hi all, hope u r having a good holiday so far....
been listening to the songs again and came up with a few ideas...
In ghost the lyric "All the clubs have been closed down," referred to the Locarno in Coventry which was a dance hall club in 1960s. perhaps we could have something similar maybe the club (or whatever) is a place where people take refuge to get away from what ever is happening above or in the real world... kinda like Cabaret (if anyone has seen the film)
ALSO...
there could be a narrator at the beginning and end whose a bit wierd and wonderful and has lived through whatever went on?
Play the songs when audience enters and leaves and we all wonder round hall (in character) when audience enters or just stand still like stauessing bits of ghost town either at end or in the actual piece just to create a atmosphere kinda what we felt when we first went into the drama studio (creepy, horrific, curiosity etc)
i really like the idea of it being set in old victorian times with death, plague, having a good time, corruption etc it would mean great costumes, make up and lots of different characters
so they r just some random thoughts if u wanna expand on them please do! and wanna tlk to me about them if you don't get any of them
Josie xx
Friday 24 July 2009
Wednesday 22 July 2009
Monday 20 July 2009
Haha.
Anyway, the pandora's box idea could work, since i thought it might go hand in hand with the corruption and politics idea. Saying that the government could have something called 'Project Pandora' which could be a corrupt idea thats being planned by the government or leader.
Or, branching down the fantasy route, we have the real pandora's box, or something similar, that does open and does release some sort of horror, corruption, plague, famine or whatever you want onto the city/country (hence the picture with the starving man and the man who hung himself) and there could be one man (mack the knife?) who uses this to his advantage?
Im just throwing ideas about - writing my thoughts out. Anyone want to elaborate on the ideas feel free to do so... or just disregard them completely :P
- Cam
Sunday 19 July 2009
an idea?
heyy =)
this is just a random idea that came to my head while i was thinking about all the ideas people were talking about, one of the main things that people seemed to be saying was the corruption of politics and one idea i had was to have 3 scenarios where the we how this 'corruption' has effected people in different situations. its just an idea but thought i would put it here to see if anyone can develop it furthur or something like that =)
there was talk of a pandora's box type idea which sounded cool, but i dont know where to go with that myself =(
Callum
this is just a random idea that came to my head while i was thinking about all the ideas people were talking about, one of the main things that people seemed to be saying was the corruption of politics and one idea i had was to have 3 scenarios where the we how this 'corruption' has effected people in different situations. its just an idea but thought i would put it here to see if anyone can develop it furthur or something like that =)
there was talk of a pandora's box type idea which sounded cool, but i dont know where to go with that myself =(
Callum
Thursday 16 July 2009
Performance dates!
These are the dates we will be working towards:
Wedsnesday 2nd of December: Dress and Tech rehearsal
Thursday 3rd of December: Evening performace
Friday 4th of December: Evening performance
Saturday 5th of December: Eveving performance
WE MUST BE COMPLETELY READY BY THE 2ND OF DECMEBER !!
We are also pondering one or two matinee performances ( Afternoon) In order to raise funds even further
The Guidhall has been booked for during the day and evening for rehearsal and performance
We are looking to raise about £500 to cover the costs of the Guildhall and so tickets prices will be approx £8.00
MR T and Kat
x
Wedsnesday 2nd of December: Dress and Tech rehearsal
Thursday 3rd of December: Evening performace
Friday 4th of December: Evening performance
Saturday 5th of December: Eveving performance
WE MUST BE COMPLETELY READY BY THE 2ND OF DECMEBER !!
We are also pondering one or two matinee performances ( Afternoon) In order to raise funds even further
The Guidhall has been booked for during the day and evening for rehearsal and performance
We are looking to raise about £500 to cover the costs of the Guildhall and so tickets prices will be approx £8.00
MR T and Kat
x
Tuesday 14 July 2009
T.S Eliot
hey guys,
i found this bit at the beginning of the Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse
A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo
Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,
Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.
roughly translated:
"If I thought my answer were given
to anyone who would ever return to the world,
this flame would stand still without moving any further.
But since never from this abyss
has anyone ever returned alive, if what I hear is true,
without fear of infamy I answer you."
i was thinking it kinda ties in with a few of our initial ideas
like death, horror, ghost towns, murder? also one we havent got which came to my mind, the afterlife?
thought you might want to know...
