Weekend at Guildhall
Music workshop, during the weekend led by Rick and Joe, second term about Collaboration, with the Leadership masters group.
I was excited for these sessions, even though they were on a weekend. It was the first time collaborating with the masters, building new relationships and connections in the school, and also learning with them.
Something special from that weekend, is that I was starting to be aware of how I see my creative thoughts more alive in detail, my visions. Not sure how that happened because someone stole my note book that I was using for that term. What I do know is that around those times we had an interesting class with Detta, where we were exploring and creating learning models. Each one of us had distinct ideas to help in different aspects and processes. For example, Reme did a learning model that was building a play by building a spaceship and taking it off, flying etc.
My model was the "babe thought balloon".
When I presented to the class, Natasha got interested in my model and together we developed Baby-Thought Balloon & Comfort Zone model. "The model acts as a visual reflection prompt; with the ‘Baby Thought’ representing an action, idea or feeling felt over a period of time or within a specific moment. The ‘Quality of the Ground’ asks one to rate their comfort level; ‘Knowledge of the Ground’ is a metaphorical invitation to investigate one’s emotional reaction to the level of comfort/discomfort; and, the fact that this is all illustrated within a balloon emphasises the transient and evolutionary nature of our thoughts, ideas and feelings. In the same way that the ‘ground’ changes, the contents of an individual’s three zones are constantly being updated. If you are not paying attention, even as the individual experiencing the shift, you might miss it. This is where perceived risk-taking/comfort versus personal risk-taking/comfort comes in".
So I became interested to see my own thoughts, How do they appear? How do I trigger them?
I know that feeling comfortable with my mind, for example, sometimes having a relaxed shower, ideas and impulses can pop in a way that I might even need to write it down, such as, scenes for Dicking Around. Also at work, or doing physical exercise when I let my mind breathe alone. Depending how I look at things, anything has the potential to trigger my mind and appear a vision, and if I hold on to it, I can see its details flourishing. (Which I started to be aware on the Music workshop).
That maybe led me to also get curiosity in people’s ideas and visions. On the Music workshop weekend, my first group on the Saturday was with Rick and Jow. Through the process, Rick asked me a couple of questions which I didn’t understand why.. “When you walk around on the street, is there anything you sing?”, funny enough on the night before I was whistling a friend’s song coming back from gym. But, anyway, for Rick it was all making sense to ask me these questions, linking with what he was seeing, and creating on his mind.
On my next group, we had to use a sound of a glass shattering as a trigger to create something, Hanna (Masters), was manipulating the sound, slowing it down, backwards, echo, which gave a totally different texture and when I heard, instantly I saw a desert with a car, and as much I was on it, more I was seeing.. and being truthful to my vision, I wouldn't hold back my ideas, which is a big thing for my own development and the group.
"A cold, windy desert at night, with a rust car left forgotten".
I tried to write some stuff, though my writing skills was a bit too abstract when reading back. We ended up creating a scene, with this sound on the background, and me walking slowly, trying to see far away (thinking about the desert in my mind), Petra was shadowing my movements, using an exercise that we learned from an workshop with Neil Paris on the week before.
On the last group from the Saturday session, until end of Sunday. Reme, Cal and me had to use a poem that Dee wrote. Cal had an idea of recording us speaking the poem in different ways, and made a beat from that. As I was starting my adventure in rap around those weeks, Reme plays a big part on that helping me with feedback, which is someone that I have already a level of trust to try different ideas and risks. So, I gave the idea of getting each a line from the poem, and write a rap responding to it.
We performed on the end of Saturday. Although my lyrics were really poor and my level of confidence on it wasn’t great. It felt good to have this opportunity to perform something I wrote, I think for the first time ever.
On the next day Reme and me were bouncing ideas, and I had this vision of a scene or physical theater. We got some words that we liked from the rap, and made a sequence of movements, which was Reme character inside of my head…
What was challenging on that day, was to translate my ideas to Cal. Making the sounds with my mouth etc, trying to explain them. Such as, just after the intro when Reme says “Do you, still have hope?” we look at each other, and move together. I had a vision that usually on a movie on the cinema, it would be a bass note going lower and lower with the intention of entering into a different world. So, Reme and me moving together (00:11), with that sound, it would represent, going inside of my characters mind, where Reme’s character is trying to kill me.
Unfortunately don't have the full video that shows the next part where Reme and me rap with the poem. It wasn't a good delivery of my part. But we got really into this idea of mixing physical theater with rap, wanting to develop this idea forward, but as the time passed, we didn’t get back to it. Who knows perhaps it can go to a future performance.
What I take forward from this project is that I need to keep being aware of holding on to my ideas and visions. Also developing in describing them to the group clearly.
First jamming session with Reme. I don't play piano and Reme don't free style. Having some fun...
