August 2010 Archives

Musical theatre is the strongest, most vibrant strand of the performing arts industry. And it continues to shine cheerfully, and often movingly, even in these gloomy days of cuts, cutbacks and pessimistic talk.

Education trends always mirror professional trends in this industry so it isn’t surprising that, if you are a teacher looking for a good syllabus with graded examinations through which to develop musical theatre skills, you are rapidly becoming spoiled for choice.

LAMDA, for example, launched its examinations in Musical Theatre for the Actor/Singer in 2007 and Trinity Guildhall followed suit with its Musical Theatre and Performance Arts certificates at Grades 1 to 8 in January this year.

Now, starting this month, comes a Musical Theatre Graded Singing Examinations syllabus from Guildford School of Acting.

On the face of it September seems a funny time to produce a musical called Spring Awakening but I’ll let it pass. ‘Spring’ in this context is, of course, metaphorical. This award-winning 2006 musical (off Broadway and then last year in London) based on Frank Wedekind’s edgy, long-banned, 1891 play, is about burgeoning teenage sexuality with music by Duncan Sheik and book and lyrics by Steven Slater.

Now that the performing rights for Spring Awakening are available, the forthcoming show at the People’s Theatre, Newcastle is presenting a group of students with a good performance opportunity in Tyne and Wear. It is also the first time the piece has been staged in the north-east and one of the first productions outside London and New York.

Founded in 2007 by Ben Hunt who is currently reading Drama and Theatre Studies at the University of Sunderland, Nice Swan Theatre Company (NSTC) is a non-profit, student-based production company. It offers a dramatic platform to young people and gives them the chance to be part of ‘cutting edge’ productions - such as Rent last year - on their home patch.

A US exchange student with a strong musical background helped NSTC by acting as casting director for Spring Awakening which is currently in rehearsal.

NSTC also hosts drama-focused workshops at local Secondary Schools, to encourage youngsters to get involved in drama and performance. The overall aim of the company is to create opportunities for young people and to encourage them to develop their talents and interest in drama, via workshops and productions. And it clearly does its best (literally) to act this out with its unusual ‘by students for students’ approach.

Spring Awakening runs from September 28 to October 2 at the People’s Theatre, Newcastle.

I’m always happy to publicise participatory arts projects because they are so crucial to the process of getting more arts education to more people.

The latest one to have caught my eye is based in Aberdeen and begins with a launch event this week. Titled Extreme, it will culminate in a large-scale theatre production in March. Students from Bridge of Don Academy, Kingsford Primary School and St Joseph’s RC Primary School, local artists and community groups will all be involved.

Aberdeen City Council’s Arts Education Team is leading the project in partnership with The National Theatre of Scotland and Transition Extreme Sports Ltd. An Inspire project, Extreme is supported by the National Lottery through the Scottish Arts Council, with additional support from Shell and the Scottish Government.

The idea is to focus on the rush of high energy sports and to mix it with theatre, dance, music and art. So, irrespective of age, if you are interested in any of these things the Extreme team would be delighted to see you on Wednesday 25th August from 6.30pm - 9.30pm at Transition Extreme Sports Limited, Links Road, Queens Links, Aberdeen. There you can take part in some free taster sessions involving music, drama, parkour, BMXing, climbing and skateboarding. There’s more information at artseducation@aberdeencity.gov.uk

Extreme is led by an impressively eclectic group of people from the National Theatre of Scotland, including Simon Sharkey and Graham McLaren as Directors, Phil McCormack as Assistant Director, Chris Grant as Parkour Artist and Dave Martin as Digital Music Composer.

Three artists specialising in dance, movement and visual art, Will Thorburn, Claire Reid and Craig Barrowman, are also on board as Creative Catalysts. Their job is to work creatively on the project with the three Aberdeen schools.

Extreme builds on the success of last year’s project, Transform Aberdeen: The Cabaret of Impossible Dreams, in which over 120 Dyce Academy students and local community members took part. An impressive arts and education project which culminated in five performances in March, it was seen by over 470 audience members at The Forum in Aberdeen.

