230 Live Music Performance

Brief:

Your school is hosting a showcase for parents and governors. You have been asked to provide a 10-15 minute performance appropriate to the event.

Your work: Must be suitable for the audience

If you work as a group each candidate in the group must be able to show their contribution. Each candidate will be assessed individually. 

Our event at Monk’s Walk School

You must design your programme around the audience – state which community organisations would be invited to your event and explain how your programme relates to the types of people that would be in these organisations.

TASK 1 Planning

My statement of personal aims:

What do I want to achieve through my contribution

Through my contribution to the event I would like to achieve the following goals: 

• Improved Confidence: Performing in front of a crowd - I have never done this before.
• Improve my timing: as I have found that I am very poor at this when rehearsing for my other RSL units.

The skills I have that I can use:

I think that I have the following skills which I will use to help me achieve these goals: I can play guitar, but find singing difficult to do at the same time. Therefore I feel I might be best to focus on just one instrument. I also really enjoy singing and music. I am excited to perform in front of an audience, even though I might be very nervous. I will choose to focus on my singing.

How I will know if I have achieved it:

I will know if I’ve achieved my goals and the brief because I will feel better about performing, my confidence will improve, I will receive peer and teacher feedback. I can also watch my performance back and evaluate it.

How I will meet the expectations of the audience:
The audience will be parents and governors, and maybe children as parents may bring them. I will therefore need to consider what the audience might like to hear. If  choose current chart songs and recent chart songs then I feel the audience will be familiar with the content and it will appeal to the largest number of people. I will choose a mixture of pop and hip hop.

Plan of my contribution to the performance:

The requirements of the brief and how I will meet them:
the requirements of the brief is to make 10-15 minutes worth of music for an audience. I will therefore need at least 4 songs to perform. If each song lasts longer that 3 minutes I will have met the time requirement of the brief. I will also need to plan my set list as mentioned above to make sure my set list is suitable for the audience.

What I intend to do:
I intend to perform on stage I will play the following songs the fray how to save a life, my love route 94 ft jess glynne, (see my set list below). First I will play my love with a bass player (Zack) and a piano player (Jake). It will be a good opening song because it is easy to play and will therefore be our best performance. It is also a song that many of the audience will know, as they might not know other songs in my set list.

Set list:
My Love (ensemble)
Rip Tide (ensemble)
Did you See (ensemble)
Jackets (ensemble)

What is Love (solo to a backing track).

How I will do it:
I will need to rehearse with my ensemble songs with Zack and Jake and will will require the most amount of time and organisation. I will therefore plan a lot of my early rehearses with the group.
I will need to speak to my instrumental teacher and Mr Flowers to help with my timing accuracy goal and my vocal technique. I will use my phone to record rehearsals and solo practice to hear what the audience will hear and develop what I think needs to be improved. We will perform a dress rehearsal to make sure that we can perform our set live. We can then evaluate and adjust accordingly. 

Who I will need to involve:
My ensemble members: Zack (Bass) and Jake (Piano).
My music teacher: Mr Flowers
My instrumental teacher: Miss Aderson.
My peers for peer feedback.

The resources I will need:
I will need a microphone (with lead and amp) and backing tracks. My ensemble members will need a Bass, amp and a piano. I will need to provide the backing tracks to the concert crew for them to load and get ready. I would also like a music stand and my printed lyrics.

The time needed for each song/activity:

I will have 5 songs in my set, each will need to last at least 3 minutes to meet the time requirement. I will need to plan for a certain amount of hours and practice for at least 10 hours.

The health and safety issues for rehearsals and the performances:

I will need to be aware of volume levels when rehearsing, as very loud levels for a long time can damage my hearing. When playing the liver performance we will need to sound check to make sure this volume is at a safe level. It's also important that we take regular breaks during the rehearsal process where we are not playing any music. This will give our ears a rest.

When rehearsing and on stage it's important that no leads are left dangling around as these can be trip hazards. We will need to plan our walking routes when on stage to prevent this. We will also need to make sure to only used closed bottles of water, to avoid anything spilling.

My set list:

My Love (ensemble)
Rip Tide (ensemble)
Did you See (ensemble)
Jackets (ensemble)

What is Love (solo to a backing track).

Style and Image:

Our style is pop for a couple of minutes then goes to grime/rap to change the sort of music being played. We cannot change what we wear as we will need to perform in school uniform as we are on the school site. 

Ideas for the performance:

We will need to all look professional and make a connection with the audience. We need to be well rehearsed to meet this.

