Extra Notes On Duet Piece

Ella and I decided to make our duet about the communication and separation between home and the front-line in the first world war. We used the song Still by Daughter as many of the lyrics in the song have a direct link with the physical meaning within the piece. We also used a voice over of the letter in our piece to show the communication element. The separation was shown throughout the piece.

Lesson 6 Notes

Lesson 6- Notes

This was basically running through our show and cleaning up all of our sections and making them clean and sharp. We also showed our work to the other class which clearly showed our show was not ready to show yet. The other group however seemed in good stead, there show was both naturalistic and symbolic. The pieces almost manage to show the divide between those at war and those having to keep Britain moving and growing at home.

Lesson 5 notes

Lesson 5- Notes

This week we rehearsed all of the opening sequence and went through what the promenade theatre layout would be like as a group. We also had some time to teach each other our routines, so we could simultaneously swap between each line. We are no longer doing this because it didnt look very clean. We also rehearsed and reminded ourselves of the sections we did in Lesson 1.

Lesson 4 Notes

Lesson 4-Notes 

This lesson began with us learning the waltz with in pairs. This was a very funny task as many of us were not the best and probably explains the reasoning for only a few pairs doing it in the show. After a while we came up with the opening to our promenade theatre piece. The start begins with roughly 5/6 pairs waltzing in a ballroom/tea party style, with men and woman drinking tea or observing around the edge in a horse shoe shape.

We also learnt the song 'Pack up your troubles in your old kit bag' by Spike Jones (1942) which includes the lyrics:
Pack up your troubles in your old kit bag and smile, smile, smile
While you've a Lucifer to light your fag
Smile boys that's the style
What's the use of worrying
It never was worthwhile
Pack up your troubles in your old kit bag and smile, smile, smile

The boys already leave before this ends, apart from Jacob and I that stay to put on our soldiers costumes.

Lesson 3 Notes

Lesson 3- Notes

Lesson three consisted of our class going to he dance studio to see everybody's duet and solo pieces. I think that Romy and Eloise& Pakize's pieces really stood out in terms of concept. I really liked Romy's idea of a soldier fading and how the meaning in the music matched this concept; I don't know if the piece of music actually matched however. I think Eloise and Pakize had a great concept with putting tape down the middle of the space and showing the divide in war. I think Ursula's was very good as well as we spoke about the idea in rehearsals when we were devising and she did well to incorporate the stimulus of division and mental heath within the 'world war one' stimulus.

Lesson 2 Notes

Lesson 2- Notes

For the first section of the lesson we talked about the appropriate preparation which was needed for our Auditions. We then went back the dance studio where we begun to rehearse and devise the different stages of war and form them in to four different lines. Our movement piece is based on the front line. So far we have decided that we are going to have a shooting sequence between three people that go forward first, then the next three join. We did this so it would create a level change as well as a split movement.

We also searched about trenches on our phones through the following websites:

 http://ww1facts.net/the-land-war/life-in-the-trenches/

http://trenches.jynx.ca/

http://history1900s.about.com/od/worldwari/a/Trenches-In-World-War-I.htm


Lesson 2- Extra Notes

We also came up with physical pieces whilst stood in ration line. My group consisted of Romy, Claudia, Tyler and I. We chose to show the different levels of society within ours. Romy shows the youth by leaping to the front of the line, whilst bending Claudia's back (depicting her as the elderly within the group) and then Tyler and myself show the harsh mid-generation as soldiers which send Romy to the back of the cue.

Lesson 1 Notes

Lesson 1

• We thought of a word which we felt depicted the the First World War. We used this as a stimulus in order to come up with physical/movement piece in groups of four. These worked as small pieces which would depict and convey the four different words relating to war. The word I thought of was strength. I picked this word as I thought it would be a great stimulus and related to many parts of the war. I think the men/soldiers and women equally had a lot of mental and physical strength to get through the war. This is why my small moment within the piece is of my character standing with two hands strongly placed in front of him and a straight, well held back and spine.

•  We also came up with movement pieces about the husband leaving home and the wifes having to deal with this. I really loved the piece that Ursula and I created as I feel it was truly symbolic of the movements that lovers have with each other, as well as the sadness and togetherness people have when they know it could be there final days with each other.