And here’s another, not unrelated, bit of good news: Since its launch in February 2006, the National Theatre of Scotland, which is supported by the Scottish Government, has performed to over 482,000 people across three continents. With no building of its own, the Company takes theatre all over Scotland and beyond. The National Theatre of Scotland also creates opportunities for people actively to take part in its projects which have involved over 105,000 participants, over 5,000 workshops and over 90 schools in 26 Scottish local authority areas.

It was an email from Vicky Ireland - playwright, adapter, director, former artistic director of Polka Theatre and indefatigable champion of children’s theatre - which drew my attention to an interesting looking event coming up next month.

A Japan-UK Forum, co organised by The Japan Foundation and Action for Children’s Arts (which Ireland chairs), runs on September 8-9. They didn’t do very well with coining a snappy title but at least it’s clear what the event is about. It is called: Japan-UK Forum: How Can Theatre and Drama Offer Children and Young People a Place in Our Community? Japan-UK Perspectives.

A Japan Foundation spokesperson explains:

As the structure of society and sense of community rapidly changes, the roles of drama and theatre and what they can offer to children are constantly under review …

Though the agenda may vary within different societies, one of the issues which can be shared between Japan and the UK is whether drama and theatre for children and young people offers them the chance to thrive within a safe environment. If so, how can this be facilitated and encouraged?

On the first day there will be a half-day seminar at the Japan Foundation in Russell Square to introduce some recent successful cases from Japan and the UK. Leading practitioners and academics from both countries will lead, including:

• Dr Cecily O’Neill
• Hisashi Shimoyama, Director of KIJIMUNA FESTA (International Theatre Festival Okinawa for Young Audience)
• Dr Takashi Takao, Associate Professor, Tokyo Gakugei University
• Graduate School and Prof. Yuriko Kobayashi, Tokyo City University

They are promising lots of opportunity for discussion.

Then, the next day, two experienced facilitators from the UK and Japan, will run drama workshops at New Diorama Theatre (Triton Street) to help develop skills and ideas for practitioners who wish to explore the concepts introduced the day before. There is more information about both halves of the event at The Japan Foundation website.

Sounds to me like a diary date for practitioners, academics and anyone else concerned about youth drama’s role in the development of community awareness to get together and learn from each other about current practice and what might yet be achieved in Japan and the UK.

It is all free but you do need to book. Contact event@jpf.org.uk to book a place at the seminar on September 8 and catherine.rollins@birmingham-rep.co.uk to register for the workshops on September 9.

Good news from Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts which has just announced an initiative aimed at providing part-time opportunities for young performers in Haringey, its home borough.

Starting next month, the scheme offers financial support and encourages local young people, aged 11-24, to get involved in part-time performing arts courses. Industry professionals will, as always, do the teaching.

The money is coming from the Tottenham Grammar School Foundation which has worked with Mountview in the past - and provided over £17m education grants in Haringey over the last 21 years - although, as Graham Chappell, Clerk to the Foundation explains, there have been problems: “The recent global economic crisis has significantly reduced the level of funds available to the Trustees for distribution to students, schools and other charities.”

But more positively, he adds: “After a succession of difficult decisions over the last two years, the Trustees have been pleased to approve this innovative scheme which will improve access to Mountview’s world-class programmes and facilities for residents who may have previously felt excluded on the grounds of cost.”

Like most professional reviewers I pass on nearly all review copies once I’ve written about them or rejected them. If I didn’t I would not by now be able to get through the front door for miniature mountains of books and, as it is, friends and family tease me about my ‘book problem’ - by which they mean the 5,000 or so titles which are shelved, reasonably systematically, all over the house from attic to cellar.

But every now and again the postie or courier turns up with a review copy of something so useful, interesting, entertaining or whatever, that I can’t part with it and it just has to join the bulging shelves. The Oxford Companion to Theatre and Performance, edited by Dennis Kennedy and to be published on 26 August, is a case in point.

Its 2,400 entries eclectically cover styles, movements, buildings, organisations and traditions with biographies of actors, playwrights, directors and designers. A quick flick, for example, turns up Chichester Festival Theatre, W S Gilbert, Guthrie Theatre, La Mama Experimental Theatre Club, Margaret Leighton, Hal Prince, satire, Ken Saro-Wiwa and zaju (tsa-chu).

