Sophia Roberts 25101227
Some recognise progress as ‘a fine exhibition of courage and faith’ (Dewey, 1916: 311). Indeed, within my first eight months at Leeds Conservatoire I have attempted to take this philosophy on board to become as courageous in my practice as possible, enabling myself to notice progression in my skillset as a performer. Whilst I still have a lot to discover in my training, I find myself reflecting on the positive development I have made within the year through the three disciplines of Musical Theatre. In this portfolio, I aim to document my journey in these areas and in doing so, I will use Rolfe’s reflection model to analyse what was effective and how I plan to keep the ‘courage and faith’ (Dewey, 1916: 311) in future training.
Voice
At the beginning of the year, I felt that out of the three musical theatre disciplines, singing was my strongest asset, however as we started with the golden age, I swiftly noticed that I was more suited to songs of the contemporary era, due to the brighter and belting sounds I was accustomed to. Therefore, I set my sights to focus on my mix and head voice, that was characterised in the songs of the early musical theatre canon, moving out of using entirely my chest voice.
This is as the sound I was used to was not appropriate for legit singing as the female golden age voice was renowned for ‘vibrato, rounded, tall and dark vowels, smooth transitions between the vocal registers’(Total Voice Studio, n.d) . This was this derived from opera but also before microphones, performers needed to project with natural, resonant technique. At the beginning of the year, I really struggled with these skills, bringing a contemporary performance to classical songs, which was entirely inappropriate. This was apparent when learning ‘Goodbye Little Dream Goodbye’ (Porter et.al., 1934). At first trying to belt the highest notes was unsuccessful and incorrect for the style of the song. Whilst Porter’s work was of the jazz era and sung in a legit style, it was necessary that I took on board the stylistic elements of the era to create an appropriate performance. My bright and wide vowel placements also hindered the classical sound and on top of this, the balance between my chest and head voice wasn’t appropriate causing some sounds too thin and too breathy, particularly in this video.
To practice and amend this, I focused on placements for my head voice ‘to “camouflage the passaggio,” the area between vocal registers where the notorious “break” occurs’ (McAllen et.al., 2026), helping to create the stylistically correct smooth-transitions for the golden-age. In doing so I attempted using Husler’s placements techniques, focusing on projecting the sound through the top of my head and lifting my soft palate to create a ‘coreless head tone’ (Husler and Rodd-Marling, 1965). I found this enabled me to create a much lighter sound, that was more operatic and less breathy. However, I found that it wasn’t useful for the more supported sound I desired for the E5 when working on “Goodbye Little Dream, Goodbye’’ (Porter et.al., 1936). Instead, I used the forehead for a ‘’cored head-toned’’ (Husler and Rodd-Marling, 1965), sound, that proved to work better for myself in these circumstances, it also helped me to create a smoother transition into each register which made the overall sound and this particular note have a lot more clarity. This created a more head voice dominated mix, which created a stronger sound. I noticed a much more resonant sound as well, and that these placements helped me hit these higher notes much more effortlessly due to the ‘head resonance… causing vibratory sensations on the face and head’ supporting a more appropriate ‘… bright colour especially predominating in the higher pitch range’ (Aura et.al, 2022).
To maintain my practice on this area of my voice, I focused on exercises in my 121 singing classes to work on mixing and my head voice with a more sustained, resonant sound.This exercise helped created a more rounded sound rather than a twang. We worked to find a head voice space, allowing the resonance to do the work for me rather than the breath flow, as I was relying on this for the higher sound. This made my vocal folds longer and thinner, making them less resistant to the sound and breath I was throwing at them, allowing a lot of breath leakage. After working on this exercise, the resonance that soon followed allowed for a stronger sound. See the voice memo below.
On top of this, we also tried working on other songs that required a mix, to put these exercises into practice such as ‘Home’ (Menken et.al, 1995), as the top note was synonymous to that of ‘Goodbye Little Dream, Goodbye’ (Porter et.al., 1936), being an E5. This way I could get more confident in a mix by continuously working on it in slightly different context. Having worked on the first song at the beginning of the year versus ‘Home’ (Menken et.al., 1995), towards the end, after consistently working on mix exercises for weeks, the final high note became so much more consolidated, and I felt more comfortable in this area of my voice.
After taking this action on my voice, I have recognised that it is not a crime to transition between head voice and chest voice as well as mixing in musical theatre, particularly in more golden age work. I am also pleased with the result of the E5 in ‘Home’ (Menken et.al., 1995), so I intend to find some exercises to stretch out my top vocal range so I can apply my mix to much higher notes. I will also continue these exercises to keep making it more usual and comfortable to place my voice differently as I had before September. I realise that to keep improving these skills, it would be best for me to analyse each song according to Husler’s placements to make sure I’m aware of where the sound is coming from in my body, as well as experimenting which placement works best for what sound. Overall, though, after my work and progression regarding my voice these last eight months, I feel more capable and confident to approach songs of legit style that were seemingly unfamiliar to me in September.
