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The Full Performance is linked under the Resources Padlet!

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Initial Thoughts:

During first semester, I believe I made significant progress in my overall musicianship, which was reflected with a much-improved result for the performance. This was largely as a direct result of strong time management, as I was able to organise more practice sessions in advance and therefore ensure each piece was better-rehearsed. Aside from the assessment itself, there were further recital opportunities including a performance at ‘Live From Surrey’ which highlighted the progress in stage interaction and stage presence we made as an ensemble. The feedback was largely positive, and I was glad to have received comments regarding interaction, as this was a primary point of improvement, although I am still keen to improve this detail. However, despite being less appreciative of a criticism referring to the way in which I received applause between songs, I do agree that my acknowledgement of the audience at the beginning and end of the recital can be improved. As a consequence of the feedback, I aimed to collaborate more with other musicians, ideally with a wider range of instruments, and demonstrate further creativity by rearranging pieces in ways that improved my musicianship.

Creative Outlook:

Originally, I was keen to demonstrate the concept of adapting pieces to my own style by arranging the song ‘Easy Lover’ by Phil Collins into a big band piece and including new instruments, like Saxophone and Violin into my settled ensemble. However, following email correspondence with Tonmeister students it became apparent that this would be unachievable due to technical logistics. This meant I had to look elsewhere for an opportunity to be creative, which came after being introduced to the cover group ‘Scary Pockets’ by a course mate. I noticed the group often performed funk covers of popular songs, and after listening to 2 covers of Dua Lipa songs, I decided to rework these into one arrangement. Whilst they were both performed in similar keys, I faced an initial challenge to ensure the different tempos were aligned smoothly, which was resolved by adding drum fills to link the songs together following discussions with my drum teacher. As well as this, I created a new percussion sound by hitting one drumstick against the other on the snare drum, thus showcasing 2 methods of successfully illustrating a strong creative outlook.

Collaboration:

As part of my Dissertation, I completed a performance that linked into my academic research on drum technology and decided this was an excellent opportunity to demonstrate many of the skills I hoped to improve, so I prioritised this in my weekly ensemble. Firstly, I was able to expand my musicianship by working alongside multiple singers and a pianist and these inclusions required me to learn to become more assertive in directing the arrangement.

I spent considerable time working with the singers to determine harmonies and distribute the leading vocals equally, which felt strange initially, as this was definitely out of my comfort zone, and I felt very under-qualified in demonstrating what I wanted to achieve since I am not the most competent singer myself. I had to redraft individual lyric sheets multiple times, but in doing so, I learned that researching and making things clearer to understand was pivotal for the best outcome. In future I would love to improve on this, as well as be more confident and assertive in directing the band to follow the arrangement I had planned, but the fact everyone was confident in their respective roles weeks in advance of the final performance further supports the point that time management is a strong asset of mine.

The dissertation performance also provided scope to experiment with the sounds I was producing on the kit, as I was advised by my personal tutor, John McGrath, to display creativity through the use of added percussion, alternative sticks, and props to give new life to the kit. Following his recommendation, I had to think carefully about which grooves I would perform, as I needed to demonstrate many elements of my research in one long, continuous piece. Due to the constant changes in piece, (many of which were at a fast tempo) and the idea of incorporating creative elements, this proved to be quite a challenge in an intense arrangement. For example, I knew that by the final piece, ‘Blue Monday’ I would be tired and if I attempted to play a standard groove at the required tempo it would likely sound messy. This prompted me to follow a Linear groove, where each element of the kit is played separately rather than layered together (Chaffee, 1993, p.7). As a result, it allowed the bassline to have more space to flourish, as I had removed unnecessary ‘metronome-like’ drum hits and therefore, saved myself time and energy.

In the final performance, I demonstrated creativity throughout; I used a pair of timpani mallet sticks to create a transition into ‘Purple Rain’, I dampened the Snare sound in ‘Kiss’ using a tea towel, used a Cowbell in ‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody’ and added some moon gel to dampen the low tom. I also followed the technique of turning the snare on and off mid-way a piece, as I had watched Ollie Woods do in a previous Lunchtime Concert. These accumulated in a largely successful performance, and I credit some of its success to these inclusions, which demonstrated clear creative intention and I received a lot of positive feedback, including from both staff members and on my social media platforms, including my Instagram music account. I was also glad of the way the backing singers understood their role within the ensemble, as Harvey Rutterford demonstrated by positioning himself to the side when he wasn’t singing to bring the audience attention to the solo instruments when required, thus boosting the stagecraft element of the performance.

