Unit 5 - Pop Through The Decades Production
Session 1 - 17/01/19
In today's meeting, we discussed and chose the roles that each of us are doing for the performance. They are:
My Roles:
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Finance
I think that I’d be good for this role because I’m good at maths (I got an 8 - A* - at GCSE level) and statistics and I can organise information clearly. Also, I’m good at surveys and setting prices.
Set Design – with Taylor
I think that me and Taylor would be good for set design because we both know how to lay amps and equipment out so there’s no feedback and people can move around on stage easily.
Marketing & Promotion - with Tia, India, Sam, Erin and Logan
I think we’re a good fit for this role because we all work well together and we’re all good when it comes to designing posters/tickets. Also, I got an 8 (A*) in art at GCSE and Tia got an arts award so we can both do designs.
Roadie – All
We’d all be good as roadies because if we have an equipment list, we can easily get the equipment and carry it to the venue and help the techs involved set it up. This is the responsibility of the level 3 music technicians.
Performers – All
All of us would be very well suited for performer because we are all performers and we’ve done gigs before, so we all have experience in the role.
Other Roles:
Costume Designers – Matt, Taylor, India, Mikael, Ross, Tia
Everyone that’s doing this role would be a good fit for it because they’re all creative and they know what would look good for each decade. They can also avoid any costume clashes and ensure that everyone’s comfortable with what they’re wearing. Matt and Ross especially have good tastes in fashion so they know what would work well and what wouldn’t.
Hair & Makeup – Ross, Mikael, Tia
Ross, Mikael and Tia would all be good for this job because they work well as a group and because there’s only 3 of them, it’ll be easier for them to decide on what make-up looks good with what outfit.
Sound and Lighting – Angel and Dane
Dane would be good at this because he’s done gigs before so he knows what sound would fit each decade. Both Dane and Angel would be efficient with the lighting as well since both know what aesthetics are best suited to each decade.
Front of House – Emily R
Emily would be good as the front of house manager because she’s decisive so she knows who would do well for each role (like ticket collector or merchandise table). She’d also be efficient at sorting the tables out so that people know where to go to hand their tickets over and still be able to move around easily into the venue.
Venue Liaison – James
James would be great as venue liaison because he knows how to find out who it is he needs to talk to about the venue and then talk to them about it.
Health and Safety – Mikael
Mikael would be very good as the Health and Safety person since he’s very conscious of risks and he’s perceptive so he can identify risks easily. He’s also good at laying out information in a concise and clear order.
Stage Manager - Responsibility of Level 3 Music Technicians
The stage manager is the person that ensures that the entire gig runs smoothly and everyone is in the right place at the right time (so performers would be at the stage door in time to go on for their part of the performance) an everything is timed perfectly.
Drum Technician – Will
Will would be a great drum technician because he’s a drummer and he knows how to set up a drum kit and make sure each part is tuned correctly.
Catering – Matt and Tia
Matt and Tia will both be good for this role because they’re both good at communicating with others so they can talk to the caterers and decide on a menu that’s fitting for the theme of pop through the decades (or something like a hot dog stand).
Media – Hazel and James
Hazel and James are both very creative so they know what visuals would work for a song along with the lighting and sound set-up.
Logistics – Will
Will would be well-suited for the logistics role because he knows what’s needed for a gig so he can talk to everyone involved and figure out how many amps – for example – would be needed on stage overall. Along with this, he can also find out how many mic leads/guitar leads and kettle plugs would be needed for the entire gig and putting it into a list for the techs involved with the gig.
Fundraising – Emily W
Emily would be excellent in this role because she is very organised so she can sort fundraising events out without clashing with anything else happening and she is a lively person so people would be more likely to come to these events if she engaged them in them.
Session 2 - 24/01/19
Today, everyone discussed their targets over the weeks until the performance and any ideas they had for their role by giving a short presentation to the rest of us.
This is my presentation from today for Set Design which focuses on ideas for the bass drum covers in relation to pop (so pop art) and ideas for the general set-up, such as using keyboard covers or placing fairy lights around the stage.
I started the spreadsheet today as well with an income and an expenditure column so we can start recording our expenses but there are more categories to be added for fundraising events and also whatever merchandise we decide on selling.
Venue - the venue has been confirmed (James is the venue liaison for the gig) by email so we can use the theatre from 3 until half 9.
Fundraising - the only fundraising ideas we have so far are for a bake sale and to also go busking in Carlisle; we need to come up with more ideas for the next session and start planning when we're going to actually do them.
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Front of House - Emily has got 4 contracts for front of house wrote up and signed by a few people from the media course so now we have the front of house team confirmed for the night.
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Media
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Visuals - the visuals team need the final set list and song timings for each band so they can start looking for footage related to the songs that can be projected onto the wall behind the band.
Band photos - the media and the marketing and promotion teams both need band photos for each band; media needs them for visuals as well as recorded footage and marketing and promotion need them for posters to sell on the night.
Tech crew - the media team needs contracts for either music technicians or media students to come in on the night to make sure that the visuals run smoothly and that they match up with the songs performed.
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Marketing and Promotion - the plan for the social media pages (Facebook and Instagram) is to upload regular photos and videos from each band's rehearsals in the 2 weeks leading up to the gig. Tickets and posters need band photos so they can start finalising designs and we need to decide on what merchandise we're selling and start putting the designs onto templates so we can send them off - by email - to start being produced.