Staging and equipment needs:

I will need: microphone, leads, PA system (or amp), backing tracks and music stand (with printed lyrics on). My band will need: bass guitar (with lead), amp, keyboard.

We will need to set ourselves nicely around the stage so that you can see everyone and see our faces.

Rehearsal Schedule

Rehearsal 1: 20th March CONTROLLED ASSESSMENT TIME

We planned what songs we would do and we listened to the performances and tried to watch YouTube videos of the performances live.
Rehearsal 2: 21st March AM CONTROLLED ASSESSMENT TIME

I practised singing all four songs to backing tracks.
Rehearsal 3: 21th PM March CONTROLLED ASSESSMENT TIME

I performed and practiced Rip Tide with Jake and Zack. This went well as the same riff and chord progression was quite simple. I found that because this was simple I was able to stay in time better.
Rehearsal 4: 27th March CONTROLLED ASSESSMENT TIME

We practising My Love as a whole band. We chose to focus on the introduction mainly to get this right.
Rehearsal 5: 28th March CONTROLLED ASSESSMENT TIME

We found some backing tracks to perform a long to as our timing wasn't very good. We practising playing Riptide, My Love as a whole band, and then I practised Did You See separately.
Rehearsal 6: 19th April CONTROLLED ASSESSMENT TIME

The equipment wasn't working at the start so we lost about 20 minutes practise time. We went through all the songs we have practised already (Riptide, My Love, Did you See).
Rehearsal 7: 26th April CONTROLLED ASSESSMENT TIME

I practised What Is Love and Jackets. I found Jackets quite difficult, so I spend most of my time getting the vocals ready for that.

DRESS REHEARSAL ON STAGE and rehearsal in practice room: Wednesday 3rd May (2 hours)

Youtube link: https://youtu.be/JH9FSGjFnpc

Rehearsal 9: 4th May

We found that the dress rehearsal was quite out of time, so we spend this rehearsal performing with the backing tracks. This really improved our timing as so we will use these for the final performance.

PERFORMANCE: WEDNESDAY 10th May

https://www.youtube.com/embed/aVBrnUe3mRY 

TASK 2 – THE PERFORMANCE

FINAL LIVE MUSIC PERFORMANCE:

https://www.youtube.com/embed/aVBrnUe3mRY

TASK 3 Evaluation:

Strengths Reflection:

1. What went well during the performance? Think about the performance as a whole (the whole group performance):what went well was i was able to sing even tho i was really nervous but was so glad to get off stage

2. What did YOU do well during the performance? Write about the strengths of your individual contribution: singing/rapping and actually staying on stage without leaving in nerves.

Improvement Reflection:

3. What could have been done better if you were to perform again? Both as a whole group and your individual contribution.

I would have liked to have had more rehearsal time with me band. I found it quite difficult to get organised with the group. Often we would have practiced different parts and not the same section, so that caused issues when we wanted to play together. I would have liked to perform more, so that I was less nervous and had more confidence.

4. Now write what you need to improve and write a strategy of what you will do to make those improvements:
Improvement #1: Be more confident

Strategy: How could you make that improvement?:

I need to practice more with my band to feel and be more confident. I would like more live performance experience to also be more confident.

Improvement #2: Audience communication/stage presence

Strategy: How could you make that improvement?:

Practice in front of a mirror.
Have my peers watch me perform, and not just listen.
Watch my favourite singers and see how they stand and present themselves on the stage.

Improvement #3: Learn the lyrics off by heart

Strategy: How could you make that improvement?:

Repeat certain sections until I have learnt the lyrics for that part. I found that I would sing through the whole song each time, and not only focus on the parts I didn't know.

Feedback from others:

5. What was the feedback your received from your teacher, other group members and members of the audience?

Teacher:

• Be more confident with your vocals - sing louder.
• Look at the audience at times and use occasionally move your hands.
• Don't rely on lyrics, if you need them then have them printed and on a stand beside you so you can occasionally look down.

Audience:

• Practice your timing together and if there are issues when look at each other and communicate non-verbally.
• No safety issues.

6. How did this feedback help with your evaluation of the performance? e.g. what did they notice and comment on that you didn’t realise/know/think about?

I liked that I could watch the dress rehearsal and see that I needed to improve my timing. My peers and teachers have said I need to sing louder to come across more confident. I will now need to use that as my target if I was to do this again.

Conclusion:

I was very nervous when performing, but I am really happy I have achieved something with this performance.