Les miserbles at the queens theatre.

Yesterday I went to see les mis in London.  I’ve wanted to go and see it for a while but there were always other shows that sounded more interesting as when I was reading about the plot it didn’t really grab my attention as much as something like Wicked and We Will Rock You did. Then I was given to song from the show ‘ on my own’ to sing for an exam so I had to watch videos on YouTube to get to know the character and the story line a lot better and then I was hooked.

At first I was a bit unsure about the fact there’s no speaking in it and it’s all done through song, I think that was only because I wasn’t used to it, but after a while that became one of the best things about it. Because of the constant song this show had some of the strongest singers around and their voices were really amazing I couldn’t believe how complicated some of the harmonies were I can only imagine how long they must have taken to get perfect. Some of the songs will just not leave my head ‘ master of the house’ is one I’m finding particularly hard to stop singing, my favourite song in the whole show was ‘ a little fall of rain’ just because its an amazingly beautiful song.

Throughout the performance I became fascinated with the revolving floor. It must be hard enough to stage a show that naturally has to have a lot of movement in all the time and then the floor was moving as well. It must be really complicated to remember your lines, stage directions and then be able to make it look completely natural while the floor underneath you is moving. However I think without that particular part of the stage it wouldn’t have been the same because a lot of the time the actors had to look like they were rushing around and that wouldn’t have been possible if the floor wasn’t moving in the opposite direction to them.

The storyline itself is pretty stunning and depressing all at once, and if it wasn’t for two characters (the inn keeper and his wife) I think it would be to dark to have been as successful as it had. There were two points when I almost cried but then before you get the chance they bring out the inn keeper to lighten the mood, I think this is very cleverly done. At the end of the show you feel like you should be crying or sad but for some reason you’re overwhelmed by how beautiful the whole thing turned out and for that reason you’re almost happy, which I found really odd considering everyone except about 4 people died.

I truly loved les mis and am beyond desperate to go back and see it right now. I envy the cast soo much they are talented beyond belief and there deserve to be in a show as incredible as Les mis.  I wouldn’t recommend  Les miserables to younger people but for teens and adults its defiantly one of the better shows to go and see.

me singing nobody's perfect

i recorded this cover of my singing nobody's perfect by Jessie J for two reasons. 1) because its a running joke between me and my friends that i only ever sing songs from musicals they've never heard of, so i wanted to prove them wrong and 2) because i love this song and at the moment im really liking Jessie J. this songs great because it has moments that have to be really powerful and moments where your voice has to be much softer. I like how its about something that pretty much everyone can relate to and that adds greatly to the appeal of the song.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5uFRa5aikB8

Last week, all that jazz and corset work

Last week in performing arts we continued looking at the all that jazz routine we have been working on. We looked into characterization and added drama elements into the routine to try and tell the story behind the song better. We thought about how women in a prison enviroment would behave and included party and fight scenes to show how things could turn out. We polished the dancing and ensured everyone knew what to do and when and set positions. then we worked on the singing and finished devsising out singing roles.

costume
in costume construction we are continuing work on our corsets and they are now pretty much made besides fixing a pannel of elastic at the back and the nest step is decoration.

my corset so far.

this week :)

This week we started looking into the musical theatre side of performing arts and I really love it already. We started off by looking at the song ' all that jazz' from the musical Chicago. We learnt how to sing it and annotated the lyrics so we all had a good idea about what the lyrics meant and how they should be portrayed in a performance. To me singing is the most enjoyable part of musical theatre so I really enjoyed this lesson. Then we split into groups and had a chance to choreograph a routine that would go with the song in the style of fossy. This was really interesting to see what everyone came up with and the final routines were really good.

Then we learnt a dance as a whole group that was again inspired by fossy and was quite show girl like. I loved this style of dancing a lot more than I first thought I would because it takes a while to get used to moving in what I would call odd ways. But now I think I prefer it to all the other dance styles I’ve tried before, because it’s so much more interesting.

Because of how much I love the theatre and everything to do with it this last week in performing arts has been so enjoyable for me and I am genuinely excited about what were going to do next week.

In costume construction we have been working very hard on finishing the basics that we need to complete the corset.  In the last two weeks we managed to cut out the sections needed for our corsets following a template, tack them together and then sew them on the sewing machine. I was convinced mine would fail but I’m pleasantly surprised by the result so far and next week are focusing on fitting the corsets and decorating them to fit with the ‘we will rock you’ theme

constructing the corset

in costume construction at the moment we are working on constructiing a corset to accompany our skirts. these are the steps to completing the corset.

• first of all we placed a template on the denim and carefully cut around it using material scissors.

•Then, once all the pieces had been cut out, I pinned each section to the next in the right order.

•To ensure they stayed together I then used needle and thread to tack over where I had previously pinned. the reason for tacking was so that when I reached the sewing machine I had a guideline of where to sew and so that each part was already in the correct place, saving a lot of time at the sewing machine.

•Once I have completed sewing the bodice together I will use rosettes, badges and pins to decorate the bodice and skirt. I will be adding denim edging to the bodice so it looks more finished and neat.

•On the back I will be adding an elastic strip to ensure the bodice fits correctly and comfortably and can be performed in.

 

so far my corset construction is going well and im really enjoying it because its not as difficault as i thought it would be.