WTF?! Do musicians have to learn acting, too?

 

Throughout 2018, we’re teaming up with talent at the Australian National Academy of Music to bring you informed answers to real questions and topics about your music career.

Ever wondered why you feel performance anxiety? What the deal is with tuning to 440Hz – or not? How to lead an orchestra? We’re here to tell you all about it.

In our latest What the Fact?! we explore acting.

That is, we tell you that as a musician, you should probably learn acting, too. (Sorry. It’s kinda fun, though.)

Here’s Bethany Simons, who takes acting pretty seriously:

But what Bethany also understands is the way actors and musicians alike have a lot to learn from each other. In particular, as musicians, you’ll need some acting skills to help you build confidence and command of the stage.

Bethany brings her experience as an award-winning writer, performer, and director into the musical world of ANAM. In the past, Bethany’s works for the stage have been performed through Melbourne Fringe Festival, Regional Arts Victoria, the Melbourne International Comedy Festival, and the Melbourne Recital Centre among other places – but she’s also collaborated with musicians from the Melbourne Youth Orchestra to the Southern Cross Soloists.

Bethany will narrate Mostly Mozart 4: Operatic Mozart this 14 September, and Abduction from the Seraglio this September 16, with musicians and soloists from ANAM.

Hacking acting for musos!

 

Bethany, you have an extensive background in acting and writing for the stage. What do you love about acting?

For me, it always comes back to storytelling and characters. I loved telling stories as a kid, and impersonating teachers and friends. I would often entertain at family dinner parties and I thoroughly enjoyed drama class and school productions when I was a teenager. But I’m not sure that I knew acting was a career choice.

My mum was the one to encourage me to pursue what I loved. I studied acting for screen and stage at university. But, even so, I don’t often introduce myself as an actor. I say I am a theatre maker because it better describes all the elements of my creative practice – writing, performing, devising, directing, dramaturgy.

As a performer, I delight in vocal and physical transformation, comedic timing, dramatic structure. I love the craft, and I also love audiences! Without them, live performance wouldn’t exist. They expect us, as performers, to take them somewhere every time we play or tell a story. I’m grateful that people continue to leave the comfort of their own home, buy a ticket, and sit in a dark auditorium. That moment of hush and expectation is where the magic happens.

You’ll be narrating some upcoming concerts with ANAM. Why have you chosen to use your acting skills to cross over into the music industry, too?

I have ANAM to thank for the ‘cross-over’. I worked part-time on the front desk for a number of years when I first moved to Melbourne from regional New South Wales. Everyone knew I was an actor, so students would often call on my skills for their recital programs, and then things progressed to narrating all sorts of ensemble works, from children’s classic Peter and the Wolf, to John Cage’s Marriage at the Eiffel Tower, and David Lang’s Are You Experienced?.

It’s been rewarding to forge a bit of a career from my connections with musicians. I’ve collaborated as a writer/performer on projects including Musical Fairytales with Melbourne Youth Music (now Melbourne Youth Orchestras), a fully staged version of Peta and the Wolf (featuring a female protagonist) with Southern Cross Soloists, and I occasionally write presenter notes for concerts. I also co-wrote Reception: The Musical with ANAM associate artist Peter de Jager.

The funny thing is, I’m not a musician. But I have an active imagination and a good ear, so I always try to bring a new layer to the music through storytelling, character, and imagery.

As musicians, we are often taught to be true to the composer’s intentions and to express our own selves through our music. But when it comes down to it, music is a lot about taking on a role and exhibiting stage presence. Why should musicians think about acting?

Musicians and actors essentially do the same thing, but with different instruments. As an actor my ‘instrument’ is my body and voice, and my job is to interpret material and engage the audience. There are actually many similarities when it comes to creative process as well. I work with text in the same way that a musician approaches a score – I do a read-through, mark the changes, think about structure, rhythm, dynamics, intonation.

I do think musicians could sharpen a number of transferable skills from acting. In particular, developing new ways of listening, unlocking greater physicality (we do lots of stretching and rolling around on the floor!) and working in an ensemble.

I think about guest artist David Dolan, who used to come to ANAM to teach improvisation. Many students would resist the idea at first, because it was so foreign to their practice as a classical musician But, after a week or so, they were exploring new ways of listening, responding, trusting and ‘playing’ with their musical foundations. Stepping away from what you know stretches you – it’s good for the brain and for your craft.

Research is an element of the actor’s process that musicians would also find appealing. Just as a musician considers the life of a composer, historical context, intention, and so on, when playing a part, actors consider these same things. We study a text to find out what the playwright wants to say, what the character wants, and then we employ techniques to structure the story.

