25100862 Grace Baker
Over the past few months of first year I have been observing and documenting the development I have made throughout my training. At the beginning of term 1, in our Professional Studies class, we were instructed to make a PDP (Personal Development Plan). In my PDP I wrote out some smaller, more short-term targets and then one main overarching goals in each of the disciplines I am training in. My goal in my singing lessons is to get my mix belt . My goal in acting is to define my acting process to further my understanding of a script so that my performance is true to the playwright’s intentions. Finally, my goal in dance is to improve my technique and pick-up skills in tap. I set these goals using SMART targets, to make sure that they were achievable and measurable. In this essay I will outline and examine the progress that I have made over the past few months and discuss the methods it took to get me there.
Singing
In first year, getting my mix/belt was paramount. Working on my belt and mixed belt is important to me, as I want to be a well rounded vocalist, who can sing proficiently in many different styles, increasing my castability. Furthermore, most new works and current shows on the West End are contemporary, so having this skill in my repertoire will be highly beneficial.When I first came to Leeds Conservatoire, I strictly sang classical or legit songs and felt really insecure about my belt, so this is why working on my belt is such a priority for me. Previously, whenever I tried belting I felt like I was shouting and straining my vocal cords, which felt unhealthy and is not maintainable for a 8 show week. To combat this, I brought ‘Back to Before’ from the musical ‘Ragtime‘(Aherns and Flaherty 1996) into my singing lessons. I picked this song because although it is written more lyrically, with legato phrasing, it requires a chesty mixed belt. In my singing lessons with Sarah we did many exercises so that I can get used to the sensation of belting.
As you can hear in the audio file, we started with alternating the vowels ‘oo’ and ‘ee’ going up the scale. Nearing the top of my range I could sense and Sarah could hear some tension rising in my voice. To address this, I was instructed to shake my head from side to side, so that I was focused on that, instead of the quality of my voice and the sound I was producing, in turn releasing the tension. When I first started doing this exercise, I did not enjoy it because I could hear the break in my range made me feel discouraged, despite the progress I had been making. I have realised over the course of the year that the main origin of tension in my voice comes from anxiety and stress, as my previous singing teacher taught me that belting was unhealthy and would ruin my voice if I did it, so unlearning that has become a large part of my progress this year. Another exercise we did was also going up the scales on a ‘nyah’. The point of this excersise is to create a nasal sound, so that the transition from my chest voice to my head voice is less noticeable, and then also is a starting point for mixing. I really clicked with this exercise, I could hear the progress I was making from each lesson and being able to remove the nasal quality of the sound, extending my chest voice. I also used ‘nyah’ to the melody of the song, getting my larynx used to the placement of mixing the notes to the melody. I only spent two singing lessons on ‘Back to Before’ before bringing it to our acting through song lesson. In this, excluding my acting feedback, I was told that I need to stop approximating the low A’s and G’s and really sit in that lower part of my range. I did this by slowing the tempo down and, not change the rhythm, staying on the lower notes for longer in order to train my muscle memory for when performing this song.
‘Ooee’ exercise
‘Nyah’ exercise
The next song I decided that I wanted to sing was ‘Woman’ from ‘The Pirate Queen‘ (Boublil and Schönberg 2006). This song has always a challenge for me as it sits in the break of my vocal range. This audio file is the first time I sang ‘Woman’ before I brought it to my singing lesson. To begin with, I mixed up the lyrics a couple of times, switching words such as ‘can’ and ‘should’. As you can see, to fix this, I wrote down the lyrics into my notebook and compared it with my sheet music. , I did this a couple of times until it was correct. This works for me because I find that the physical aspect of a pen and paper create a better link for my brain to process information. I also did not like the quality of my voice, it sounded too heavy and weighty, which is not correct for the character, which in turn made my performance sound pitchy. One way I resolved this is by slowing the tempo, over enunciate the lyrics and really articulate my diction. Richard Miller states in his book “The mouth and pharynx will match laryngeal vowel formation. Good singing is the result of laryngeal action and the corresponding shapes of the resonator tube.” (R.Miller 1996). I also used the same exercises I used for ‘Back to Before’. In the more beltier section my voice sounded very strained and tight when I did attempt to belt it or I would get scared and flip to my head voice.
