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A Director's Lot Is Not A Happy One, part the first
{Take the 100 Things challenge!}
It is a well-known fact* that requiring chorus players to move as well as sing reduces their individual IQs by a minimum of twenty points.
Fortunately, the effect is temporary, and can be ameliorated by actual effort—you know, learning the words, being certain of the notes, and writing the moves down so that you can go over it at home—the kind of effort most chorus members (including me, I'm not claiming any kind of special exemption here) decline to put in. Oh yes.
Setting the chorus numbers is generally more than a bit tiresome. People miss rehearsals, people don't understand what you're asking them to do (that IQ thing? I asked two people to stand one in front of the other, and they obediently… stood side by side), or don't know the music/lyrics well enough to be able to do the moves because they're struggling to remember what to sing.
However, at times it can be gratifying. I remember pondering over little pieces of paper for ages, deciding which chorus person should go where in which line, then giving them their instructions, and finding to my very great surprise that the move—getting two lines to file on from opposite sides, progress across and around the stage, and end up in four columns—worked perfectly. This time around, I've had to make four substitutions (in a group of seven, ye gods) and the newcomers have picked it up very nicely. Phew.
Onward!
* Ask anyone who directs amateur theatre.
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Even worse! (but I really do understand the problem, and I have an advantage due to existing terminology that most of them will understand) (cast out, come forward in pairs, etc)
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I've just been re-watching the Olympic Closing Ceremony, and am filled with awe at the choreographers who managed to get hundreds of amateurs working together so well.
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I had to work out the notation for 'TWiget' from watching a selection of videos.
It took me several days to get a result that felt unambiguous and possible to understand. I haven't actually had the chance to try it out on real dancers yet, but I will later this year...
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