Blog 9: Advisory House Prep

1. State whether or not you currently have a mentor, and what the status of your interview is with that person (I have completed the interview, I have scheduled the interview, I have not scheduled the interview, etc).
My mentor is the musical director of the children's theater, Lisa Pettygrove. I have not interviewed her yet but I will the last Tuesday of October. I will hopefully interview the other musical director, Jackie, who works for the young adults theater.

2. At this point, your research is probably guiding your studies toward more specific areas within your topic.  Name the area or two you find most promising and explain your reasons.   
Vocals and the process of a show from the director's eyes. By vocals, I mean as in how to keep them healthy, warm ups, how to match your tone and pitch with the different types of songs, and so on. And the process of a show is self explanatory but I will be relying on one journal/book to use.

3. What kinds of sources do you think will help you in the next month to gain more research depth?  Where will you go to get them?
I will definitely be relying on interviews and some articles/journals from libraries to go into depth with my research since it is getting a bit more difficult. I'm not sure exactly what but hopefully I find something that I can branch out into.

4. Write down a possible EQ.  Please don't worry about wording other than ensuring that it provides the option for multiple correct answers.  At this point, the senior team is most interested in understanding your thought process.
How can a director showcase a successful musical?

Blog 8: Independent Component 1 Proposal

1.  Describe in detail what you plan to do for your 30 hours.

Who: Middle school students, students from my program and two high school students. 

What: I'm going to be teaching vocal lessons and help them enhance their performance The middle school students I will be putting on a small show in front of their school. Those at my program will do the same but will be performing at the Claremont Colleges. The two high school students are in a talent show and will be in future shows, I am just their teacher/trainer. 

Why: Vocal lessons are expensive and difficult to find. I will not be teaching them how to read notes but I will have them constantly practice and improve their performance. I will have them do skits and other monologues as well so they comfortable with becoming a different character. 

2.  Discuss how or what you will do to meet the expectation of showing 30 hours of evidence.

I will be meeting with these students every Friday and Tuesday for about an hour each and I also have to make tons of game plans as well and different activities/assignments. Besides, I have to do whatever the vice principal would want us to do as well.

3.  Explain how what you will be doing will help you explore your topic in more depth.

Since I will be the teacher, I have to look for different pieces for them to do, explore more songs in different genres, learn what I should do as a teacher, and get hands on experience on how to be a musical director in a show. 

4.  Update your Senior Project Hours log.

Will do. 

Mentorship is every Tuesday from 4:00 p.m. - 9:00 p.m. and starting October 10, we will be meeting every Saturday as well from 12:30 p.m. - 4:00 p.m.

Blog 7 - Second Interview Preparation

1.  Who is your mentor and where do they work?  If their workplace does not reflect their expertise, what makes them an expert?

My mentor is Lisa Pettygrove and she mainly works as an elementary school teacher. However, she is also a choir teacher and she is the musical director for the children's theater. She has been doing that for years now as well. 

2.  What five questions will you ask them about their background?

• what college did you attend? OR what did you do to get to a musical director/choir teacher?
• where is the best place/thing for me to do so I can get experience in that?
• why did you choose to be a musical director?
• I also want to become a teacher as well and a vocal teacher. How do you balance that? 
• Is it stressful to create a show and plan things for your class?
• Have you gone through any programs that have helped you get to where you are now?
• what was your motivation/inspiration/idols?

Blog 6 - Advisory Prep

1. What has worked well for you concerning senior project this year?  What has made it a positive experience for you?  
I cannot lie, I am extremely excited to start my independent components because I will be doing two. One of them is to create a two 10 minute maximum shows for the Fullerton College Drama Festival, one which I will be featured in. The other independent component is to "teach and mentor" kids within my program and my old middle school to enhance their vocal performances. And I will be starting those very soon!