This new book is a concise and updated version of The Oxford Encyclopaedia of Theatre and Performance which was published in 2003 in two volumes and is still available online by subscription through www.oxfordreference.com.

Editor Dennis Kennedy is Beckett Professor of Drama Emeritus at Trinity College, Dublin and a professional director and playwright. He says that the new book ‘attempts to see theatre and performance as human expressions with large cultural significance,’ explaining that the discussion has been expanded to include ‘key issues in censorship, dance and dance-drama, opera, ritual and some para-theatrical activities such as animal fights and public executions.’ Also included are other types of live entertainment including circus, sport and Wild West shows.

Keeping the focus firmly on performance and leaving other books to cover literary issues, the new Oxford Companion certainly ranges across an impressive number of topics and there are things to learn on almost every page, especially about plays, practitioners and movements from other countries and cultures. Find out here, for example, about Danish dramatist Ludwig Holberg (1684-1754) whose name I knew because of Greig’s Holberg Suite, but that was the sum total of my knowledge. There’s an interesting starting point entry on ritual and theatre too and another on Greek Drama. Get the basics here and then move on to something more detailed if/when you want to take it further. That makes it a useful reference book for students.

Inevitably some of the choices are arbitrary. Simon Russell Beale is included but Alex Jennings is not. Neither West Yorkshire Playhouse nor Crucible Sheffield is regarded as significant enough for inclusion. Given the current emphasis on the importance of children’s theatre and work for young audiences it seems odd too that neither Unicorn nor Polka merits an entry of its own, although there is a brief reference to Unicorn in the short essay on youth theatre. On balance, though, I think The Oxford Companion to Theatre and Performance is a book best valued for what it includes rather than criticised for what it leaves out and, as such, it certainly earns a place in my collection.

• The Oxford Companion to Theatre and Performance

I’m always on the look out for interesting providers of specialist performing arts training whose work I don’t already know about. I was quite pleased, therefore, when an email from the Ghost Academy of Performing Arts turned up the other day because it is based at Villamartin near Torrevieja on Spain’s Costa Blanca, which is certainly something a bit different. It offers pre-vocational and professional training at pre-degree level (as well as sports, exercise and fitness classes).

I pounced on the prospectus with interest. The academy has its own premises which include a sprung floor dance studio, rehearsal studio and music studio and - joy of joys because this is sunny Mediterranean Spain - there’s an outdoor classroom with digital whiteboard and seating area as well as a cafeteria and all the usual infrastructure.

A lot of shallow silly stuff has been said and written in recent years about whether or not classical music is ‘posh,’ elitist and unsuitable for ordinary people. It’s a very snobbish - both the straight and the inverted kind - and awfully British debate.

And it all, of course, comes back to education.

The point is, surely, that most children will find their way to the latest cult pop group without any help from anyone, just as they will discover comics and TV soaps unaided. The role of teachers and of the education system should be to open doors for pupils which would otherwise have remained shut by introducing them to, for example, art forms they probably would otherwise know nothing about.

That is why classical music should be part of every child’s education, just as much as Dickens, Shakespeare and Leonardo de Vinci are. Otherwise we practise real elitism by saying, effectively, ‘No this music is not for the likes of you’ which deprives them of a substantial tranche of their heritage and locks then into the very limited field of their own unguided experience.

Last week I saw the Pirates of Penzance. Nothing particularly unusual in that. I don’t miss many opportunities to see Gilbert & Sullivan productions and have probably seen the Pirates 30 times before. But this production was different.

It was produced jointly by three schools in the London Borough of Bromley - Langley Park Girls, Langley Park Boys and Ravens Wood - in collaboration with West Wickham Operatic Society, whose Kevin Gauntlett directed. Musical Director was John Hargreaves, outgoing Director of Music at Langley Park Girls (he’s moving to Woldingham School in September). Together they have formed The Courtyard Theatre Company.

What a lot you can achieve with talented, committed youthful bounce. Rarely have I heard a pirate chorus so clearly in tune and so exuberantly confident. And what a joy to see lively, giggly daughters for Major General Stanley who are actually the right age for their roles. I loved the choreography of their beach games too. Although these youngsters need coaching in how to camp up Gilbert’s dialogue so that its daft logic and evergreen jokes can be heard clearly, the sung solo work was commendable.