Task 1: Planning
My candidate number: 5146. My centre number: 17343.
My name is Megan Moss. The instrument I will be playing for this performance is guitar. The brief requires me to play 10-15 minutes worth of performance appropriate to play for the local label. .
Through my performance, I want to achieve the following personal goals:
- Personal Goal 1: I would like to learn to do a song collaboratively that sounds good, which would help to develop my skills.
- Personal Goal 2: I would to improve my confidence with performance so I have better stage presence.
- Personal Goal 3: I would like to improve my overall ability to play guitar.
To help achieve the above goals, I think I have the following skills that I can use:
- Skill 1: My first good skill is I have the determination to get it to sound good while working with someone else
- Skill 2: My second good skill is I have confidence that can be used to give an engaging performance.
- Skill 3: My third good skill is I am a good guitar player who can accurately play their instrument.
I will know if I have achieved my goals at the end of the assessment because my performance will go smoothly with very few mistakes. I will walk away from the final performance knowing i have done well and that I put so much into it and I tried hard to give a convincing performance.
The audience I am performing to is A&R and they will be expecting me to be confident and show a strong performance that represents what music i enjoy playing the most. I will meet these expectations by giving a performance that is confident and shows my skills as a performer. I will play songs that i know showcase my skills, i will perform a set that is 10-15 minutes which will showcase a range of my guitar skills.
I will perform music in the following style/styles: rock and classical. This is because the rock songs show my skills in chords and the classical shows my skills in tab and more developed songs.
My personal image for the event will be smart and formal attire, which will help me project confidence as i will be well dressed. It fits with my songs as they are all quite relaxed and none of them are pop and upbeat. It is appropriate for the audience because it projects an image of confidence in my music and its shows i care about how i appear to an audience.
My ideas for the performance are to sit on a chair and play my guitar to the audience; I intend to have a very relaxed atmosphere to my performance. I will do it by not walking around the stage and keeping stationary which will make it run smoothly because i will not be moving around possibly causing heightened health and safety risks. I will make sure it runs smoothly by practicing profusely before the final performance and i will use a crew to make sure my set is mixed well enough so you can hear me clearly. I will make sure it is organised by making sure i have everything i need before my performance starts so it isn't a rush and so i don't end up forgetting anything.
The set list I will perform as my given repertoire will contain the following songs:
- Song 1: Artist/Band: Linkin Park Song title: One More Light Estimated length of song: 3 minutes. I have chosen this song because it shows my skills in playing chords and it gives me a chance to show my skills playing in collaboration.
- Song 2: Artist/Band: Foo Fighters Song title: Best Of You Estimated length of song: 4 minutes . I have chosen this song because I think it sounded really interesting and the guitar part covers a variety of skills.
- Song 3: Artist/Band: Unknown Song title: Romanza Estimated length of song: 4 minutes . I have chosen this song because it gives me opportunity to show my skills in playing tab/ individual picking patterns and it is a good song to play by myself.
The total estimated length of my set list will therefore be 11 minutes.
I have chosen to play these songs in this order because I want the collaborative song to be at the start so Josh does not have to hang around for my whole set and he can practice his own performance. Also, it will showcase my first skill of working in collaboration with someone for a song. Then i will do Best Of You which will showcase my skills of playing with a backing track and playing power chords; it will also keep both myrock songs together in the set which will make it more cohesive. I will then end on my classical piece because i think that with enough practice it will be my strongest and most memorable performance. Also, it is very different to my other two songs so it will stand out more if i put it at the end.
I will need to involve the following person in my performance Josh. This is because I am doing a collaboration with him on the song 'One More Light' by Linkin Park.
I will need the following resources and equipment
- guitar because that is the instrument i will be playing
- backing track because some of the song will sound better with other instrument accompaniment
- music sheets because i will not be able to remember all my songs for the 10-15 minute performance
- music stand because i will need to put my music on something
- A capo for One More Light
- A pick for my first two songs because it is easier and better to play chord based songs with a pick.
- I will need a concert crew to play my backing tracks, to set up my microphone for my guitar and to mix my audio.
When performing live, I will need to consider the following health and safety issues:
Health & Safety Issue 1: cables will be a tripping hazard . How I will make sure I am safe by keeping all the cables in one area..
Health & Safety Issue 2: music being too loud. How I will make sure I am safe by keeping the volume at a moderate level.
Health & Safety Issue 3: falling off the stage. How I will make sure I am safe by staying away from the edge of the stage while performing.
Health & Safety Issue 4: spilling water onto the electronics. How I will make sure I am safe is that i will not bring any liquids onto the stage.
I used the following website(s) to help me with my research n/a.
I will need to spend 20 hours at school preparing, performing and evaluating the event. I will spend my time by doing many rehearsals of my performance and writing up my blog.
