlikely that we’d be able to afford to hire one after the costs of the stage props and equipment bookings. In case we are unable to hire a professional videographer, we decided to have someone from the prod team record the whole showcase. This wouldn’t be a bad compromise as this person has had experience filming shows at the open theatre society before.

7. Potential for Development

Potential for Development

My main concern with this project is that it finishes on the 6th December. This means I will need another project to continue on with afterwards, ideally related to theatre music. I believe that if I did another play, I’d have more things to talk about on my final assignment and it would make sense following on from my current project as it’d be theatre related. Thankfully, I’ve recently been able to collaborate with an old college friend who has been looking for composers for his own play. This will not be a live band performance; I will just be producing tracks to be sent over. This means that more of my production skills will be used. I feel my current project doesn’t display my production skills enough, so this second project will showcase them more extensively.

8. Evaluation Viability

Evaluation Viability

Overall, I believe my project is viable as it is a collaborative effort that puts my production and musical ability to the test. The skills that I need to apply will be applicable for future work within teaching and live sound. This means that this project will help develop those skills and will help surround me with the right kind of people in order to develop this project into future work. Although this project is short, I have been able to source a new project directly related to this work and will be able to apply these skills to the new project. Learning how the theatre teams works and being in the correct environment has made me ready for a second play production. I am confident that I can continue this type of work and take the skills I’ve developed and apply them to this second project.

9. Bibliography

Bibliography

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Appendix – Song Demos

First Song – Rough Demo – WAV

Second Song – Rough Demo – WAV