Dance
The first area of improvement that stood out to me in dance was working on improving my pickup skills when learning choreography. Indeed, this is necessary for a musical theatre performer to nail this skill as in today’s industry, dance auditions are reliant on fast paced learning and performance. Furthermore, many show contracts only have small rehearsal periods making learning things quickly extremely essential. Improving this skill seemed like a fundamental one for me as in the future it may allow me to shine better in auditions and feel more at ease when dancing in general as well. At the beginning of the year, across all my dance classes I found I was struggling to pick up basic routines and execute them correctly within the same lesson. This hindered my ability to perform them as I appeared flustered and felt overwhelmed. Especially in this footage from an early jazz repertoire class of a ‘Shrek’(Tesori et.al., 2009) dance, see me far left.
I was determined to get better at this skill and through wider reading I became more aware that ballet particularly ‘places great importance on the ‘correct’ execution of skills’ (Bailey and Pickard, 2010), and that a great dance performance is reliant on ‘knowledge of technique, knowledge of the piece, knowledge of other dancers, confidence’ (Bailey and Pickard, 2010). Therefore, I recognised that my lack of awareness of some dance technique was potentially hindering my ability to efficiently pick up a dance routine as I wasn’t entirely aware of how to execute moves correctly or as to why they were done in a particular manner, especially as ‘the mind controls and the body follows’ (Bailey and Pickard, 2010). This was an extremely beneficial observation to make and was logistical as I had never danced at such level before starting at Leeds Conservatoire, resultantly I needed to become more educated and aware of correct dance technique. One technical error I immediately picked up on was my incorrect alignment, particularly in the placement of my pelvis, which was even recognised by my ballet teachers early on. This was important to fix as soon as possible as ‘classical ballet technique emphasizes proper alignment of the pelvis to optimize dancer performance’ (Deckert et.al., 2007) and that ‘Several dance training authorities suggest that misalignment of the pelvis in dancers may lead to vertebral stress and knee, foot, and ankle injuries due to compensatory movements and excess muscle tension’(Deckert et.al., 2007). This error is evident in this clip of work at the ballet barre, where my alignment is incorrect as well as the extension of my leg in a certain move.
To amend this to prevent injury, I implemented a full body scan and check in before each dance class, especially ballet. This ensured that I would make sure that my posture is correct, as well as whether I am engaging all my muscles correct to ensure optimal use of them in that class, to help get one step closer the goals I wish to achieve in dance. Indeed, whilst my pelvis alignment becomes only a small part of technique that would help contribute to my wider goal in dance, it was imperative for me to fix this early on as ‘technique becomes the key to the dancer’s alignment and biomechanics’ (Weiss et.al., 1996). Swiftly after correcting this, I found that I was more aware and therefore able to correctly engage the rest of my muscles efficiently in class such as my core, giving me more strength to carry out movements such as pirouettes with ease as I was aligned correctly and aware of where my body needed to be placed for the ideal balance. My kicks also became much better as I was engaging each muscle accordingly to not only create the aesthetically desired appearance of the move but also carry it out in a safe way to prevent injury through lack of awareness and using my body incorrectly.
Once my pelvis alignment was fixed, I was able to explore other small yet fundamental techniques that contributed to the bigger picture in my dance. This included ensuring I engage my turn out muscles. This would benefit my plies in ballet and my kicks in second in jazz class too. From each small percentage of change, lots of improvement would follow as not only was I aware of what I needed to do to make this change, but naturally my body would follow as everything seemingly fell into place.
Following this, I would make sure to constantly be aware of my technique in repertoire classes too and with my wider understanding of dance technique fundamentals in my education at Leeds Conservatoire, the overall performance that I gave had much more professionality and clarity. See below footage of a ‘Dirty Rotten Scoundrels” (Yazbek et.al.,2005), routine in class, whilst it is not perfect, the technical elements were more precise, positively impacting my overall pick up and presentation of the dance.
I have realised it is essential to nail dance technique to lead to a successful musical theatre style performance. To not let these skills escape, I have made sure to allot time to practice these weekly, to keep reminding myself of how to engage certain areas of my body and make sure I don’t forget certain technical fundamentals. I consolidate these further by putting them into practice into more of a supervised class atmosphere in weekly jazz technique class with Rachel Woodward. By drilling these essentials into my body, I feel such more confident and aware of what I need to be doing dance to keep making progress. Having not come from a dance background, to some, these techniques may seem basic, yet they have helped me feel more confident in my own ability. I now allow myself to let go more during a dance, enjoying the performance element and allowing myself to pick things up quicker as I understand quicker what I am doing, and why.
Acting
Our focus at the beginning of the year for acting, as a cohort, was to create convincing characters. I agree that this is what not only what our objectives were for class, but what I personally needed to develop too. This is as sometimes I don’t think I would believe what I was performing.
