Saturday, October 17, 2015
Chavaleh Forgey Vocal Studio Taste the Arts 2015 Performance on YouTube
18 Singers in 18 minutes! -- a performance by some of the best in my studio during the Taste the Arts Festival in Visalia in October 2015. Very proud of these enthusiastic and well-prepared singers!
Sunday, October 4, 2015
Dancing Right Out of My Comfort Zone
I've been producing theater for more than twenty years in one capacity or another. Lots of professional work where I did my job as music director and conductor and didn't have to worry about anything else, and lots where low-budget and scrappy community theater called on me to do everything from hair and makeup to set construction.
Nothing, NOTHING, I tell you, prepared me for........
The pancake tutu.
They are beautiful and obviously complicated, and one to three thousand dollars, purchased. What??? And we need three for the Nutcracker?
Oh no. I can do this. Let's go to YouTube.
Huh. "How to make a cheap tutu stand up and look like a pancake..." for a Halloween costume, maybe -- not for grand ballet... Romantic tutu tutorials galore... (tutu tutorials... didn't even mean for that to be cute...)
And then I FOUND it! "How to Make a Ballet Tutu" with the competent looking woman seated in a studio surrounded by gorgeous pancake tutus.
"All you need to make a tutu is a little bit of knowledge..." (She is so comforting!!! Yay!!! She's going to impart this coveted knowledge!!!)
"...and a person, who is professionally trained in tutu making."
Wait, what? Can I get that at Joann Fabrics? I have somehow missed the human trafficking in tutu makers...
No exaggeration, here's the link, watch the first 20 seconds... How to Make a Ballet Tutu
The first attempt -- 20 some hours of attempt -- seemed pretty okay until I sewed the last seam and stood the layers up. They didn't meet in the middle! No one wants a ballerina with no tutu in the back! But I had learned a lot. I learned that the basque -- ha! First I learned what a basque was! -- is supposed to cover up all the layers of stitching. Mine didn't. I learned that the pattern I had didn't have enough material to gather, and that I needed to at least double it. I learned that I still would rather be a musician than a costumer...
But the second attempt -- Ahhh, the second attempt!! Just look at it!
And it's even prettier right-side-up and on the young woman who will play the Ballerina Doll at the party!
Finished off the day by going to rehearsal to dance in the party scene. (I'm a conductor. And a vocal coach.) I had the time of my life. Never dreamed I'd be in the ballet I've drooled over since I was a small child. Much subtle and beautiful legit dancing in this production, but the moment of "courtly" dance at the party is beautiful even with people like me doing it! Rachel Thompson is a miracle disguised as a choreographer.
How does a vocal coach and musical theater conductor get mixed up in ballet? Well the answer is also why I haven't written anything in the last six months or so --- but it's coming up soon!
Get a taste here: www.theaterartsalliance.com
Nothing, NOTHING, I tell you, prepared me for........
The pancake tutu.
They are beautiful and obviously complicated, and one to three thousand dollars, purchased. What??? And we need three for the Nutcracker?
Oh no. I can do this. Let's go to YouTube.
Huh. "How to make a cheap tutu stand up and look like a pancake..." for a Halloween costume, maybe -- not for grand ballet... Romantic tutu tutorials galore... (tutu tutorials... didn't even mean for that to be cute...)
And then I FOUND it! "How to Make a Ballet Tutu" with the competent looking woman seated in a studio surrounded by gorgeous pancake tutus.
"All you need to make a tutu is a little bit of knowledge..." (She is so comforting!!! Yay!!! She's going to impart this coveted knowledge!!!)
"...and a person, who is professionally trained in tutu making."
Wait, what? Can I get that at Joann Fabrics? I have somehow missed the human trafficking in tutu makers...
No exaggeration, here's the link, watch the first 20 seconds... How to Make a Ballet Tutu
The first attempt -- 20 some hours of attempt -- seemed pretty okay until I sewed the last seam and stood the layers up. They didn't meet in the middle! No one wants a ballerina with no tutu in the back! But I had learned a lot. I learned that the basque -- ha! First I learned what a basque was! -- is supposed to cover up all the layers of stitching. Mine didn't. I learned that the pattern I had didn't have enough material to gather, and that I needed to at least double it. I learned that I still would rather be a musician than a costumer...
But the second attempt -- Ahhh, the second attempt!! Just look at it!
And it's even prettier right-side-up and on the young woman who will play the Ballerina Doll at the party!
Finished off the day by going to rehearsal to dance in the party scene. (I'm a conductor. And a vocal coach.) I had the time of my life. Never dreamed I'd be in the ballet I've drooled over since I was a small child. Much subtle and beautiful legit dancing in this production, but the moment of "courtly" dance at the party is beautiful even with people like me doing it! Rachel Thompson is a miracle disguised as a choreographer.
How does a vocal coach and musical theater conductor get mixed up in ballet? Well the answer is also why I haven't written anything in the last six months or so --- but it's coming up soon!
Get a taste here: www.theaterartsalliance.com
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