Woman 1
To battle this, we did an exercise that would get me more connected to my body and mack muscles, grounding myself. I would sing the lyrics all the while physically act like I am playing a cello. I found that this really helped with making the phrasing sound more legato and musical whilst being in my body has helped me get over the mental block that I have with belting. I’ve been told am my singing lesson that there are two teachers in the room, my singing teacher and myself. I will force myself into my head voice when I think that it’s going to sound bad, which has been detrimental to my progress because if I had overcome this sooner, I think that my progress with this song would have much faster. Really letting go is something that I’ve had to practice in my singing lessons -not being scared about what the quality of the sound is and the fact that I don’t sound like Stephanie J Block singing it. I am my own worst critic so overcoming that has been a very big deal to me. The final audio clip is the most recent time I’ve sang ‘Woman’. It is obviously still not a finished product however, as you can tell, the exercises that I’ve done has and the practice that I have put in has fixed most of the challenges that I faced with this song, the tone of my voice sounds a lot lighter. I can mix belt the final notes and the phrases are much more Legato and not in quotation marks choppy. I am extremely proud of myself of the progress that I have made over the year. Going forward into our summer break, I will continue to do the exercises that I have been given and continue picking songs that will challenge me and step outside of my comfort zone.
‘Woman’ 2
Acting
In acting this year, I really wanted to learn how to properly analyse a text and to create a process that works for me. Coming to Leeds Conservatoire I had very little acting training so I started off with a blank slate. Throughout the year I have been exposed to many different practitioners and acting techniques across many different lessons.
One of the techniques I explored for my acting exam was ‘listing’ in a script. Listing is analysing the text and discovering different frames of references for your character. For example: What does my character say about herself? What does other character say about my character and what does the playwright say about my character? By doing this, it should enable me to understand my character and give me the tools I need to perform her. I did this with my acting assessment script from the ‘Ruffian on the Stairs‘ (J.Orton 1967). I found that this technique didn’t really work for me because I felt that it was very one dimensional and that I couldn’t create my own interpretation for my character, Joyce. Despite this, I found that animal studies really worked well for me with the script I interpreted Joyce as a bird. To prepare for this, I watched videos of birds and tried mimicking the movement. This helped me get into my body in order to perform my character. This has assisted me with my acting progress because I feel like you have to be connected to your body when in a physical performance and creating small nuances is important for when performing a character. Another technique that resonated with me is Stanislavski‘s ‘The Magic If’ (K.Stanislavski 2008). I found that putting myself into my character shoes and performing the script as if it were me enabled my performance to be realistic and that I’m not showing the audience that I am acting, this is important in the industry because, to me, acting is truth and if my performance isn’t believable then the likelihood of me being cast in a show is going to decrease. I strongly believe that exploring these techniques and recognising what works and what doesn’t work for me has improved my acting abilities because there is no trial and error and I feel more confident in what I’m doing. Moving forward, I will persist with trying out new acting techniques and discovering new practitioners methods, because even if they make me feel uncomfortable or I dislike them, I will not learn anything new if I stay in my comfort zone.
Dance
When I first started dance this year I had very little experience, other than the one year of lyrical that I took back in 2022, so I knew that dance was going to be perhaps more difficult for me than others in my year. I really wanted to push myself because coordination has always been something that I have struggled with. Because I am going into the musical theatre industry when I graduate, I need to have basic dance technique and pick up skills under my belt. This is important because the current landscape of musical theatre, i.e. shows being produced, new works and the current shows on the West End require a high level of dance to some extent. Dancing is also another way to tell stories and convey emotion so being able to dance to a decent level is very important to me because it hopefully should increase my castability.
Time Steps and Pull Backs
This year I decided that I would focus on tap. I found tap to be incredibly intriguing as you are not only moving your body and dancing, but you are also producing music and creating rhythms.As you will find in this video, it is me at the beginning of the year attempting to do a single time step. Clearly, it’s very clunky and not in time with the music. I remember feeling very stiff and quite disheartened because to many people in my class it came quite easy. In order to fix this, I practised every day while doing normal Monday and tasks like cooking dinner or washing the dishes until it became just second nature and muscle memory in the second video titled times step two you can see that because of the practice that I’ve done it has become much more fluid. It’s in time with the music and that I’m able to do it to music with a faster tempo. I’ve also done this method of practising with my double and triple times steps. Although I don’t have my triple time step completely in my body yet I think that the progress I’ve made since the start of the year has been immense and also my confidence within doing times steps has greatly increased.
