Broadway baby

I think I forgot to fill you all in on this one. I have recently enrolled in a musical theater class here in the city. On Wednesday nights, I head down to 24th Street for my Performance Techniques Workshop to sing my little heart out. So far, I have gone three times and I'm really enjoying it. Any outlet to sing is welcomed with open arms by this girl, of course.

Deciding to enroll kind of happened on a whim -- my friend was trying to convince me to take acting classes with her, but I thought that if I was going to take any classes, I wanted them to be specific to vocal performance. So, I found this class instead. It's basically set up like a master class setting; we bring in songs and perform, then get feedback from our classmates and the instructor, and work through moments.

It's a small class - the most we've had in attendance was 7, and we get a lot of opportunities to perform and work on our songs. What I really enjoy is how performance focused it is. Pretty much all of the classes I have taken in my life have been focused on the vocal technique. Now, I'm not denying the importance of that, nor am I claiming to need no instruction in that area. But it feels good to flex a bit of a different muscle, you know?

Along with flexing different muscles in terms of acting/singing, I am also trying to branch out of my musical style box. I choose a lot of contemporary musical theater stuff - specifically, a ton of Jason Robert Brown songs. And it turns out that I should probably have some variety in my book. Who would have thought, right? So that's what I'm doing.

It's fun to get involved in the theater in this small way, to feel like I'm doing rather than just observing. Of course, it's simply a small step. I don't know what direction I'm headed in, exactly, though. Does this mean I'm looking for auditions? This class is about preparing songs for performance and audition, so I suppose perhaps I should.

When leaving the class one evening, I was walking in the same direction as my teacher, John. He asked me about my background, and was surprised when I told him I was PR major, not musical theater. He said, "So, you moved to New York to do the singer/actor thing..." And, really, the answer is no. That's not the reason why I moved to New York. But John wasn't convinced when I told him so. "Don't be afraid to say it," he said. My response: "Well, it really wasn't my plan to come here and try to do this. But, I suppose this could be a step in that direction."

Then he asked me if I had gotten an agent yet. Now, that's a funny thought, and definitely a step I'm not quite ready to take. Though you never know what's going to happen...

To end on a less vague statement, how about a quick anecdote from the class:
After each song is over, we go around and say something positive about that person's performance. My favorite comment that I have gotten? "Well, you sure can sing the shit out of anything. And this week, I made people cry. In a good way. I sang Still Hurting from The Last Five Years.

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Apologies for the sub-par level of writing in this post. It's 6:30 on a Friday and I'm sitting in the office waiting for everyone's conference calls to end so we can go to happy hour at Blockheads. Viva la weekend!