What are some specific techniques surrounding stage presence or even etiquette that you’d advise young musicians to consider?

From the moment one appears on stage, the performance has begun! I’ve run stage craft workshops for musicians in the past where we look at all elements of a performance: from entering and exiting the stage, to carrying music, introducing pieces, tuning, acknowledging colleagues, engaging with the audience, bowing, dress code. There is a lot to consider. And it’s worth rehearsing these elements!

For example, actors wouldn’t dream of performing in a show without having done a dress rehearsal, so take time to rehearse in the outfit and shoes. And, if public speaking makes you nervous, write notes and practice introducing the pieces; imagine kind people in the audience (they want to be there!). It’s really about giving yourself every opportunity to be relaxed and confident in order to focus on playing your best.

To flip things around, what do you need to know about music to be a successful narrator?

Narrators need to have a good ear, and they need to be sensitive to structure. I’m not a musician. I can bash out chords on the piano, I grew up singing with my siblings in a trio, and my mum was a piano teacher, so music moves me greatly. But I walk into these projects without being able to read music. I use feeling and memory to learn the score, and I plot it out dramatically. I think my time at ANAM being around ensemble and orchestral rehearsals gave me an advantage as well, because I learnt how conductors work and what musicians need both from the rehearsal, and from me.

As a theatre maker, I am interested in what is called ‘story theatre’, and so I approach narration as a storyteller. It’s a seemingly simple, ancient method of communicating, but it is highly specific. I’m thinking not just about the plot and the music, but about a lot of technical elements: the placement of character and eyelines, dexterity of jumping in and out of characters, playing the dramatic changes, clarity.

In your Mostly Mozart concert, the cast of characters from his opera music will be removed and replaced with chamber musicians. What responsibility does this place on the performers to represent the roles when ‘acting’ is removed?

This piece has been co-written by ANAM librarian and actor Phil Lambert and myself. We’ve taken the libretto and reworked it to be a solo monologue that weaves through the wind ensemble arrangement of Mozart’s Seraglio. Constance is the storyteller in this version, so we have taken liberties and explored elements of the story that are not necessarily in the original. For example, we meet her before the initial sea voyage, we see her being sold in the Turkish market, and so on.

When rehearsing the text, I employ the conventions of story theatre to replace the normal stage action with story. In this piece, I am ‘Constance The Storyteller’ at all times, but I dip in and out of other character voices and physicality in order to build a richer story experience for the audience.

The role of the musicians, in this case, is not to play set characters, but to help tell the story with music. The score has been a key consideration when plotting the structure of the text. We have taken note of mood, atmosphere, and moments that punctuate the storytelling. Of course, Constance is aware that there are musicians on stage, so she is free to interact with them – it’s fun to push the boundaries of concert etiquette!

Moving forward, how can we avoid stigma or discrimination across these two industries? That is, how can actors and musicians work collaboratively and respectfully with each other, without judging the other’s artistic choices?

I’ve learnt a lot about discipline from classical musicians. I used to marvel at the way they beat themselves up if they missed a day of practice! I’m not sure the self-loathing is productive, but the discipline made a great impression on me.

In terms of collaboration, perhaps the key is to remember that each art form has its own unique process. For this reason, we each need our own time apart to do specific technical work. When we come together, we do work to marry our creative disciplines. When I come in as a narrator for a music program, my role is to ensure that the conductor and musicians feel confident with the cues. We rehearse the parts of text and music that overlap, we tighten things. Sometimes I will ask if things can be adjusted to better serve the story – it might be a cut, or a sound effect – but in the end, it is a musically driven work, so the storyteller exists to enhance the musical experience.

Like a marriage, compromise is important, as is listening and respecting the other person. I find interdisciplinary work exciting – hopefully it’s also fun for the musicians to work on something a little different!

Any parting words for musicians unconvinced that they could learn from those skilled in acting?

Remain open to other artistic disciplines. I love watching documentaries about painters, photographers, dancers and designers – creatives who express in a different way to me. It’s inspiring and fascinating.

Instead of suggesting that all musicians start attending acting classes, I would encourage them to be on the look-out for left-of-field collaborators. You learn a lot about your own creative practice when working in cross-artform settings.

Bethany will narrate Mostly Mozart 4: Operatic Mozart at 11am September 14 in the Melbourne Recital Centre, and Abduction from the Seraglio at 4pm September 16 in the Government House Ballroom, St George’s Terrace, Perth. 

READ NEXT: Nick Deutsch, who will perform oboe in this event, explains everything you need to know about tuning. EVERYTHING.

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Images supplied. Credit: Sarah Eley. Emoji via APACHE – License 2.0.