This year has been a very interesting and complex year for me. I have learnt more than I could possibly imagine, developed my acting and music skills, dealt with and overcome  a lot of personal and academic challenges. I feel as though I have developed more as an artist this year than I have throughout the rest of my education, the support and education that I have received has allowed me to finally view myself as an artist which beforehand I struggled to do. Now don’t get me wrong, this year has been filled with a plethora of challenges for me, however I believe they have all helped me to realise how I deal with things and the patterns to look out for in order to make sure that I am able to make the most out of my studies. I am really grateful for this year as it has not only inspired and educated me as an actor musician but also helped my mental health a lot. I have reconnected with my passion for performing and fallen in love with it all over again. My main struggles this year as an actor have been confidence and my understanding of acting technique, I came to this course with a lot of prior training however I felt like it was not taught to me in a way that was understandable or useable. This year has been very pivotal as I have realised what works for me, what techniques which I previously didn’t understand or like, are really useful to my acting process.

Acting:

Believe it or not, at the start of the course, acting classes were one of the things that I felt I was the worst in. I was very insecure about my acting ability and felt as though everything I did appeared false or like “bad acting.” I was very apprehensive when performing in front of the class or presenting ideas or even working in groups which really held back my learning as I was not making the most out of the classes.I think a lot of this had stemmed from college, and the environment/people that I was working with then but also a lot of “imposter syndrome”, I didn’t feel as though I belonged. I believe the main thing that helped me get to the place I am now was practitioner work. While not every practitioner/technique worked, there were a couple which really helped my skills as an actor to develop. The technique that I saw the greatest development in my skills with was Laban’s Eight Efforts. I had chosen to study these for my final piece of coursework at college, I looked into a lot of Laban/Irmgard Bartenieff techniques including Labanotarion, and Laban Movement Analysis (LMA) which includes the Efforts. Despite doing a lot of extensive research and applying these techniques to characters and performances, I never really saw that much of an impact, I especially felt very confused on how the efforts are actually supposed to help, I originally saw them as pretty useless. This was until I was taught how to use them properly by an acting tutor, what made the technique stick was realising that it is not all about showing these efforts obviously, it can also be internal, like a feeling which then can turn into smaller yet effective characteristics which can help to characterise. I believe that this really aided me in creating believable characters as I was able to feel what I needed to show internally. Realising that this technique is actually really effective for me gave me a confidence boost that I really needed. I have created some work which I am incredibly proud of such as in my role of Mother Courage from Mother Courage in a Research for Performance project. I had to show the anguish of a mother looking at the dead body of her son and scream in complete silence. I was originally feeling very awkward when doing this and I was putting off showing it to my group. I decided that since I found the work that I have done on Laban so far was incredibly useful, I’d apply it to this project so I decided I wanted  to play mother courage with the effort flick internally. I held this feeling inside of me to help me to replicate and feel the intense emotions that she is trying to keep concealed. I have always found that if you are trying to hide your emotions they tend to appear discreetly in a jolting sort of motion which I thought that using the effort of flick could help me to replicate. This effort sits in my chest and feels like anxiety to me which also allowed me to get into a more frantic headspace for this character which worked really well, I felt very confident in this performance in the end and I believe it was due to my work on the Efforts, which is why I will be consistently using this technique in the future.

One of my biggest challenges his year has been bravery, being confident and comfortable enough to put myself forward. I was pretty much forced to ignore this in improv classes and it did me a world of good. “Yes and” has been pretty revolutionary for me as someone who was notorious for killing scenes and making them boring (in my opinion) which led me to feeling insecure. This technique has made me much more agile as a performer, I have learnt to accept offers from scene partners and build on them without hesitation. I feel this work has also aided me in my scripted work, especially when working on techniques by Mike Alfreds. He wrote a book called “Different Every Night” which focuses on what my character is trying to achieve whilst  leaving room for different ideas and interpretations and ideas every time, similar to how in improv you go with how the scene is feeling at that time instead of sticking to a plan. Both of these, have helped to free me from my self consciousness and allow me to connect more with scene partners, I am more concerned about making them feel emotions than just trying to show them. Just like Laban’s technique, I have found that these really work for me so I am going to continue to use these in my acting process.

