Performance | Lesson 15

In today's lesson we did the actual performance in front of a Year 7 class, and I think it went really well. We started by doing the same warm up as we did last lesson as we knew it was effective and we thought it would help us when performing today. Then once we did a quick run-through of our duets, we started the performance.

When performing Blank Space, myself and Evie had to share a microphone because we only had three available to us, which meant we had to make sure our vocals were heard equally through the microphone. I think the performance of Blank Space went really well and I was really happy with the outcome of it. I think the harmonies were heard equally and the dynamics of the song sounded balanced, which is good as that was something we had to work on when improving the song. Everyone knew the lyrics so we didn't have any mess ups during the performance. Overall, I think this song went really well and the audience looked like they enjoyed it.

When performing Up, the vocals sounded equal and the harmonies sounded accurate. When there were a view mess ups of harmonies, we managed to keep going with the song making the mistakes not noticeable in our performance. We both knew the lyrics and we knew when to come in which made the performance a lot better. The audience enjoyed the performance and I am happy with the outcome of this performance. Overall, I think this song went really well and the audience looked like they enjoyed it.

When performing Ho Hey, myself and Maddie had to share a microphone because we only had three available to us, which meant we had to make sure our vocals were hear equally through the microphone during the third verse and the last chorus. I think the performance of Ho Hey went really well and I was happy with how the harmonies sounded. Everyone knew the lyrics and were confident with what they were singing which made the performance really good. Overall, I think this song went really well and the audience looked like they enjoyed it.

Run-Through | Lesson 14

Since this lesson is the one before the actual performance we decided to do a run-through of all of the songs after we decide what order the songs will be placed in. When warming up we did the siren warm up to help us reach the high notes in the songs and also to help warm up our vocal cords. We also sung the scale of C while saying the phrase "Green Lorry, Orange Lorry" to help pronounce our words correctly.

We started the lesson by choosing the order of each song. We decided to start with Blank Space because we knew the audience, which was a year 7 class, would know the song and they would enjoy hearing a song that they like and know fairly well. As this song is quite up-tempo, we wanted a slow song to go afterwards. We agreed that Maddie and Evie would sing their duet Big Yellow Taxi as it's quite a slow song and is quite the opposite to Blank Space. Then due to mine and Amelia's duet being up-tempo, we decided to have that song next to keep the balance correct. We all agreed that we would end with Ho Hey as it is our best ensemble out of all of them and we wanted  to end a positive and calm note which this song will do.

When rehearsing the songs individually we stood in the places that we would be when actually doing the performances in our next lesson. For Blank Space, Evie will be on the end and I will be between her and Maddie. Amelia will then be on the other end of the line next Maddie due to mine and Evie's harmony being similar and Maddie and Amelia's parts being similar as well. Then for Up I will be on the left and Amelia will be on the right but for the audience I am on the right and Amelia is on the left. Then when we sing Ho Hey Maddie will be on the end, where Evie previously was, and I will in between Maddie and Evie while Amelia is in the same spot as before.

When doing a run-through of each song, we all really liked the outcome of each ensemble song and duet song. There a few things we still need to improve on slightly, like being confident with what we are singing, but other than that it sounds really good and I think we are ready for the performance in our next lesson.

Dynamics | Lesson 13

In today's lesson we decided to do more run-throughs of both of the ensemble songs that we are going to be performing. We warmed up our voices with the same warm up as we did yesterday as we knew it was effective and it helps a lot when warming up our vocal cords as well pronouncing our words properly when singing the songs.

We started by rehearsing Ho Hey because we felt this was our better ensemble out of the two we have. When rehearsing the song we thought it sounded good and we were happy with the outcome. The higher harmony needs to be a little louder but not too much as we wanted to keep the song calm and simple through the melody and the harmony. We then rehearsed Blank Space and realised we had learnt the lyrics a little better than before, and also the harmonies sounded better. We have found that the high harmony, which is what I am singing, needs to be a little bit louder to make the dynamics sound better.

To make my high harmony louder I need to make sure I open my mouth wider when singing the harmony as it helps boost the volume of my voice. However, the high harmony is right at the top of my vocal range which means that it's a little difficult for me to raise my voice, but I am going to try and sing louder to balance the dynamics of the song.

Once we finished the rehearsals of the ensemble songs, we decided to move onto rehearsing the duets. Again, myself and Amelia decided to focus on the harmonies of the song just to perfect them. We sung along with the original version of the song and the karaoke version to help us get used to the original song which can help us with the harmonies as well. After the rehearsals were completed we liked the outcome of the harmonies and we knew the lyrics of the song which helped us when singing the karaoke version.

Without Lyrics | Lesson 11 & 12

Last lesson we all agreed that we needed to learn the lyrics to both of the ensemble songs, so we have decided to do that this lesson. Before that we sung up the scale of C while singing "o e o e o" and also we decided to sing our arpeggios as well to help with any leaps that we have in our songs. Both of these warm ups were effective because they warmed up our vocal cords and also they helped me prepare me for our duet as I have quite a few leaps in the song that I need to prepare.

