Monday 16th February 2015 - Researching Character Songs

Monday 16th February 2015
Researching Character Songs

http://www.broadway.com/buzz/154793/signature-wicked-song-
proves-most-popular-among-kristin-chenoweth-fans/

http://pixgood.com/glinda-wicked-costume-popular.html

Character songs are often used in musicals, they allow the character to express their feeling to the audience or other characters in the show. One idea for my variety performance is to sing a character song, this is because I think that my main strength out of singing, dancing and acting is singing. I could use this skill to be able to sing a character song. As most of the songs which I have sing before has been ballads I am going to do a comedy song, this would allow me to develop skills that I hadn't previously used before. One idea of a comedy character song would be "Popular" from "Wicked". I chose this because I can comfortably sing the notes as it is in my range as well as this it combines singing and speaking, this is something I have never done before. As well as this it is a modern version of a character song that would have been performed in a music hall in the 19th and 20th centuries. The song was originally performed by Kristen Chenoweth in the musical Wicked in 2003 on Broadway. The character of Galinda is very confident and "in your face" as she is liked by everyone, she sees an opportunity to help Elphaba to make new friends and make gain more confidence. If I performed this I would need someone to be Elphaba that I would be able to sing the song to, this would improve the performance as it would make more sense o sing to someone, as she is helping her rather than to the audience.

Costume - Galinda wears a puffy pink dress, this suggests to the audience that she is a "girly girl". If I performed this song I would also wear a pink dress to show a true resemblance to the character that I would be portraying.