Blessings From A Disaster

There are some silly things that happen in life that are so humiliating you feel you want to forget them for ever - and of course they are are the hardest things to forget. Many of these things happen when you are a teenager and easily humiliated but I find as you get older and more able to laugh at yourself these get fewer and farther between. One such rare thing happened for me when I went to audition for a cruise ship - near the beginning of 2014 I think it was. It was an audition with a company I had worked for before so that unknown at least was taken out, but I knew the audition would be hard work as it featured dancing which at the time I was not doing a lot of. I had some basic dance training and experience and can certainly learn and follow a sequence of choreography, but do not have that memory for moves that 'professional dancers' seem blessed with. Never the less the audition was primarily for singing, which I knew I could do, so I was determined to go for it none the less, if only so i wouldn't regret missing the opportunity. It was not long after the worst period of my mental health problems, and so I hadn't been working quite as frequently and felt extra nervous and out of practise from the audition world (I never have liked, and still don't really like auditions! But alas they are a necessary evil!). I tried to reassure myself that the feelings of nerves before the audition would be worse than the audition themselves - as is always true - except for this time.

I got through the first round - singing a solo - and was asked to come back for the afternoon. Gareth and I got a bite to eat and I went back for the second round which comprised of two parts - singing in harmony and dancing. The singing in harmony went poorly. I was able to sing the harmony when the musical director played it to me, but as soon as the other auditionees came in with their harmonies, I lost it completely.

Then the dancing. The choreographer was so much fun to watch but try as i might to concentrate I felt like the moves he taught me were slipping through my brain like water through a sieve. He told us to work on it ourselves for a few minutes, and I was so despairing I hardly did anything. I meekly asked a girl next to me for help but without any really hope of recalling the entire sequence within that minute. All I could hope was that I could copy the other auditionees when it came my turn to do it. No such luck. They split us down into groups of 3 and chose to put me at the front. I couldn't even pretend to know what I was doing. It was especially frustrating because I knew I was completely capable of performing the movements he had shown us, I just had no ability to remember what they were in such a short space of time. I had always done fairly well in my dance assessments at college, but only because I had excellent teachers who were willing to help me as I practised extra hard to master things.

I left the audition and went to Gareth's arms with frustrated and angry tears. I had never felt so humiliated and stupid at an audition before, and the fact that my confidence was low due to my current health circumstances, definitely magnified my feelings of despair. I felt stupid for thinking I could audition, and for the practising I had done in my living room to try to get back into dancing. SO so stupid. I realised I wasn't actually that bothered about not getting the job - as the people had spoke at the audition about what it would involve, I realised it wasn't quite what I wanted, but I was just ashamed and frustrated with myself, and embarrassed.

As time passed on and my humiliation simmered enough for me to reflect on the experience, a new frustration  arose - yes i had been lousy at the choreography - I'd known that would be a challenge - but why was i so rubbish at singing in Harmony? I could sing couldn't I? I'd been employed for singing work? I couldn't be that bad. Surely this was a skill I should master! I still wanted to master the dancing too, but for now that could wait.

So I sought out a singing teacher to teach me specifically how to sing in harmony, the fantastic Hannah Evans, and I joined Huddersfield Community Gospel Choir - I talked a bit about this, and a bit about my journey towards developing my skills in singing in harmony in this blog post here.

Since then as I began working with The Fabularium my new found skills were developed and put into use further, as I helped to develop harmonies for the songs in their shows.

After a performance of The Town Band Of Bremen with The Fabularium

I got to a certain point in my career where I decided it was time to start trying to 'tailor' my career in specific directions of what I wanted to do at that time. I decided that at that time I'd like to do either more physical theatre, or more singing work. So as I went down the line of applying for these kinds of work, something came up which was a dream opportunity.

I had been following, over Facebook, the ventures of a girl I had met briefly back whilst working as a performer at Nidd Hall, and in particular, the Vintage Trio she co-ran: The Daisy Belles. Check out their fantastic website here. Well they did a call out for a new girl. I had to apply. I was pretty scared, but delighted when I got an audition. I also discovered they were thinking of developing a new Motown trio - even more perfect as I loved Motown music.

I went along to the audition feeling pretty nervous. They were very friendly and nice. There was a little bit of dancing involved, but it was manageable. The singing went fairly well and I was in awe of how amazing their voices sounded together, and pleasantly surprised when mine seemed to blend with them pretty well! I told them I was also very interested in the Motown opportunity.

I left the audition feeling even more sure I wanted the job, but then I had that horrible mental battle of trying not to get my hopes up. I hate this, and I suck at it. Now as a performer there are of course some jobs you apply for that you would like to get but find it easy to accept you have not, but there are some that you just can't deny your heart wants. This was one of those. And as always with waiting to hear if you've been successful for a job - the waiting was torture.

I can still remember being in the car with Gareth when I got an email asking me to work with them - I was beyond chuffed. Not only did they want me to provide cover for one of the performers for The Daisy Belles, they also wanted me to be part of their new Motown group The Dazzlettes, and they wanted me to be in their Christmas Pantomime Tour under their company Razzle Dazzle Productions that performs in care homes. Potentially with Gareth alongside me!

Performing with The Daisy Belles

This work has stretched me immensely. Not only in the amount of songs and harmonies I have had to learn but especially with dancing. It has really helped me to get more used to picking up choreography, and also be more self-disciplined with my own private rehearsal.

Promo Shot for The Dazzlettes

Looking back on the memory of that Cruise Ship audition - there is still a little bit of myself that cringes, but a bigger part of me feels proud of myself for using that frustration and channelling it into something productive, and thanks to opportunities given to me by others I am able to use those new skills and develop them further. If you face/have faced a humiliating situation like I did, I would encourage you to try and step back from it a little, and reflect whether there is anything you can do to make something good come out of what was otherwise felt like a disaster (after you've allowed yourself a bit of time to cringe obviously!).