Aj x
i found this bit at the beginning of the Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock
S’io credesse che mia risposta fosse
A persona che mai tornasse al mondo,
Questa fiamma staria senza piu scosse.
Ma perciocche giammai di questo fondo
Non torno vivo alcun, s’i’odo il vero,
Senza tema d’infamia ti rispondo.
roughly translated:
"If I thought my answer were given
to anyone who would ever return to the world,
this flame would stand still without moving any further.
But since never from this abyss
has anyone ever returned alive, if what I hear is true,
without fear of infamy I answer you."
i was thinking it kinda ties in with a few of our initial ideas
like death, horror, ghost towns, murder? also one we havent got which came to my mind, the afterlife?
thought you might want to know...
Aj x
Saturday 11 July 2009
MACk the knife
Heres just like some info I found about the background and inspiration of the song. Note that the play which the character Macheath is taken from 'the threepenny opera' and the lyrics were first written by Bertolt Brecht, conicidence? I think not.....
'There were no mobs in Detroit in 1728, when the character we know as Mack the Knife first made his appearance. In those days, there were only about 30 families living in Fort Ponchartrain near Detroit du Herie (strait of Erie), and none of them belonged to the Purple Gang. In fact, the reference is to London, not Detroit, and to politicians more than street gangs.
The character of Macheath, later to become Mack the Knife, first appeared in The Beggar's Opera by John Gay (1685-1732). Gay was a popular English playwright and poet, a friend and collaborator of Jonathan Swift and Alexander Pope.
The Beggar's Opera is a comic ballad opera, the first of its kind, and took London theatre by storm. Gay uses lower-class criminals to satirize government and upper-class society, an idea that has been used often ever since. A century and a half later, the title characters in Gilbert and Sullivan's Pirates of Penzance note that they are more honest than "many a king on a first-class throne." And in our time, wasn't it Bob Dylan who wrote, "Steal a little and they throw you in jail; steal a lot and they make you a king?"
The main character of The Beggar's Opera is a swashbuckling thief called Macheath. He's a dashing romantic, a gentleman pickpocket, a Robin Hood type. He is polite to the people he robs, avoids violence, and shows impeccable good manners while cheating on his wife. The character is usually understood as partly a satire of Sir Robert Walpole, a leading British politician of the time.
The Beggar's Opera was a success from its first production in 1728, and continued to be performed for many years. It was the first musical play produced in colonial New York; George Washington enjoyed it.
We now skip about 200 years to post-WWI Europe and Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956), a distant cousin of this SDSTAFFer. World War I had a revolutionary impact on the arts. The avant-garde movement, in despair after the war, embraced the concept of the anti-hero. Gay's play was revived in England in 1920, and Brecht thought it could be adapted to suit the new era - who's more of an anti-hero than Macheath? So in 1927 he got a German translation and started writing Die Dreigroschenoper, "The Three Penny Opera."
Brecht worked with Kurt Weill (1900-1950) on the adaptation. He did far more than just translate Gay's play, he reworked it to reflect the decadence of the period and of the Weimar republic. Mostly, Brecht wrote or adapted the lyrics, and Weill wrote or adapted the music. Gay's eighteenth-century ballads were replaced with foxtrots and tangos. Only one of Gay's melodies remained in the new work. The play parodies operatic conventions, romantic lyricism and happy endings.
The main character is still Macheath, but Macheath transformed. He's now called Mackie Messer, AKA Mack the Knife. ("Messer" is German for knife.) Where Gay's Macheath was a gentleman thief, Brecht's Mackie is an out-and-out gangster. He's no longer the Robin Hood type, he's an underworld cutthroat, the head of a band of street robbers and muggers. He describes his activities as "business" and himself as a "businessman." Still, the character does manage to arouse some sympathy from the audience.
So, we finally get to your song, the "Ballad of Mack the Knife" (Die Moritat von Mackie Messer) from The Three Penny Opera. The song was a last-minute addition to appease the vanity of tenor Harald Paulson, who played Macheath. However, it was performed by the ballad singer, to introduce the character. The essence of the song is: "Oh, look who's coming onstage, it's Mack the Knife - a thief, murderer, arsonist, and rapist." (If these last two startle you, be patient for a couple paragraphs.)
The Brecht-Weill version premiered in Germany in 1928 and was an instant hit. Within a year, it was being performed throughout Europe, from France to Russia. Between 1928 and 1933 it was translated into 18 languages and had over 10,000 performances.
