Flying Solo
For the past few weeks, my Performance Lab class (run through the Theatre Department) has been building our show, Solos, which opens in two weeks! Performance Lab is an incredible class that Theatre Performance POEs get to experience, where every few weeks different guest artists come to school to work on specific techniques or skills with us. We’ve worked on movement, scene studies, playwriting, and stage makeup, and learned what it’s like to be an actor after we graduate. I’ve only had two semesters of Performance Lab so far (as a Theatre POE we need five semesters), and it is definitely the best and most rewarding class I have taken at Juniata. We get to build so many different skills, work with incredible artists, and make outside connections in the “actor world.”
Recently, we have been working with Leigh Hendrix, an actor and theatre performer based in New York, who is serving as our mentor for our solo performances. Each student in our Performance Lab class has created a seven-minute piece, and is starring in it alone. The themes and stories are all incredibly different, and my classmates have worked to portray a multitude of diverse characters.
For my solo, I wrote a short play called “Out of My Head”, which shows the struggle of a girl who is arguing and sometimes being controlled by the voice in her head (which I believe everyone has had some experience with at some point). I will be playing the girl and the voice at the same time, switching back and forth between the two simultaneously. Playing two characters at once is something I’ve never done before, so I’m really excited to continue working with my play in rehearsals. I probably re-wrote my script a dozen times, always tweaking and changing little things here and there until I found a draft that I am very satisfied with. As an actor and playwright, it’s nearly impossible to find “the perfect draft” of a play because every time you read it, or listen to it being read, you find new things you want to change. It’s a really fun but strenuous process.
Solos are being performed April 20th, 21st, and 22nd in both the Suzanne Von Liebig Theatre and The Movement Studio. Since there are eleven students in our class, we split the group in half, so six will be performing in SVL Theatre, and five in the movement studio. I definitely recommend coming to see a performance, because it’s really amazing to see some of the work Juniata’s performers can do. If you want to see all of the student’s pieces, you’ll need to come two nights (since you can only be in one space at one time). My friends and I have worked really hard on these original pieces, and I can’t wait until we can show everyone!
Thoughts on the Juniata Concert Choir
This weekend was the Juniata College Concert Choir’s Spring performance. At this show they presented all the work they have been practicing and perfecting since January, all of which they performed on their recent domestic tour through Pennsylvania, New York, and Connecticut. It featured traditional religious songs and several songs of Czech origin, two of which were written and composed by Antonin Dvorak. It was a moving auditory and even visual performance, and one that I will not soon forget.
I first heard the Concert Choir fifteen or so years ago when I was in kindergarten. The Shuler Theater in Raton, New Mexico, is run by a man named Bill Fegan, a Juniata Alumnus and a master at getting hard to get performances to come to a small middle-of-nowhere town. Bill managed to get the choir to swing through Raton on their Southwest domestic tour and although I don’t remember most of the performance there is one that stands out in my memory.
The choir had come down from the stage and had spread themselves out in front of and around either side of the audience. I don’t remember the song or even the tune, I just remember that even at such a young age I was in some sort of awe. I relived this awe this weekend as the choir neatly removed themselves from the stage and positioned themselves around the audience. The first song they sang in this formation was Remember Me. The Baritone’s deep voices perfectly balanced with the soprano’s high tones, and the Tenors and Altos blended it all together to make a hauntingly beautiful masterpiece. I don’t remember this song so much for the tune or even the words, but for the emotional response it brought. Throughout the entire piece I fought with being happy as it seemed that two souls were going their separate ways and moving on. But as the song went on, I realized that it was really someone saying goodbye for good, and the final line of “Remember me and be sad” hit home.
I have listened to a fair number of choirs during my life, but none so powerful as the Juniata Concert Choir. While many of them are wonderful singers, none except for their director Russell Shelley are what you would call professionals. Yet this group of young individuals comes together and manages to not only sing well but to also convey a breathtaking amount of emotion that caused the lady sitting behind me to exclaim “Oh, wow” after every song.
Taking a Break
Since I live in New Mexico I go home twice a year; Summer and Winter breaks. That means I either stay on campus or nicely ask a friend to stay with them. This past weekend was the three day Easter Weekend and since I was on duty (and because I had nowhere else to go) I stayed on campus. This is a hard thing to do, especially when the majority of your friends have gone home to be with their families for the weekend. Fortunately, there are several groups on campus that put on events for those of us who have to stay because we live so far away.
My weekend began with a trip to the cliffs, a beautiful location just north of campus. The rocky outcroppings jut out into a canyon through which the Juniata River runs. In the fall the leaves on the oaks, maples, and elms are shades of red and orange so vivid, that when the wind blows through the trees it looks like a raging wildfire has engulfed the canyon. My friends and I wandered down to the cave at the base of the third cliff and then continued exploring down the lower path, picking our way through brambles and dead bushes. We got to the fourth cliff and I suddenly had the bright idea to climb up instead of walking back along the trail.
There is something strangely relaxing about doing something risky after weeks of stress. My friends and I climbed up the wall of thorns and rotten logs and loose rocks half hoping, half praying that we wouldn’t fall. It was nice to get back to the simple things, to just focus on where we were and where we were going. When we finally reached the top we just sat, relaxed, watched the sun set over Huntingdon, and of course took new profile pictures.
After we had got all the right angles for our new profile pictures and captured as much of the dying sunlight as we could, we continued on down the trail to the fourth, fifth, sixth cliffs. When we finally reached the end we realized that it might not be the best idea for us to walk all the way back through the dark along the trail so we bushwhacked our way through a bramble thicket and back into civilization. We ended up several blocks away and down a very steep hill from our car so it took us another couple of minutes to actually get back to campus.
One of the best things about Juniata is its proximity to beautiful places in nature. The cliffs and the Peace Chapel are the closest of these, but if you ever get a chance, take the drive out to A Thousand Steps. The climb up all of the steps can be difficult and long but all of that is worth the views from the top. It is easy to get lost in your school work and clubs and sports teams and social life, and all that is well and good for being a successful college student. But sometimes you just have to take an evening, afternoon or an entire day to just go out into nature, take a breath, and just enjoy the sunset.