Aside from this arrangement, I had myriad opportunities to perform in other ensembles for student assessments, which often saw me perform styles of drumming that I wasn’t overly familiar with. For example, in Charlie Mortimer’s assessment, I found myself playing pieces in more obscure time signatures, including a piece by Guthrie Govan in 5/4. Additionally, for an arrangement of Lovely Day in Matt Stevens’ ensemble, I was asked to play a groove in which the snare beat is displaced, by pushing it a quaver beat earlier than anticipated. By performing in these styles, I learned to adapt to new structures and prevented becoming

complacent in my drumming, where I normally perform in just conventional time signatures.

Stage Interaction:

Aside from continuing to improve stage interaction during the pieces themselves, I prioritised learning how to become more visually professional in how I handled stage entrances & exits, and the moments in between songs. On the whole, these improved, although I encountered a few problems with interaction in some performances as a result of poor setups. For example, in a lunchtime concert performance on 26th April, the bass player was isolated on the far side of the stage and couldn’t look to me for visual cues as the electric guitarist was positioned in between us. Thankfully, it didn’t affect the sound of the music, but it was a frustrating setback regardless. Similarly, in my final assessment, the electric guitarist was positioned in front of me, preventing interactions with other band members aside from the bassist, so I had to compensate by imitating the vocal line, particularly lip-syncing at points in the pre-chorus of ‘Rosanna’, which definitely improved it from a previous lunchtime recital, but was still unideal. Having submitted a specific tech plan prior to the performance that wasn’t followed, I’m unsure as to how much more assertive I could have been, but it made me aware that I could still be stronger in communicating these details in future.

In the assessment recital, I believe the stages entrances and exits were more professional, but the interaction between us during the songs was significantly weaker than before, partly because of the positioning of the instruments, which severely hindered us. I was helped by the way the backing singers swayed from side to side during ‘Why We Stay’ but otherwise it wasn’t as strong as the last assessment, with the placement of the Electric Guitar definitely influencing this. The interaction would have significantly improved if the guitar was positioned correctly, but nonetheless it is still an element of my performances that needs refining.

My strongest point of improvement regarding this assessment was undoubtedly the medium of introducing the pieces to reduce the awkward silence between pieces. I opened my set by introducing each musician before confidently presenting each song with a small monologue to demonstrate my intentions to improve this. Altogether this was a success, although I did accidentally attempt to reintroduce my backing singers for the final piece, only to realise that they weren’t performing in this song. I believe I recovered well by explaining confidently to the audience that I had made a mistake and swiftly moving onto to perform the piece, but this was definitely much better than previous recitals.

Future Improvements:

There are definitely improvements that could be made on the techniques I elaborated on, as well as addressing a new habit I developed in recent months regarding the method of preparation before performance. I have started to become distracted in the Green Room just before entering the stage without properly preparing mentally, meaning I have made sloppy mistakes and dwelled on them mid-performance after they have happened, so this is certainly an area of future improvement. On balance though, I believe I made brilliant progress on my musicianship during the semester.

References:

Chaffee, G., 1993. Linear time playing: funk & fusion grooves for the modern styles. Alfred Music Publishing, p.7

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Harry Travis: ‘Spain’ – Chick Corea:

The Lunchtime Concert in PATS Studio 1 on 29th March 2023 proved to be an excellent opportunity to review the works of other groups, as there were aspects of multiple performances that appealed to my own musicianship. One such example was a clean, classy performance of the piece ‘Spain’ by Harry Travis’ quartet, originally performed by Chick Corea. The structure of the arrangement was well distributed, as it allowed for each instrument to have a solo section either side of the head of the piece before a carefully controlled ending.

I was particularly impressed with the drummer, Ollie Woods, who aside from providing a fluent drum part that made great use of rhythmic patterns, clearly understood his role within the ensemble, as I discussed with him afterwards. This was crucial to the Jazz setting of the performance, which traditionally requires the drummer to occupy a smaller role by keeping tempo whilst allowing other instruments to flourish. However, I found his ability to subtly turn the snare drum off mid-way through his solo section very impressive, especially as it didn’t break the fluidity in his playing. This added a high level of musicianship to the role of the drummer and challenged me to do something similar in my own recitals, particularly in my Dissertation performance, as I attempted to recreate the drum part from Phil Collins’ 1981 hit ‘In The Air Tonight’, which required the snare to be turned off large parts of the piece before the iconic drum fill (Phil Collins, 1981).

