20.08.08
By this, our third session at the centre in South Melbourne, I was definitely feeling increasingly relaxed and a sense of routine had taken hold.
This session was ostensibly run by a new face- David, who I subsequently learned is the husband of an old teacher of mine. Soon after Jayden, Jess, Nini (Anita) and I arrived I overheard David talking to Myf about "status" and "working with status" and I misinterpreted this conversation as David putting in his two-cents worth about our performance's structure.
After most people arrived (except those rendered late at the hands of that inept bus driver), we warmed-up our creative juices by reciting 'The Canoe Song' as a group.
David then took over the class by allocating a group of seven students (Olivia, Ashlee, Lauryn, Jess, Nini, Emma and myself) to act as an example for a game which toyed with 'status' (Uh-huh! That's what they were talking about). I volunteered to be the 'high status' king as others acted as my sycophantic underlings. The point of this exercise was not about who was 'high status', it was more about the status struggles amongst the minions who desperately tried to climb the power ladder and vied for the king's favour. The next exercise (my group still as the exemplar) had a slight variation- the king's authority (or status) could be usurped and others could take control. This caused a cyclical effect- the leaders status was constantly under the threat of mutiny. I enjoyed these exercises very much, and I loved both bossing my minions as the king and finding ways of re-attaining my status when I was overthrown. I also enjoyed watching Nini's dictatorship schemes.
Next we more or less played the same game, but our group was integrated with City Voices members. Spiros, Debra and Tracey joined my group. Jess suggested the scenario 'at a concert' which gave us many options of ways to refocus the status dynamic within our group. David suggested that we try to incorporate the idea of 'heroes' which has permeated these workshops- so Spiros played Elvis. I was surprised at how well Spiros handled this task, as it is often difficult for even very experienced performers to be creative in an improvised environment.
I realised later that I didn't really pay any attention to the City Voices members disadvantages while plotting and performing these pieces- I focused on the performance itself which could either be a positive or a negative. It's positive because it indicates that I am no longer daunted or uncomfortable around them, but it may have been insensitive of me to have ignored or overlooked their special needs. I hope that Debra handled everything fine, because I can't remember her presence in the performance whatsoever. Next time, I'll be more in-tune with this.
I do have a criticism about this latter activity: I don't quite see the point of having to 'rehearse' for twenty minutes when it was meant to be improvised- isn't that a contradiction? It was frustrating when we were caught 'planning' the performance and having David interject with "No planning! Improvise!", I'd advise that next time he structure this last activity more like our initial status activity were we were put entirely on the spot. This seemed to be the most effective, spontaneous and interesting method.
All the groups performed their sequences quite differently. I must say that the City Voices members seemed to be far more engaged and creative than a lot of the students. The highlights for me were Marylla's strangulation of Amee, Brian hitting Dylan on the head and Cathy dismissing Lucy's authority with a flop of her hand.
After all the groups had finished the performances- we realised that 7:00 had crept up on us.
I don't know if much from David's class can be used in the final performance, but I had fun.
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