In 1933, The Three Penny Opera was first translated into English and brought to New York by Gifford Cochran and Jerrold Krimsky. There have been at least eight English translations over the years. In the 1950s, Marc Blitzstein wrote an adaptation, cleaning up "Mack the Knife" and dropping the last two stanzas about arson and rape. At the revival in New York using the Blitzstein translation, Lotte Lenya, Kurt Weill's widow, made her comeback - she had a role in the original 1928 Berlin production.
Blitzstein's sanitized adaptation is the best known version of the song in the English-speaking world, and undoubtedly the one you've heard. Louis Armstrong popularized it worldwide in 1955 with an amazing jazz beat. Bobby Darin's 1958 recording was #1 on the Billboard charts for many weeks and won a Grammy as best song. It's been sung as ballad, jazz, and rock by many of the greats, including Ella Fitzgerald and Rosemary Clooney.
In the 1970s, Joseph Papp commissioned Ralph Manheim and John Willett to do an adaptation/translation that would be "more faithful" to Brecht. So, if you were surprised at the notion of arson and rape, here's Willett's translation of the last two stanzas, omitted from the Blitzstein version:
And the ghastly fire in Soho, Seven children at a go- In the crowd stands Mack the knife, but He's not asked and doesn't know. And the child bride in her nightie, Whose assailant's still at large Violated in her slumbers- Mackie how much did you charge?
Having hit the heights with Louis Armstrong, it's only fair that we also recount the depths reached in the 1980s with the McDonald's TV jingle, "Mac Tonight." Selling Big Macs - how have the mighty fallen.
Got a question, Harmon Everett? Get behind old Lucy Brown. Oh the line forms on the right, dear Now that Cecil's back in town.
— Songbird'
The character of Macheath, later to become Mack the Knife, first appeared in The Beggar's Opera by John Gay (1685-1732). Gay was a popular English playwright and poet, a friend and collaborator of Jonathan Swift and Alexander Pope.
The Beggar's Opera is a comic ballad opera, the first of its kind, and took London theatre by storm. Gay uses lower-class criminals to satirize government and upper-class society, an idea that has been used often ever since. A century and a half later, the title characters in Gilbert and Sullivan's Pirates of Penzance note that they are more honest than "many a king on a first-class throne." And in our time, wasn't it Bob Dylan who wrote, "Steal a little and they throw you in jail; steal a lot and they make you a king?"
The main character of The Beggar's Opera is a swashbuckling thief called Macheath. He's a dashing romantic, a gentleman pickpocket, a Robin Hood type. He is polite to the people he robs, avoids violence, and shows impeccable good manners while cheating on his wife. The character is usually understood as partly a satire of Sir Robert Walpole, a leading British politician of the time.
The Beggar's Opera was a success from its first production in 1728, and continued to be performed for many years. It was the first musical play produced in colonial New York; George Washington enjoyed it.
We now skip about 200 years to post-WWI Europe and Bertolt Brecht (1898-1956), a distant cousin of this SDSTAFFer. World War I had a revolutionary impact on the arts. The avant-garde movement, in despair after the war, embraced the concept of the anti-hero. Gay's play was revived in England in 1920, and Brecht thought it could be adapted to suit the new era - who's more of an anti-hero than Macheath? So in 1927 he got a German translation and started writing Die Dreigroschenoper, "The Three Penny Opera."
Brecht worked with Kurt Weill (1900-1950) on the adaptation. He did far more than just translate Gay's play, he reworked it to reflect the decadence of the period and of the Weimar republic. Mostly, Brecht wrote or adapted the lyrics, and Weill wrote or adapted the music. Gay's eighteenth-century ballads were replaced with foxtrots and tangos. Only one of Gay's melodies remained in the new work. The play parodies operatic conventions, romantic lyricism and happy endings.
The main character is still Macheath, but Macheath transformed. He's now called Mackie Messer, AKA Mack the Knife. ("Messer" is German for knife.) Where Gay's Macheath was a gentleman thief, Brecht's Mackie is an out-and-out gangster. He's no longer the Robin Hood type, he's an underworld cutthroat, the head of a band of street robbers and muggers. He describes his activities as "business" and himself as a "businessman." Still, the character does manage to arouse some sympathy from the audience.