Movement

Animal studies quickly became one of my favourite classes this year, I grew to love being a gorilla and grew so passionate about being as accurate as possible. I really wanted to challenge myself with this project by choosing an animal that is both physically and vocally loud. I thought that if I purposely chose an animal which has no intention of hiding themselves then I have no excuse to either, I’m not able to hide in a corner in hopes that nobody is watching me. The processes of imagination and observation were incredibly useful to me within this process, I really dived into my research/observation, finding articles, videos, photos on how gorillas bodies are actually put together, their skeletons, how they walk, sit, and sound, which I believe had a massive impact on the believability of my gorilla. It wasn’t until I researched into the final details however that it really clicked, finding out that gorillas tap the fingers on the floor or flare their nostrils and breath really deep in there throat making a grunting sound, took my gorilla to a whole new level. I was able to get into the headspace of my gorilla so much more, it felt like them final small details were a missing piece which didn’t give me much more to do that was obvious to an audience but allowed my imagination to expand. I believe without any of this observation, I wouldn’t be able to have anywhere near as much imagination or play as I did, once I had all of my notes in my brain and I was no longer needing to constantly think about my physicality, I was able to fully get into the mindset of a gorilla, imagine their surroundings and connect with their ability to not get bored or have the same daily thoughts as humans. One problem, especially for this project, with my sometimes lack of bravery is that I am a perfectionist, as someone who comes from a dancing background I am obsessed with watching everything I do in a mirror to make sure that it is perfect. However, with this project I really challenged myself to get out of this mindset which I also believe did my process a whole lot of good. I become so unconcern with how I looked and in turn what everyone else thought about me when I used my imagination to get into a gorillas mindset, they don’t get insecure the same way we do, they wouldn’t be checking how silly they look in a mirror so neither did I, which allowed me to be so much braver. I even had a go at trying some gorilla noises (screaming) which I am really proud of. After receiving so much positive feedback I was reinstalled with the idea that it is so much more worth it to go for things and give it your all. I found anthropomorphising my gorilla really useful, it was interesting to see how these qualities can be applied to characters and can also look really normal. I starting with an internal feeling of strength, power and aggression but also gentleness and stoicism, and used that to create my physicality, similar to how I used Laban’s Efforts. I found using this particularly useful in my Royal Armouries project, I was playing Anne Bonny, a female pirate who has disguised herself as a man to stay on a ship, I wanted to really exaggerate the manliness that she was trying to convince the other shipmates that she had. So I tapped into my gorillas physicality, making myself take up space how they would. I made my posture take up as much space as possible with exaggerated breathing, wide shoulders and stance and large gestures. I found myself sitting like my gorilla during the piece and pulling similar facial expressions which actually ended up being very effective.

Movement technique classes were a mystery to me to begin with, I had no idea what to expect going into it. I found it really interesting learning about things that you wouldn’t normally consider, such as alignment and how all of your body parts work in relation to one another. It made me notice a lot about myself, different challenges that my body has and ways in which I can get around them. For example I have a lot of pain in my right shoulder which prevents me from being able to move it in certain ways however I have been taught some stretches which have eased this pain before doing any work which might affect it, I now include these in every physical warmup that I do.

In my classes with Eilon I believe I put myself forward a lot which I am very proud of. I found that I was offering to try things out, going  first when others didn’t want to, engaging in a lot of group discussions and providing a lot of feedback in these classes. I believe it was because I found these classes so fascinating. I had never considered viewpoints before and how much of an impact that these could have on your movement but I was very interested in them from the start. These viewpoints are Shape, Gesture, Topography, Spacial Relations, Kinaesthetic Response, Architecture, Repetition, Duration, and Tempo. These really opened my eyes to the possibilities of movement, I have found that I do a lot of the same things with my body, in movement classes I rely a lot of round, smooth movements but it has been very eye opening to see other possibilities. I found it very interesting to see not just how focusing on one of these viewpoints at a time affected my movement but how they all coexist and how many I can use at once before it gets overwhelming. I found that I was using a lot more than I thought subconsciously which was a nice revaluation as I thought I was too in my head. It’s also really interesting to see how putting other people into this process can effect my choices and impulses, which is something else we worked on. I found that I am much more effected by impulses created by those around me than the world beyond the movement and myself. The next step with this work for me is working on applying this to performances as  this is something which still confuses me.