On a separate note, I had hoped to be inspired by the chemistry and stage interaction between the group. Whilst the interactions appeared quite strong at first, it worsened and became less convincing as the song progressed, particularly during the Bass solo, as other players stared intensely at the bassist to communicate the cue for the next section. I interpreted this as a suggestion that the section was slightly under rehearsed and recognised this as a point of improvement in my own ensemble; by practicing more and communicating specific cues in rehearsals it would ensure that the transitions between sections were more secure. Furthermore, it would allow for my ensemble to, as Jamie Sexton writes, ‘operate in a self-expressive mode’, so we can prioritise stage interaction with one another instead of over-thinking the structure of the music (Sexton, 2007, p.113).

Robin Bailey: ‘Always Sayin’ - Littlest Man Band:

Robin Bailey gave another excellent performance that day and as much as I enjoyed their musical theatre repertoire, most of my admiration was for their method of introducing their pieces with charisma. They perfectly judged the interactions between songs, which fitted in with the material they covered for their performance; for example, they commented on the unexpected absence of a brass section by declaring: ‘I will do my best to emulate the effect with my face’. This perfectly demonstrated how they were setting the tone for their repertoire by presenting it in a manner similar to the genre itself. Moreover, their innovative mimicking of the brass section bolstered their creativity and demonstrated how they perfectly adapted to an unforeseen scenario. This prompted thoughts of how I could also overcome logistic issues and still achieve a successful performance through creativity and resourcefulness.

Whilst the performance was very different to Harry Travis’ group, I drew much inspiration from this as I was aware that my methods of introducing songs previously came across as awkward and unconvincing to the audience. By watching Robin appear relaxed and in control of the moment, I believed, as an audience member, that they were completely in control of the performance and this confidence reflected in the music. It inspired me to think carefully about how to replicate this in order to ensure my interaction with the audience exudes an air of confidence, as in theory it would improve my musical output.

References:

Collins, P., 1981. In the air tonight. Effectsound.

Sexton, J. ed., 2007. Music, sound and multimedia: From the live to the virtual. Edinburgh University Press, p.113

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Chamber Choir Concert – 10th May 2023

I completed my concert co-ordinating responsibilities on 10th May 2023 during the Chamber Choir concert, in which the choir performed 8 pieces by composers such as Lili Boulanger and Judith Weir. I believe that the concert was relatively straight forward overall and a large success, as the requirements weren’t as demanding as standard lunchtime concerts. Due to the collection of Classical repertoires, it became evident that the management team wouldn’t have a massive amount of responsibility, since only one group were performing and, therefore, no adjustments to the setup were needed. Prior to the event communication between the concert management team was minimal, as Shiv Varma was absent and we were alerted that the conductor, Jeremy Barham, wouldn’t provide any information until the day of the concert itself. This meant there wasn’t anything to do in advance of the concert so I couldn’t demonstrate the organisational skills I elaborated on in Semester 1.

On the day of the concert, I was present during the tech rehearsals and met the concert assistant, Eze Day, the only other member of the team, as the manager was also absent. After moving the piano into position for the accompanist, Margaret Roberts, I placed a conductor stand in position for Jeremy to view both Margaret and the choir. The attention to detail here was crucial, as it required us to position the equipment in a way that allowed Margaret to also see the conductor without reducing the space the choir had to work. Because we did this relatively quickly, there were no delays to timings for the tech rehearsal and the choir ran through all their pieces with plenty of time to spare before the beginning of the concert, which meant we had roughly an hour before the choir members returned for the performance. During this period, I folded the programmes for the concert that Jeremy had provided and helped the technician configure the lighting for the concert by standing in various positions on the stage and determining if the lights needed dimming or turning off. On the surface, this was a basic task, but it proved to be significant as incorrect lighting would have either blinded certain choir members or made it difficult for them to read their sheet music.

I presided with the concert assistant about any final details and then we headed to the Green Room so that the concert could begin. Once I did this I remained there for the duration of the choir, opening the doors for when the choir and conductor entered and exited off stage and enjoyed listening to the performance, before helping to pack down to complete my duties.

Initially I was worried about an overload of responsibility considering the fact we had two key management positions missing, but ultimately, the concert was a quiet affair and relatively straightforward to organise, so it didn’t matter, and I was able to complete all duties smoothly without struggle.