Flat Found and the Vocal Variation

I am pleased to announce; I have found a place to live! What a relief! I can now stop scouring the internet for ads and running around town looking at places. Ah, to have my free time back for stuff like research projects and summative statement term papers. Thank you!

The flat is on Glasgow’s Southside and is home to a lovely couple and their two cats. She’s an artist and a business woman, he’s a musician and songwriter and the cats, well, they must be creative if they live in that environment. It’s a good size place on the top floor in a Victorian tenement building. In my search I have seen a few flats in these kinds of buildings. The top floor flats are often two levels and this is no exception. The couple’s quarters are upstairs and my room is down. There’s an eat-in- kitchen, dining room and living room and a bathroom up as well as down. I have a feeling it is going to be a wonderful home for me. Oh and here is the craziest thing: the mister is the cousin of my classmate Eric; the new dad and our Julius Caesar! Small world, eh? We had no idea we had this connection as I just found this place on a website called Gumtree. But we were standing in the kitchen and I saw on the wall Eric’s name under an arty photograph of trees. Eric was a professional photographer before he came to the RSAMD but I thought, "Surely it is not the same Eric." However, when I mentioned it and we got to talking, lo and behold, it is the very man! So, as you can see, it is simply cosmic fate that I’m moving into this place.

Earlier this week the ‘Dead in Scotland’ crew hit the recording studio. It was a fantastic experience. I think I have found a new love in the form of voice acting. Producing this recording was the crux of Barbara’s research project. Neither one of us had ever done any voice acting or recording of any kind and Lauren had never directed for the medium. So we three were total novices in the studio. Thank goodness for Bob Whitney the engineer at the RSAMD studio. He was an absolute delight and made us all feel at ease. We couldn’t have asked for a more professional, more expert source than Bob to guide us through and make us sound fabulous. Thanks Bob!

The recording itself was finished in one day. We were very pleased at our timing. We had the whole play recorded by lunch and after the break all we needed to do was some clean up. Our production and rehearsal history with the piece aided in our efficiency. Over all we are quite happy with the recording. Of course there are parts, as an actor, you think, “Oh I wish I would have delivered that a bit differently.” However, this was our first time doing anything like this and that was the point, to learn. It is amazing how things read differently when you take out the visual but, we adapted very well to the new performance medium. So much of what happened on stage came from Barbara and me having eye contact with each other. We didn’t have that in the recording studio. We had to keep our heads forward and speak into the microphone. This meant our communication with each other, our ‘actions’ all had to happen with the voice. That’s why Lauren was there in the booth listening. She was essential for keeping our intentions true and clear. There wasn’t a feeling of pressure on the process. It was relaxed and enjoyable. If we flubbed a line we just paused and did it again. The sound effects were fun too. Bob laid down wooden boards for us to tread on in our nosiest shoes. We had tea cups and spoons to lightly clank, papers to rustle and so forth. Some effects Bob added in post (afterwards).

In the near future I will be posting the play for your listening enjoyment. We are working on some music for the top and tail. We can’t just use whatever we like because of copyright infringement issues but my friend James in New York has volunteered to write some original tunes that I can use free of royalty charges. Thanks James!! As soon as we get that sorted out I’ll make it available if you want to have a listen.

Onward ho! The upcoming week is Fringe free and we are all about our shows. We have eleven days until opening night. My show is in a good place but it is time to really focus and bring this baby up to the standard we want to present to the world. And we will.

See ya next week!
Take care!
-m