In Donald’s dance classes I have really stepped out of my comfort zone. I have experience in contemporary and lyrical dance which was useful in the first term, however after that, I was completely out of my depth. With the sole performances I was very nervous, I have never really danced alone and it’s been years since my last dance class so I was feeling a little insecure. I was spending way too long on the choreography, trying to make it perfect, after a few classes I realised that the environment that Donald creates in his classes feels very safe, I noticed that other people didn’t really care what others thought so then neither did I, I was very proud of what I had created. I found that as a dancer, and in movement classes in general, I put a lot of emotion into what I create. I have found that my main strength is the acting side of dancing and moving, especially in emotional pieces, I really feel the story which translates throughout my body and my face which is something I really enjoy. The next performance was my favourite as it allowed me to expand my knowledge of dance and explore new styles but also add so much emotion and character into my performance. It was called “Speakeasy” and was styles around 1920-1930’s Jazz culture. This style didn’t just require me to master the steps but I also had to embody the style and my character. The moves were a lot harder for me to learn than lyrical however after a lot of practice outside of classes I was secure in my movements enough to add character. I already had a strong, performative persona throughout the piece but by adding a character, I had another layer of performance which made the piece so much more interesting. I decided to be a man who was trying to win over a woman in the group played by Abi, we were on opposite sides of the space so that allowed us to play with creating a connection from afar before coming together for a moment. I really enjoyed this as it gave the dance a purpose, I was dancing to impress this woman and it gave me a range of emotions that I could show throughout, flirty, excited, frustration when she left, etc which gave my performance so much more character and interest. This project made me so much more aware of how you can connect dance and storytelling, I’m used to showing emotion in performances but not adding full characters. This is something I will carry to other subjects  especially in ensemble work and music classes. It’s really interesting to see how this performance helped my timing and musical sensitivity, I believe this project has aided me as an actor musician as I am adding character and emotion to a piece of music which is what I have to do when playing music, while I wouldn’t be dancing necessarily with my instruments it was very valuable adding strong characters to see how I can relate that to my musicality.

Movement overall has been incredibly eye opening for me, I have explored so many new techniques and styles which I had never even considered, all which have massively aided me as an actor musician. I now feel as though I have so much more to offer as an actor which fills me with so much confidence for next year.

Voice

I am very proud of my progress in voice over this year, I have learnt so much technique which has been so useful and become an integral part of my process. Something that I struggled with a lot was breathing into my abdominals, it felt very forced to begin with and I had to think about doing it which then took my mind off the text that I was performing which in turn made it sound worse. I practiced this a lot, especially at home, I used the warmups which Jo gave us such as connecting this breath to speech whilst in semi-supine and I started doing it subconsciously which is when I saw a big difference. I found that I was able to speak for longer without running out of breath, the sound that I was producing was much clearer and I could project much further. I have kept these exercises in my vocal warm ups as they are still so useful to me. I believe this paid off in my vocal assessment, I had gotten my technique right pretty early on in the process of working up to the assessment which meant that I was able to get feedback on adding character to my text instead of being stuck on my clarity for example. This improved my narrative so much as it meant that I could play around with my voice and the things that I believe I am quite good at such as resonance. Before starting this course I had no idea that my voice was capable of what it is now, after learning about resonance I have so many more possibilities when creating characters. I really enjoy using resonance as I find that it really helps me with characterisation, if I have a strong, distinction voice for my character, everything else comes so much more naturally.

I used my resonance in my Royal Armouries performance when I was pretending to be a man, I my chest resonance to create an exaggerated deep and rich sound which created a nice level of comedy as it was obvious to the audience, through other elements, that I was a woman so have a very manly voice made the performance funnier. I believe my technique really helped here, I needed a lot more breath in order to speak that way which was aided by the fact that I was able to consistently breath into my abdominals and connect that to my text.

My main feedback in this assessment was my confidence which I will definitely work on next year. I am proud that my technique was seen as a positive as I put so much effort into it and I am also proud of how far I have come confidence wise, I chose a piece which is out of my comfort zone however I definitely have a lot more work to do in terms of being confident and fully present on stage which is something I will prioritise next term.

Musicianship

I originally was unaware of this subject when applying to Leeds Conservatoire but I am so grateful that I was introduced to it, I was begin to lose touch with my musician side and this course has brought back my passion more than I can say.

When starting this course I had played saxophone when I was younger but had forgotten a lot of what I had learnt and I was a self taught beginner on guitar. I was very self conscious of my ability however this was quickly removed, my course is full of such a wide range of actor musicians, some who are actor first, some who are musician first and then some who are self taught and some who have had lessons. I decided to use this as an opportunity to learn instead of shying away from those who I thought were more skilled than me. I have found myself countless times asking people in my class for help with things I understood, especially when it comes to theory or the piano.