So, we finally get to your song, the "Ballad of Mack the Knife" (Die Moritat von Mackie Messer) from The Three Penny Opera. The song was a last-minute addition to appease the vanity of tenor Harald Paulson, who played Macheath. However, it was performed by the ballad singer, to introduce the character. The essence of the song is: "Oh, look who's coming onstage, it's Mack the Knife - a thief, murderer, arsonist, and rapist." (If these last two startle you, be patient for a couple paragraphs.)
The Brecht-Weill version premiered in Germany in 1928 and was an instant hit. Within a year, it was being performed throughout Europe, from France to Russia. Between 1928 and 1933 it was translated into 18 languages and had over 10,000 performances.
In 1933, The Three Penny Opera was first translated into English and brought to New York by Gifford Cochran and Jerrold Krimsky. There have been at least eight English translations over the years. In the 1950s, Marc Blitzstein wrote an adaptation, cleaning up "Mack the Knife" and dropping the last two stanzas about arson and rape. At the revival in New York using the Blitzstein translation, Lotte Lenya, Kurt Weill's widow, made her comeback - she had a role in the original 1928 Berlin production.
Blitzstein's sanitized adaptation is the best known version of the song in the English-speaking world, and undoubtedly the one you've heard. Louis Armstrong popularized it worldwide in 1955 with an amazing jazz beat. Bobby Darin's 1958 recording was #1 on the Billboard charts for many weeks and won a Grammy as best song. It's been sung as ballad, jazz, and rock by many of the greats, including Ella Fitzgerald and Rosemary Clooney.
In the 1970s, Joseph Papp commissioned Ralph Manheim and John Willett to do an adaptation/translation that would be "more faithful" to Brecht. So, if you were surprised at the notion of arson and rape, here's Willett's translation of the last two stanzas, omitted from the Blitzstein version:
And the ghastly fire in Soho, Seven children at a go- In the crowd stands Mack the knife, but He's not asked and doesn't know. And the child bride in her nightie, Whose assailant's still at large Violated in her slumbers- Mackie how much did you charge?
Having hit the heights with Louis Armstrong, it's only fair that we also recount the depths reached in the 1980s with the McDonald's TV jingle, "Mac Tonight." Selling Big Macs - how have the mighty fallen.
Got a question, Harmon Everett? Get behind old Lucy Brown. Oh the line forms on the right, dear Now that Cecil's back in town.
— Songbird'
Kat
Friday 10 July 2009
"No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be."
This is from a poem I have found called 'The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock' by T.S. Eliot (1888-1965) And here is a link to the page (http://www.coldbacon.com/poems/eliot.html.)
"Cursing, they scurry from the sinking ship friend turns to foe, employee snubs his boss"
This is a line from Bertolt Brecht's (the practitioner) 'The Resistable Rise of Arturo Ui' which chronicles the rise of Arturo Ui, a fictional '30s gangster. (Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Resistible_Rise_of_Arturo_Ui)
"Morals go overboard in times of crisis"
This is taken from the same play that the above quote is from several words later.
"All loyalty is gone! Money is short, but loyalty is shorter"
And the same with this quote, it originates from the same play as the two above quotes, but is actually located above the last 2.
"Politic, cautious and meticulous; Full of high sentence but a bit obtuse"
This is actually located within the T.S. Eliot poem 'The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock' and at the end of the verse where the first quote is located.
Judging by where the quotes originate from I have a feeling Mr T and Steve want us to use Brectian style theatre in the play and im not quite sure about T.S. Eliot's poems, maybe he wants us to take the quotes at face value or he wants us to research him closer.
Anyway, take what you want from it guys, any questions comment underneath the blog and put your name at the end and it will be easier than talking at school or through facebook.
Cheers,
Cam x
This is from a poem I have found called 'The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock' by T.S. Eliot (1888-1965) And here is a link to the page (http://www.coldbacon.com/poems/eliot.html.)
"Cursing, they scurry from the sinking ship friend turns to foe, employee snubs his boss"
This is a line from Bertolt Brecht's (the practitioner) 'The Resistable Rise of Arturo Ui' which chronicles the rise of Arturo Ui, a fictional '30s gangster. (Wikipedia page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Resistible_Rise_of_Arturo_Ui)
"Morals go overboard in times of crisis"
This is taken from the same play that the above quote is from several words later.