2. What are you finding difficult concerning senior project?  How can you adapt to make that portion work better for you?  How might the senior team help?
I knew from the very beginning that gathering research for my topic was going to be a bit more difficult so I can't complain much. If I get stuck, I can always ask for help from the teachers. However, I must admit that right now, my mentorship is a complete drag. I go every Tuesday from 4 p.m.- 9 p.m. and basically sit there. Sometimes, they let me pause and play the music. But its for 5 hours nonstop, besides a 30 minute break. I hope that it gets better as time goes by since we're still, after 4 practices, doing auditions and about to do call backs, it'll become more enjoyable and I'll have things to do. But until then, I must attend my days.

Blog 5 - Interview 1 Reflection

Click here for the interview audio.

1. What is the most important thing I learned from the interview?  Is there anything I would do differently for other interviews?
I interviewed 5 pretty different people. Some were more silly, others more serious and one in between. But I have to say while interviewing them and, right after, watching them practice for their auditions, they shared one huge obvious trait in common that little did I fail to realize it makes musical theatre what it is: not being themselves anymore but becoming the character. One of the interviewees mentioned before that her best advice was to become the character and repeatedly, the musical director said that was incredibly important too. There's a lot more passion and development physically and mentally in musical theatre than I thought.
I guess one thing I would change in the next interviews are ask more "why" questions instead of "how" and "what" questions. (more personal questions along with more resourceful questions)
2. Did I get additional resources and contacts?  What is the most useful?  Why?
Though it wasn't brought up in the recording and they are high school students still, they did not have any additional resources or contacts besides joining a church or looking for a program yourself.
3. What makes my interviewee qualified to help me? 
They may have been high school students but they have been doing musical theatre for over 5 years, almost over 10 years! So they are extremely experienced and know what they're doing. The interview helped me understand and see how the actors are and what they expect and feel.

Blog 4 - House Advisory Prep 1

Personally, I started with a lot of goals for my mentorship. I really wished to really get out of my comfort zone, actually believe I'm a good actor. I also would like to learn amazing tips so I can direct one of the best Fullerton Drama Festival musical IPoly has done! And those are still my goals, but some things changed a bit.

At first, I was extremely excited for my mentorship, mainly because we were going to do Aladdin and Into The Woods. Once I started my mentorship, the people were nice and talented especially the actors. However, it's very slow and all I do right now is push play and pause for them. I understand it's barely auditions and they're getting ready for callbacks but it's really killing my motivation to stay there. I was always nervous to try acting so musical theatre was my escape in some sense. But at this point, I'm trying to allow myself to believe I am and that the mentorship will help me out a lot. I'm not kidding when I say these people are talented. The best part is that they're funny and kind. 

If I do end up staying, then I will strive to be as involved as I can. Starting out, I want to start talking to the actors, to stop being so shy and quiet. Then, to get as much help as I can for my independent component which is to "direct" a musical for the Fullerton Drama Festival and for once make it into finals.

Blog 3 - First Interview Preparation

1.  Who do you plan to interview?  Why?
I just started my mentorship yesterday, September 1, and I met a girl named Lauren. You can easily tell she's a hard-core drama person and incredibly dedicated but also very sweet so I asked her if I can interview her. I would've asked the director first but I decided that once the show is further in or at least until auditions are over, that I should start with the actors themselves. Besides, it would be very nice to see how they try to get their parts for a show during auditions and how they rehearse.

2.  Five questions will be assigned to all seniors to ask.  What additional questions do you plan to ask?  

• How do you personally prepare yourself for an audition? What methods or techniques do you use that help you nail your auditions?
• What about being in musical theatre specifically motivates you to keep on staying in the program?
• Is it difficult to balance out learning dancing, singing, and acting at the same time? How so?
• What show have you done that you personally feel was the most successful? What do you think made it so successful?
• Do you take special care of your body, mainly your vocals, a certain time before the show or all the time? What things do you do?
• What happens if you're an actor with low stamina?