We started by rehearsing Ho Hey with the lyrics quite a few times in a row so we could get used to the lyrics and also so we could remind ourselves of what we are singing. Then once we had rehearsed it with the lyrics a few times, we decided to rehearse it without the lyrics. This wasn't too challenging as we all knew our parts and we roughly knew the lyrics anyway. We did the same thing with Blank Space and we found that we struggled with remembering the lyrics more. The reason for this is because the song is up-tempo and the phrasing in the song is quite fast which means we have a lot to remember when singing the song. We decided to go back to singing the song with the lyrics and then after a few run-throughs of that, we decided to go back to singing the song without the lyrics to see if we had improved. The outcome of that was good as we remember the majority of the lyrics. We still need to learn some of the lyrics, but we know all the chorus' and the bridges in both songs so we only need to focus on the lyrics in the verses.

Once we had rehearsed all the group songs with and without the lyrics we decided to go and work on our duets separately. Myself and Amelia knew we had to work on the harmonies and the melody of the chorus, fourth verse and the bridge so we decided to focus on that this lesson. When we messed up we would go back to where we messed up refresh our memory of what we have to sing and then redo it to help us get used to it and to help it stick in our memory. We still need to improve on the harmonies slightly but we are improving quite a bit and we are happy with the outcome so far.

Rehearsals | Lesson 10

In todays lesson we decided to go through both of the ensemble songs and both of the duets as we hadn't heard Evie's and Maddie's duet yet. To warm up we did the same warm up where we sing "Red Lorry, Yellow Lorry" along with the scale of C, but we also sung "Red Lorry, Green Lorry" to help us with our pronunciation. We found this warm up effective because it helped us pronounce the words in the songs correctly, and it also warmed up our vocal cords so we were ready to sing our ensemble and duet songs.

We rehearsed Ho Hey first as we all agreed it sounded really good and we were all really happy with the outcome of the harmonies and we didn't really think it needed to be improved as much as our other ensemble song. When we rehearsed Ho Hey we all agreed that it sounded really good, and we really needed to improve on was the lyrics as we don't all know the lyrics yet. We then moved onto Blank Space and we did a run-through to hear how the harmonies sounded in the chorus' and the bridge. When rehearsing this song we found that we still need to learn the lyrics and also we still need to improve on some of the harmonies in the chorus. We did a few run-throughs of this song so we could improve the harmonies in the chorus and the bridge, and also so we could learn the lyrics of the song. After doing a few run-throughs we agreed that the sounded good and we were happy with the outcome.

We then took turns to perform our duet pieces. Evie and Maddie went first and showed Amelia and I what they have done with their song so far. They have started the first part of the song and they have worked out some harmonies that sound really good in the song. They still need to work on the rest of the song and they need to learn the lyrics but other than that their duet sounded really good.

Myself and Amelia performed our duet with what we have done so far and it sounded quite good. The others said the performance is good but we need to learn the lyrics. We also found that some of the harmonies were a little bit flat so we need to make sure we improve on the melody and the harmony during the fourth verse and the bridge.

All four songs sound really good, but we have all decided that we need to improve a little more and learn the lyrics of the song to make the songs perfect.

Up | Lesson 8 & 9

Before we started rehearsing the song we did the same warm up as we did last lesson because we thought it was effective and we knew it would help us prepare for rehearsing our duet. Once we finished the warm up we did a run-through of the duet and decided that we needed to break the song down in order to get the harmonies accurate.

We found that there were harmonies in the fourth verse, the bridge and there are a few in the last chorus. We decided to start with the harmonies in the fourth verse as they were the first harmonies  we could hear in the song. Amelia found singing the melody along with the harmony fairly difficult so we  decided to sing along to the original at first to see what it sounded like. Then we started by singing the melody a few times and I came in with the harmony. However, the first I came in with the harmony I made sure to be quiet and then get louder once Amelia had caught onto the melody and could sing along to the harmony. We tried this method for the bridge as well as we found it quite effective. Whenever one of us went wrong in the rehearsal we stopped where we went wrong and kept singing it until we got it correct. We did this so we would get used to singing the part we got wrong and also so we could improve the lines that we needed to improve.

We spent the lesson rehearsing the song and just making sure the harmonies sounded accurate. By the end of the lesson we agreed the harmonies sounded better than they did, but we still need to work on them to make them perfect.

Duets | Lesson 7

I was absent for a lesson and during this lesson the others in the group tried Rude by Magic again, but they decided that the song wasn't suitable for us. Instead they agreed that we would sing two different duets. Maddie and Evie would sing a duet and myself and Amelia would sing the other duet. We decided to do warm ups in our duet pairs. Myself and Amelia chose to sing the scale of C, up and down, while singing "Red Lorry, Yellow Lorry" as we  found effective the last time we used this warm up. We also decided to do siren noises to help us reach the top of our vocal range and the bottom of our vocal range. This warm up is also effective because it helps us with any leaps we may have to sing.

Went through different songs we could do as duets and we agreed that we should choose Up by Olly Murs and Demi Lovato as our duet. We originally knew the song, so it meant that it wouldn't take us long to learn the lyrics of the song and to learn the actual song. It's quite a well-known song so we knew the  audience would enjoy the performance so we both agreed that the song would be our duet. We listened to the original song and decided that Amelia would sing Olly Murs' parts of the song and I would sing Demi Lovato's parts of the song. We agreed this because Amelia's vocal range is similar to Olly's and my vocal range is similar to Demi's. After choosing who would sing what parts, we listened to the karaoke version of the song and we tried singing our parts to see what it sounded like. We liked what the outcome was but we agreed that we needed to improve the harmonies a bit more and we need to learn the lyrics a little bit more so we could perfect the song. We decided to go away and learn our parts individually along with the karaoke track so when we rehearse the song the next time we could see how to improve.