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Sound and Lighting - the contracts have all been wrote up now and only the sound contracts are left to be signed by the music technicians.
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Health and Safety - a basic risk assessment has been written which just includes general risks like equipment safety (use cable protectors/gaffa tape so we know where the wires are and we don't trip over them) because all the equipment needs to be confirmed so the full risk assessment can be made.
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Costume - ideas for the costumes for each decade included things such as flannel for the 90s/00s, suits or dresses for the 50s and flared skirts/pants for the 70s (and a lot more) but none of these have been finalised yet and they're more of a general basis for the costumes.
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Hair & Makeup - make-up ideas include things like a Ziggy Stardust lightning bolt, very pale foundation for the men in the 50s and then more dramatic/theatrical make-up for the later decades but these also still need to be finalised/narrowed down.
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Logistics - the final equipment lists need to be given to Will so he can book all of the equipment for the night.
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Catering - the food that could be sold on the night could be things like hot dogs, £1 sweet bags (like chocolate buttons), crisps and a variety of soft drinks but the pricing still needs to be confirmed because so far some of them seem too deer to make a profit because if they cost too much, no-one will buy them.
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Session 3 - 31/01/19
In today's session, we focused on making questionnaires and sorting out the set lists for each band with the song timings for the media team (for visuals) and the sound and lighting teams (for the aesthetics of the set and what the live sound mixing should be like on the night)
The questionnaires were made so we can find out how many people would buy merchandise at the gig and which price would be the best for people who want to come - when we get the results we can use them to help with deciding what merch to sell and set ticket prices to help plan the budget.
Above are my notes from the session - the first picture is a draft of the questionnaire that I'm going to give to 5 people to help determine what we're going to sell after getting results from everyone else and putting them all together.
Session 4 - 07/02/19
Today we focused on making equipment lists to give to the person in charge of logistics (Will) so he can book everything we need for the gig. We also got the results of the questionnaires, which were as follows:
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Question 1 - What do you identify as?
a. Male - 26/53
b. Female - 27/53
c. Other - 0/53
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Question 2 - Which age group do you belong to?
a. Under 18 - 15/53
b. 18-25 - 12/53
c. 26+ - 26/53
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Question 3 - How much would you pay for a ticket?
a. £5 - 17/53
b. £6.50 - 25/53
c. £8 -11/53
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Question 4 - What merchandise would you buy?
a. T-shirt - 20/53
b. Poster - 25/53
c. Key ring - 17/53
d. Badges - 9/53
e. CDs - 27/53
f. Hoodies - 21/53
g. Mugs - 16/53
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With these results, we can each make a summary for next week with suggestions based on the results such as what the ticket price should be and what merchandise we should sell at the gig.
Session 5 - 14/02/19
Our main goals for this session were to take band photos for the posters and visuals for the performance, make summaries from our questionnaire results to decide on merchandise and ticket prices, and to sort out the stage plan.
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Most of the session was spent on the band photos so that the person in charge of posters (Sam) could use them sort the posters out over half term to be distributed around college and sold on the night. Here are a few examples:
From the summaries we've decided that the ticket price will be £6.50 for the night and we're going to discuss the merchandise further in the next session since almost all of the session was dedicated to the pictures. The stage plan is almost complete, however I need to make a few changes - I need to add raised staging under the amps and I need to change the loop pedal to my own pedal since that's what I've been practising with.
Session 6 - 28/02/19
In this session, we also sorted the posters out and set up the social media pages. I'm in charge of the Facebook page and my plan for it is to have a post a day leading up to the gig which can either be a photo or a video and also to create an event so we have an idea of how many people could potentially be coming (except people who are performing or doing lights, sound, visuals etc). This way we can give people regular updates on the gig and information such as ticket prices, contact information and what time doors open/the gig starts.
This is the final stage plan for the gig with the raised staging and extra bass amp added in, as well as one of the amps being changed to a Marshall amp (originally put on as James' own guitar amp) and one of the pedals being changed to my own. This has now been given to the music technicians so they can put everything in the right place for the gig.
Session 7 - 07/03/19 and Session 8 - 11/03/19
In these sessions we each finished off work for our individual roles - for my role of stage design, I printed out the final stage plan to give to the logistics team so they could get it to the technicians and I finished off the bass drum cover. I also helped the person in charge of tickets in my team for Marketing & Promotion to get them all cut out so they could be sold from the college's main reception. However, I have to wait until after the gig to get the information for the spreadsheet so I can't finish it until after the performance.
This is the completed bass drum cover - I made this by using the vinyl design from the tickets and posters and then made a collage of pop art and pop icons in the middle because this project is about pop through the decades. I think that this looks good but I don't know how well it'll fit onto the bass drum until the day of the performance.
Posts from Facebook page:
Final Spreadsheets (18/03/19):
This is the final spreadsheet for finance; the first one shows that we made a profit of £199.20 overall from the night so the expenses from Sweets overall (£48) was made up for from ticket sales which came to £247.20 with 20% tax deducted (so the gross income was £299).
All of the proof that I used to make this and to find out the overall income is below (receipts from shops for sweets, popcorn and photo paper - also the front of house sheet from the night which shows how much was made from sweets and popcorn because the rest went to the college's catering tutor).
