Another week of college goes by and although it was halved this week due to internal events I still managed to progress with all current projects and was able to clarify a few things before deadline days and test times arrive.
I am feeling more confident with music theory than I have ever done before in my life and believe that my sight reading skills are improving quickly so I must take advantage of this learning sprout and practice reading music more. I was flicking through a guitar tutor book that extensively covers a few areas of music performance and production for the budding guitarist and throughout the theory sections I was noticing many mistakes regarding scales, keys, chords and other fundamentals. I was quite shocked to find such a high level of mistakes and shudder to think what the ratio of mistakes is amidst the global library, however I did take some inspiration and confidence from the fact that I noticed them. Ending on a high I have also settled my life long debate regarding when to use a sharp and when to use a flat and will now live the rest of my life in musically correct harmony.
College band practice was a bit rough around the edges and being a man down didn't help. With a practice gig next week and the final performance in 3 weeks the pressure is on to sharpen up our routine and hopefully deliver a quality performance come gig time, else the quality of my portfolio evidence decreases!
On the plus side my first study went well again and I feel I am gaining momentum regarding the improvement of my solo performances. I have covered 3 songs with ease and am now moving on to a bigger challenge with a song I think will showcase my talents and improve any chance of successfully proving myself as a west end singer.
Creative musicianship was spent covering a few project deadlines and also the all important music theory revision. Next week is test time for music theory and I am confident that if I focus during the test I should pass comfortably. It is important for me to achieve a high grade throughout most of my classes to enhance the cohesion with the type of evidence and level of planning I have already committed to within my graded unit.
The highlight of Wednesday was attending the meeting arranged by the degree hons students to arrange auditions for Rocky: The Musical. As I mentioned before I am hoping to secure a prominent role in this production and use the process and performance to clarify my abilities within my portfolio. I have already began researching the two movies covered and will also be practising "Eye Of The Tiger", as well as reading small scripts for the 4 different male roles. This early involvement has already shown me that a west end singer needs to be more committed and flexible than the front man of a local rock band, although I'm hoping to be both.
Although I had completed my planning document I have the opportunity to improve the document and gain feedback to then further improve before the final deadline, which I will make the most of as I feel any chance to improve my grade in small steps will greatly improve the bigger picture.
Had another recording session with Fuzzy Buck this week and although we were also a man down we progressed well and have now started work on multi-tracking our second song. We have 4 songs completed and hope to add another 2 to contribute towards a self-published EP. Our new bassist has taken to the songs quickly and is also suggesting riffs and ideas for new songs which will be a big help as we hope to move on and secure some gigs to performs our songs. Daniel Dundee has not been forgotten and final takes are now being completed for his entry in this years John Lennon Song Writing Competition.
The West End show research I am carrying out continues and next week I will report on the differences and similarities I have found between the first 2 musicals researched, Les Miserables and The Lion King. I am glad I have been doing this research and found the same style of research useful when I looked for information to help with any audition for the Rocky musical. Through this I am seeing more how to transcend different skills into other areas of my course and hopefully this will help me get the best out of each class and use each module to support the progress within other modules.
If you are still reading I am going to say bye for this week. CORRECT
If you're still reading I'm going to say bye for this week. WRONG
Sta bene,
Daniel.
Nice Blog dude! When do you find out if you get the part?
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