"All loyalty is gone! Money is short, but loyalty is shorter"
And the same with this quote, it originates from the same play as the two above quotes, but is actually located above the last 2.
"Politic, cautious and meticulous; Full of high sentence but a bit obtuse"
This is actually located within the T.S. Eliot poem 'The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock' and at the end of the verse where the first quote is located.
Judging by where the quotes originate from I have a feeling Mr T and Steve want us to use Brectian style theatre in the play and im not quite sure about T.S. Eliot's poems, maybe he wants us to take the quotes at face value or he wants us to research him closer.
Anyway, take what you want from it guys, any questions comment underneath the blog and put your name at the end and it will be easier than talking at school or through facebook.
Cheers,
Cam x
Few notes
hey guys well done on finding the blog (as I would have imagined you'd done having read this)
feel free t0 upload pictures, songs, ideas, comments etc. anything you want but just remember to leave your name so we know who to thank :)
yours truthfully
AJ and Kat
feel free t0 upload pictures, songs, ideas, comments etc. anything you want but just remember to leave your name so we know who to thank :)
yours truthfully
AJ and Kat
Ghost Town
This town is coming like a ghost town
All the clubs have been closed down
Bands won't play no more
Too much fighting on the dance floor
Do you remember the good old days before the ghost town?
Why must youth fight against themselves?
Government leaving youth on the shelf
This place (town) is coming like a ghost town
No job can be found in this country
Can't go on no more
The people getting angry
This town is coming like a ghost town
repeats
Initial Ideas
Pandora's box
Disease/famine/poverty
Black and white
Government/polotics (corruption)
Slavery
Hiding the truth - Mack The Knife/Ghost Town
Dark magic
Morality
Crisis/chaos
Putrid lifestyle
Timeline aspects
Jack the ripper
Murder
Hat
Trapped (bars/net) prison
Song lyrics (underlying meaning)
Ghost Town - scar/reggae - skinhead - gang culture
Night time/Darkness
Relationships breaking down (friendships)
HORROR
Different groups, different time period?
Smoke
Mack The Knife
Mac The Knife lyrics
Oh the shark has pretty teeth dear
And he shows them pearly white
Just a jackknife has Macheath dear
And he keeps them out of sight
When the shark bites with his teeth dear
Scarlet billows start to spread
Fancy gloves though wears Macheath dear
So theres not a trace of red
On the side walk Sunday morning
Lies a body oozing life
Someone sneakin round the corner
Is that someone Mack the Knife
From a tugboat bu the river
A cement bags droppin down
The cement just for the weight dear
Bet ya Mackies back in town
Louie Miller disappeared dear
After drawing out his cash
And Macheath spends like a sailor
did our boy do something rash
Suky Tawdry, Jenny Diver
Polly Peahum, Lucy Brown
Oh the line forms on the right dears
Now that Mackies back in town
Oh the shark has pretty teeth dear
And he shows them pearly white
Just a jackknife has Macheath dear
And he keeps it out of sight
Just a jackknife has Macheath dear
And he keeps it our of sight
Oh the shark has pretty teeth dear
And he shows them pearly white
Just a jackknife has Macheath dear
And he keeps them out of sight
When the shark bites with his teeth dear
Scarlet billows start to spread
Fancy gloves though wears Macheath dear
So theres not a trace of red
On the side walk Sunday morning
Lies a body oozing life
Someone sneakin round the corner
Is that someone Mack the Knife
From a tugboat bu the river
A cement bags droppin down
The cement just for the weight dear
Bet ya Mackies back in town
Louie Miller disappeared dear
After drawing out his cash
And Macheath spends like a sailor
did our boy do something rash
Suky Tawdry, Jenny Diver
Polly Peahum, Lucy Brown
Oh the line forms on the right dears
Now that Mackies back in town
Oh the shark has pretty teeth dear
And he shows them pearly white
Just a jackknife has Macheath dear
And he keeps it out of sight
Just a jackknife has Macheath dear
And he keeps it our of sight
Initial Stimulus
"No! i am not Price Hamlet, nor was meant to be"
"Cursing, they scurry from the sinking ship friend turns to foe, employee snubs his boss"
"Morals go overboard in times of crisis"
"All loyalty is gone!Money is short, but loyalty is shorter"
"Politic, cautious and meticulous; Full of high sentence but a bit obtuse"
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