1.3e I will rehearse on the following dates and I will work on the following at each rehearsal:
Week 19 Thursday 18th January 2018 (2 hours):
Plan: Practise 'Best Of You' by Foo Fighters.
What went well: I practised the whole song multiple times and did it without making mistakes many times.
What needs work: I need to keep on practising the song so when i perform it, it goes smoothly.
Week 20 Thursday 25th January 2018 (2 hours):
Plan: Practise 'One More Light' by Linkin Park with Josh.
What went well: We synchronised our two parts of the song together and we almost got all the way through the song together..
What needs work: We need to practise it all the way through together and i need to practise it thoroughly by myself to make sure it has fluidity all the way through..
Week 21 Thursday 1st February 2018 (2 hours):
Plan: Practise two of the songs i am doing for my performance: 'Best Of You' by Foo Fighters and 'One More Light' by Linkin Park.
What went well: I went through all the songs and they all went through smoothly with very few mistakes.
What needs work: I need to practise through my song with Josh to get the timings right.
Week 22 Thursday 8th February 2018 (2 hours):
Plan: Practise the first part of 'Romanza'.
What went well: Most of it is going through very smoothly.
What needs work: The middle part has a few pauses that i need to work ongoing through smoothly.
Week 24 Thursday 22nd February 2018 (2 hours):
Plan: Practise 'One More Light' with Josh to get the timing synced up with his singing.
What went well: We practised our song together and it went very smoothly.
What needs work: We just need to practise it together one more time together to make sure it is 100% right.
Week 25 Thursday 1st March (2 hours):
Plan: Practising for and doing my in class recording.
What went well: I practised all my songs and got more comfortable with doing them all in a set.
What needs work: i need to work on getting my set to at least 10 minutes and work on making all the songs flow correctly.
Week 25 Thursday 08/03/18 Dress Rehearsal Performance (2 hours):
Plan: Practise my set and do my dress rehearsal .
What went well: One More Light went smoothly through and i played Best Of You with very few stumbles.
What needs work: Best Of You needs to be played louder. Romanza need a lot more practise because it doesn't flow and it i don't know it well enough yet for it to be played confidently.
Week 26 Wednesday 14/03/18 Final Live Performance (2 hours):
Plan: Do my final performance of my set and to write up my evaluation .
What went well: I played all my songs to the best of my ability for my final performance. All my songs i think went through very smoothly.
What needs work: If i were to do my exam again i would want to have practised them all even more beforehand to make them all perfect.
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Task 3: Evaluation
Strengths Reflection:
One More Light was played through fluently and i stayed in time well with Josh's singing. Best Of You was played well with power behind the chords and it was completely in time with the backing track. Romanza was played with some technical accuracy. All my pieces were done with good musicality and i had a good, calm stage presence. I played most of my songs accurately but especially Best Of You.
I played my guitar with clarity of the notes and fluency between chords. I played the power chords of songs with as much volume as i could and i kept my picking patterns as technically accurate as i could.
Improvement Reflection:
I could slow down Romanza to make all the notes as clear as possible and to not make it as rushed as that made me stumble many times. I could use an electric guitar for Best Of You because it might make it easier to do the power chords and to make it more like the original song.
Improvement #1: work on the fluency of Romanza
Strategy: How could you make that improvement?: practise through the parts of the song that are played with the least fluency.
Improvement #2: work on the technical accuracy of Romanza
Strategy: How could you make that improvement?: practise through the song slowly to work on the piece as a whole.
Improvement #3: work on not muting the strings in Best Of You
Strategy: How could you make that improvement?: practise through the song and work on my hand positioning so i don't mute any strings.
Feedback from others:
1st Song - Excellent fluency without any hesitation, well done. Work on playing your strumming patterns are a little stronger to develop your dynamics. You need dynamics to demonstrate an engaging performance!
2nd Song - Excellent timing and rhythm, good accuracy, well done. It was a shame that we were having difficulty with the balance of this track as you did really well. Try to make sure as many of your notes as possible sound and 'ring' well without muting them.
3rd Song - Continue working on the accuracy and fluency of this piece the most. It cannot have any hesitancy's.
It made me realise i need to work on some of my notes in song 2 and i didn't realise i muted some of my notes. I also never thought about the dynamics in the 1st song so i will now work on those for my final performance.
It made me realise how much i need to work on my 3rd song because all the improvements she told me i needed for it to be a good piece.
Conclusion:
I think the performance went really well and I did all the songs better than i have ever done them previously. I played One More Light in time with Josh's singing and i played all the chords clearly without muting them. I played with more dynamics in this performance than in my dress rehearsal. I played Best Of You well with the backing track and i played as loud as i could while also not compromising the quality of the notes. I worked on my note clarity before the performance and i think it made this performance much better than the dress rehearsal. Romanza was played with technical accuracy and all the picking patterns were done clearly; I also played through it all with fluency. I played Romanza the best i have ever played it and definitely much better than in my dress rehearsal.
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