I found weekly acting workshops led by Sarah Groake-Booth, extremely helpful in this area. We had a focus across a full term on the work and beliefs of Stella Adler, with the aim to develop our ability to create naturalistic performances. In these workshops, I found that Stella Adler’s approach was not too dissimilar to that of Stanislavski and Mitchell, with planning, research and analysis involved. However, one aspect of Adler’s work that stood out to me was her action based and innovative approaches, such as uniting the text. This ensures that a scene ‘should be ‘mapped’ as a series of connected practical or gestural physical actions, which the actor learns alongside the text’ (Moseley, 2013) and Adler believed that these were able to express subtext and character intention as the actions were like ‘physicalised thoughts’ (Moseley, 2013). Indeed, see a photo of my journal the day we were introduced to this in the format of Rolfe’s reflection model.
As you can see, I found this new approach exciting and useful, with the desire to take this forward into my own acting further. The only problem I had was the struggle to choose the most appropriate action for some lines, as each gave a slightly different interpretation and intention for the character. Nevertheless, to try to overcome this challenge, I attempted to practically apply this to an extract from ‘Amy’s View’ (Hare, 1997) alongside a scene partner in class. Ahead of performing it and taking direction in front of the class, I made sure to action this scene. See below.
Taking direction, with a focus on actioning, I found that other people’s suggestions of what I should action on different lines insightful. The experimentation and approach to the scene in different manners unlocked a whole new world of potential. I found that I was able to find a lot of nuances within a character, rather than choosing the straightforward idea and worrying whether it was appropriate. I learnt from this class and from the experimentation with actioning that I need to be more confident within myself in acting classes, and make strong choices, without the fear of it constantly needing to be correct. This is as not only did it allow me to take a new approach, but I found that I could layer these ideas onto my original, creating a more complex and detailed character.
With the newfound success of the combination of Adler’s actioning technique, I discovered a lot more about myself as an actor and my approach to acting this year. I found that preparation was key and text analysis, so that I could really become familiarised with the world I as the character would have to face every day. On top of this, I found the importance of taking risks to unlock choices and potential not obvious on instinct. I made sure therefore, to accumulate this and Adler’s actioning into the preparation for my final acting assessment of the year in a scene in ‘The Ruffian on the Stair’ (Orton, 2013). See this below.
Stella Adler’s practice in actioning allowed me to have a clear focus and a reason for every choice that I made. I found this really shone through when putting the scene from ‘The Ruffian on the Stair’ (Orton, 2013) onto its feet. This combined with my research and analysis, made me feel more assured with what I was trying to achieve. Therefore, I decided to let this skillset transcend into my ‘Acting Through Song’ classes working on the song ‘Gorgeous’ from ‘The Apple Tree’ (Bock et.al,1967), see analysis below.
I found the work of Adler more influential when applying to song, particularly such an up-tempo character song like ‘Gorgeous’ (Bock et.al,1967) as it allowed me to be more specific with my choices. This is as instead of focusing on simply one goal throughout the song, I was able to unpick the action beneath this and track the character’s thoughts. In doing so I achieved my goal from the beginning of the year to believe my character more, as I believe that this practice made me really insightful into the choices that they would make. Continuing to keep believing in my own performances, I worked on considering the Laban efforts in my preparation for a role. This is as ‘movement is not only functional, it is also highly expressive’ (Fdili Alaoui et.al.,2017). With more focus on not only my thoughts but how this is translated through my body, I may begin to believe the physical presentation of my acting, not only the intellectual. Applying this to ‘Gorgeous’ (Bock et.al,1967), I would flick on ‘divine me’(Bock et.al,1967), and then gliding on the operatic ‘as I am’ (Bock et.al,1967), to emphasise the new state of control and settling into this beauty, she feels at the end. These efforts, therefore, also allowed me to track a development in the character’s journey throughout the song. However, moving forward, I wish to keep layering these processes and be more specific, analysing every line in a song for example with these, to allow myself as an actor to keep building my confidence and ability to understand a character in order to them justice in musical performances in the future.
Conclusion
Overall, I believe that over first year I have adapted my skillset across all three musical theatre disciplines substantially. I am more confident in my ability to sing songs stylistically correct for the golden-age era through the development of my mix over the year and applying it to slightly more contemporary sounds too so that as a singer, my voice and sound can become quite versatile. On top of this, improvement in my technique, not only in singing, but dance has been evident too, particularly focusing on my alignment to allow my execution of technical moves to be more efficient. Whilst there is still a lot of room for improvement in my dance training, I have recognised not only a change in the way I move my body, but my attitude towards dance now, and my improved work effort towards it. This is also evident in watching videos from September and now the end of the year, as I seem more focused. My next steps are to keep working on my technique and gradually develop these to hopefully more complex ones, to build my skill set. Also, to keep my pickup skills gradually getting better alongside this, at every opportunity given I will attempt to learn a musical theatre dance to the best of my ability outside of classes as well, to keep this skill motoring on. Furthermore, in acting, not only have I recognised the importance of analysis and research in my approach to a character but the importance of risk-taking, to find nuances and allow my individual creativity to shine in my work. I aspire to keep honing this skill in and allow myself to take every chance to contribute something new throughout my work and in musical theatre. As I work towards second year, I hope to continue honing these skills in over the summer to allow myself to become to refined and unique performer I aspire to be.
Bibliography
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