I chose to continue to learn saxophone and guitar this year instead of picking up something new as I wanted to make sure that I really expand on the skills I already have, brush up on my theory and grow my confidence in instruments that I will be using throughout the year before progressing which for me was a really good idea. One thing I have been struggling with is theory surrounding chords and keys however the way I have found this the easiest to learn is by doing it practically in my 1-1 music classes. By continuing with saxophone I have been able to regain all of my knowledge of theory and by sticking to guitar I have been able to work of what I was struggling with around the theory behind chords and keys.Next year I am wanting to continue to learn guitar as I feel as though I still have so much to learn, I am nowhere near as good at finger picking and guitar solos as I would like to be and I feel the best way for me to learn this is with lessons. With saxophone I feel as though I am at a point where I am able to progress on my own which I am really proud of. As for my second instrument I am hoping to move to something similar to my instruments now such as bass guitar.

Music Lab has also been incredibly useful as I am not used to playing music in a group. I have been in a band once however it was for one gig and I didn’t really feel like we were able to connect as a group, apart from that I have only ever done solo gigs so this has been a brand new experience. One of our first projects was writing a piece of music for another person in the class which was a massive worry for me as I have never written anything before. It took a lot of rewriting and communication with my partner on how to write for piano (which I don’t play) but I ended up coming up with a piece that I was very proud of. It was very interesting working with someone who played a different instrument to me and trying to figure out how I could explain what I wanted them to play without being able to play the piano for them. I ended up using my guitar as it is in the same key and was able to recreate the rhythm and indicate elements on their as well as telling them. This was a very rewarding experience as it was not only forcing me to show something that I had created which I’ve never done before but it was also helping me to figure out ways to communicate with another musician.

I was very excited for our ensemble assessment as I love working as a band. We performed “Wait for me” from Hadestown and “Skid Row” from Little Shop of Horrors. These songs were quite challenging especially on the guitar, I had to learn a lot of new chords which my classmates helped out with and had to learn how to play guitar, sing, switch to my saxophone and act and the same time. I worked really hard to perfect the technical elements of the song, I believe this project really improved my ability on both of these instruments. In the assessment we then had to add character which was really interesting. Going from playing and singing ‘Wait For Me’ for example, with a lot of enthusiasm already to then adding the character of a soldier over the top was a lot of fun. I had always wondered before this project how I would act whilst playing the saxophone but I feel as though it came very naturally, I sometimes forget that acting isn’t just about using your words but also your whole body which I took full advantage of in this project. I remember leaning towards other performers with my sax in a threatening way with another musician during this piece and hugging it in desperation in another. I thoroughly enjoyed this process and I believe it made me so much more confident as an actor musician, I didn’t just feel like a member of a band, I felt like I was acting and telling a story which was really rewarding.

Conclusion

I am incredibly proud of myself this year. It has been very challenging inside and outside of class however I believe despite this I have progressed and learnt so much, I have risen to so many challenges, put myself out there and gotten past so many mental blocks that I never would’ve done before this. I have completely fallen in love with music again which is something I was so desperate to do and I feel so much more confident as an actor, in comparison to previous training I can really tell the difference between how I started and how I am now. I’ve developed technical skills across all subjects which incredible but I am mostly proud of how much I have grown as a person, I have become so much more confident and so much more willing to be creative. I am so excited to do a lot more group work and being able to get a script in hand which I can apply everything that I have learnt to the test which will give me an even better idea of which processes work for me.

I have had so much useful feedback which I will carry into second year and work on over the summer which has really helped me figure out how I work best as an actor and what works for me. I have which processes and techniques suit me best which has improved my skills so much, I now feel like a “good actor” so much more than I did before starting this course, the imposter syndrome is almost completely worn off!

One of my main setbacks this year has been challenges outside of the conservatoire which has set me back quite a lot. This includes a lot of time off and pushed back assessments, however I have not allowed this to prevent me from learning and getting better, I took this time off and used it to continue my learning, by keeping up to date with classes and practicing at home which I saw a massive boost in my motivation from. After receiving so much support and guidance I am in a place now where I don’t see these things affecting second year, I am so excited to get back on track and prove to myself that this is where I should be. I am looking to improving my skills and then applying them to performances .