Another step that I practised was pullbacks. Pullbacks also didn’t come naturally to me and didn’t fully make sense in my brain. One way that I fixed this was by practising the steps separately and then putting the moves together. I would practice just getting some height while jumping backwards. I did that a couple of times and then I also worked on my pickups and letting my ankle relax then letting the ball of my foot hit the floor and then come up. Once I had done that a couple of times I would try and put it together. Obviously it did not go very well the first few times, but with persistence I was able to get my pullback’s correct with clear, crisp sounds that I can do consistently. Evidently, I still have a long way to go with my times steps and pull backs, but regardless I’m still proud of the progress that I have made since September.
Anything Goes Choreography
I must admit, that my choreography pick up skills and tap are not that great. And learning choreography in a large group with varying levels of tap is confusing to say the least. Trying to wrap my head around all the sounds I’m trying to create while not being able to hear myself has been greatly difficult. I recognised within the first few weeks of being in tap lessons that I would have to put in many hours outside of lesson of practice in order to just fully understand the choreography. That being said, I discovered that I really enjoyed doing the choreography to anything goes. We started learning the choreography back in September and we have only just finished it now so I’ve been able to track the progress I have made with this choreography. although initially learning it was challenging, I put in the same methods of practice that I used with my time steps in pullbacks until the choreography became muscle memory. Another way that I practised was through saying the name of the steps while dancing it without music I found that this method of practising tap works great for me and I have been able to see and hear the development of my technique in tap because I’m able to understand what I’m doing with my feet and how it should sound rhythmically, additionally making me feel more confident when performing without being in front of a mirror.
In the video below, it is the most recent time I have performed anything goes in front of our teacher and choreographer Jess. It obviously isn’t a finished product, as there are still parts where I mess up, so my goal for the next few weeks is to keep on practising and going over the steps until it is fully engrained in my mind. With The aim of not losing the progress that I have made over the year, I plan on taking tap lessons over the summer. This will be highly beneficial for me, not only just in tap but in my overall dance ability because I will keep moving my body so I won’t lose my level of fitness and also allow me to further my pick up skills, so they will not deteriorate, it would be something that I probably would not be doing much in the summer, had I not been taking classes. Going forward, I need to dedicate more time for thorough practice and less spur of the moment, unorganised practice.
Although the progress that I have made and dance this year may not seem like much to many people, to me, I feel that because I’ve started with a blank slate and with zero experience, I have come on a long way from where I’ve started and I can’t wait to see the progress that I will make in second year.
Conclusion
In conclusion, I feel that the development and progress that I have made over the past year has been immense. I have had to overcome many obstacles, both physical and mental. I have discovered that my main obstacle is myself, and that I should have more faith myself and surrender to the process throughout singing, dancing and acting. I do feel like I have achieved the goals I set myself in December, but I am aware that I still have a long way to go. It is my opinion that I have made significant progress since coming to Leeds Conservatoire and I can’t wait to see the progress I make during second year.
Bibliography
Ahrens, L. and Flaherty, S. (1998) Ragtime. New York: RCA Victor/Broadway
Flaherty, S. and Ahrens, L. (1999) Ragtime: Vocal Selections. Milwaukee: Hal Leonard
Boublil, A., Schönberg, C.-M. and Maltby, R. (2007) The Pirate Queen: Vocal Selections. Milwaukee: Hal Leonard
Boublil, A., Schönberg, C.-M. and Maltby, R. (2007) The Pirate Queen. Broadway musical. Chicago: Cadillac Palace Theatre
Miller, R. (1996) On the Art of Singing. New York: Oxford University Press
Stanislavski, K. (2008) An Actor Prepares. Translated by E.R. Hapgood. London: Methuen Drama
Orton, J. (1967) The Ruffian on the Stair. London: Methuen Drama
