"Happy New Year B": Today (28/11/16) we began working on "Happy New Year B". We began by singing through the song. The majority of the cast didn't know this song, so we listened to it for a few times first. We then sang it with the backing track a few times. We have been finding this song quite challenging as the song is quite conversational, so we have to fit a lot of lines in to not a lot of music. Also, some of the lines overlap. Thankfully though, there are no real harmonies for this song, thus suggesting that the group is all together and creates a real sense of unity. However, once we got fairly comfortable with the song, we then staged it. The first section of the song is a conversation between Joanne, Maureen and Mark about making another protest. This will be done on the L-Shaped decking, stage left. We then jump down to the actual stage to join the rest of the cast on the first "Happy New Year". By singing the first part on a different level and section of stage shows that we are in a different location at that time. On the first "Happy New Year", we all greet each other with celebratory hugs etc. Will then enters stage right and we all just stare at him. We have left a gap between Benny and the rest of the ensemble. The use of proxemics here makes the situation more awkward for Benny and shows everyone's dislike for him. We don't have any other set movement, but we just act and interact with each other. On Owen's solo line of "it's gonna be a Happy New Year", he pushes Taylor towards Henri (DSR) in an attempt to get them back together again. We then all leave stage right to leave Taylor on stage with "The Man" - i.e. her drug dealer.
Musical Numbers: We have cut a couple of songs from Act One, as they are not really needed, but a lot of songs from Act Two have now been cut, due to our performance date fast approaching. We have also changed where our interval will be due to the two acts being completely different lengths. I think that this was a good decision (to cut songs out) as we are running out of time, so it is better to perform less of the show to a high standard, rather than trying to do the whole show and it not be great. We have been careful about what songs we cut out to ensure that the show will still make sense. The difference with our version is that Mimi doesn't die and come back (i.e. "Your Eyes" and "Finale B"), and instead we don't see Mimi and Roger get back together.
- Our Act One is now as follows:
- "Tune Up #1" /// "Voice Mail #1" /// "Tune Up #2" /// "Rent" /// "Tune Up #3" /// "One Song Gory" /// "Light My Candle" /// "Voice Mail #2" /// "Today For You" /// "You'll See" /// "Tango: Maureen" /// "Life Support" /// "Another Day" /// "Will I?" /// "Santa Fe" /// "I'll Cover You" /// "We're Okay" /// "Over the Moon"
- Our Act Two is as follows:
- "La Vie Boheme" /// "Voice Mail #3" /// "Happy New Year B" /// "Take Me or Leave Me" /// "Without You /// "Voice Mail #4" /// "I'll Cover You (reprise)" /// "Goodbye Love" /// "Seasons of Love A"
05/12/16: We began this lesson with a vocal warm up and then Henri and Taylor sang "Without You" a few times. Taylor knew this song, but Henri wasn't overly confident with it so they sang through it a few times. After this we all sang through "Happy New Year" again to ensure that we remembered it. The first time we sang this today, the vocals were a bit out of time in places and the acting was a bit flat. We did it again but put more energy into it thus creating the right atmosphere and mood for the piece. Afterwards, we then sang through "Goodbye Love" for the first time. We hadn't sung this through before, so we sang it a few times. We didn't bother staging it as a lot of people didn't know the song well enough yet. Therefore, we moved on to "I'll Cover You (reprise)". Lewis knew this song, but the majority of the cast didn't know the backing vocals, so we worked on the harmonies for this song. The backing vocals are important in this number as they are symbolic of how everyone is supporting Collin in this tough time.
No comments:
Post a Comment