On Wednesday the 30th, we had a single lesson, but it turned out to be a very productive and successful rehearsal. The focus of this lesson was to go over the song 'Down and Out' and to start to add some movement into it.
Before our lesson started, I had a singing lesson at the end of lunch and I asked to specifically practise my song 'My Name is Tallulah', as recently I have been struggling with it. However, it was one of the first times that I actually felt the confidence to project it and to sing it well, as my teacher knows me well enough to pick out what I need to improve on.
After my lesson, I headed over to the main hall where the rest of the class were and we were told by miss to get the stage blocks and to set up the stage. We also had this booth which acted as the speakeasy, and a fake piano which is to be played by Fizzy in the performance, we received these back from the other school which were borrowing them. Once we were all set up and ready for the rehearsal to begin, we all grabbed a chair and sat round in a semi circle facing the stage. From here on, miss explained to us that for the rehearsal we were going to be revisiting the song 'Down and Out' which is sang by Bugsy Malone but with the rest of the chorus acting as slaves. Miss didn't let us have our music sheets but this was alright because all we had to repeatedly sing was 'down down down down, down down down and out'. It was in fact quite difficult not to get tongue tied, especially when having to repeatedly sing the word 'down'. The girls were all on the same note to each other and same with the boys, but the boys had to sing it lower to make it sound more interesting and varied. I sat apart from the girls to begin with, but this was fine as I still managed to hold all of the correct notes.
In my opinion, the hardest part of the lesson was when having to recognise and remember how many 'down down down down, down down down and outs' we had to do each time whilst Bugsy was singing. The first time that we sing it, we are all walking in from the back so we do it numerous times but when Bugsy comes in after other verses, we have to remember to firstly do it 4 times, then the second time only once and the third time 4. It gets very confusing so this is the part of the song that I will really have to focus on and do my own research on it in my own time. After going through the lines a few times, we all had to stand in a line and sing it again, moving our feet this time (a marching rhythm), like we will have to on stage. Also to put us off, miss made Adam, who plays Bugsy Malone, walk along the line singing his lines also, to see if we could keep a straight face and keep the volume. It was very hard to keep a straight face with him making funny faces at us.
In my opinion, the hardest part of the lesson was when having to recognise and remember how many 'down down down down, down down down and outs' we had to do each time whilst Bugsy was singing. The first time that we sing it, we are all walking in from the back so we do it numerous times but when Bugsy comes in after other verses, we have to remember to firstly do it 4 times, then the second time only once and the third time 4. It gets very confusing so this is the part of the song that I will really have to focus on and do my own research on it in my own time. After going through the lines a few times, we all had to stand in a line and sing it again, moving our feet this time (a marching rhythm), like we will have to on stage. Also to put us off, miss made Adam, who plays Bugsy Malone, walk along the line singing his lines also, to see if we could keep a straight face and keep the volume. It was very hard to keep a straight face with him making funny faces at us.
After the joy of repeatedly singing the same words, miss told us that it was time to add some movement into the song, which was very exciting :) Miss split us into group A and B, to make sure that people with similar singing abilities were split up making each group fair. Group A were told to come on from Entrance E and group B from the other entrance at the back of the hall. From here on, we had to get one behind each other and slowly march, in time with the song, up to the front of the stage, where we met the opposite group. It worked well and is already looking really effective. We then carried on moving it, and we had to march up from stage 3 to stage 1, where we all stood in a line whilst the soup kitchen women (Ellie and Jade) dished out the horrible muck into our imaginary bowls. When we came in singing the 'downs' again, we marched back down onto stage two where we stood in another line. When we finished singing the 4 'down and outs', group A turned their bodies left and group B right, this was to give the effect that we were still ignoring Bugsy. We turned to the front again when singing the single 'down and out' and then back again to the sides. Finally, when we sang the final 4 'down and outs', we all turned back round again but this time it was more complicated. The first person on the right had to jump down from stage 2 to stage 3 within the first two lines, the second person in the next two lines after and so on. When the person after you to your left jumped down in their two lines, you had to then sit down at the same time. One of my strengths is timing and knowing when to do something at the right time during dances, so I found it very easy and straightforward however, for the others it was quite complicated the first time, but it's really starting to come together.
We unfortunately didn't manage to finish the song but we will be carrying on with it shortly. In the mean time, we need to carry on with learning our lines and taking notes on the movements, especially as now we have started to move the numbers and it will be a lot to remember.
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