When getting audiences members in to watch my performances and write feedback on them it was important that they were a mixture of people watching so a mixture of male and female and they had different jobs, different ages and different interests this was so I could get a fair judgement of what a variety of audience members prefer within musical theatre. Because if I had brought in musical theatre singers to watch they would mostly prefer the singing performance and it would be an unfair judgement.

A main feedback point I got from a lot of the audience members was that the dance left the message and the story up to their imagination. A lot of these audience members thought it was good that the story was left to the audience’s interpretation.

One bit of feedback I got was that the dance needed to show more intensity when the music became more intense. So they probably felt that there wasn’t a build in the dance. Although I tried to show intensity and a build on the more powerful parts of the song like at the end. I did this by adding more complicated dance movements whereas before it was slower simpler dance movements. Although I probably could have used more intensity through my facial expressions in the dance. As I probably used more intense facial expressions in the song than in the dance.

A note from the feedback that I picked out was that one audience member felt if I had given them a key word before the performance they would understand it more. Although I thought giving them a key word or a description of the story would defeat the point of this performance as I wanted them to understand the story purely through the performance. Although taking this feedback into consideration I have thought maybe this audience member prefers to be told the story before watching it for them to be able to understand it. So this all goes back to individual audience members and the reception theory. It is also to do with how each individual understands a story better.

One audience member has said that every audience will put their own meaning to what they see. So even if the message is clear someone could see a different message in the performance. One audience member feels when a story is told with words we know exactly what the character is feeling and the audience doesn’t make their own interpretation of what is going on because they are being told what is going on. This audience member also states that the emotions where clearer in the dance. She also feels it depends on who the audience member is as to what they understand from the story. As every audience member is different and had different life experiences. This audience member preferred the dance because she likes ballet and people she knows dances. So someone who doesn’t know people that dance could prefer the song as they don’t have a connection with dance. This audience member connected to the dance because she put her own interpretation on what she saw. I also feel it could be to do with me as a performer whether they can connect to my character or believe it.

One audience member said her favourite musical was Lion King because they interacted with the audience. This is something I could have done to try and connect more with the audience. This audience member said this dance made her feel sad. Although I feel this is good because I wanted that sort of reaction from the dance. Although this audience member felt influenced by the music. So I could think about performing these acapella to see if the reaction is different. This audience member interpreted the story in detail by saying “the story was 2 people in love. The man went off to war and she was saying goodbye. However when he came back he was traumatised and was messing her around her emotions where everywhere she was confused and felt as if she was going to lose him mentally this time. She understood the basics of the story I put in place in the dance by saying she was communicating that she loved this guy and it was like young love. She felt the feelings of the character in the dance was a roller coaster of emotions that she was in love, sad, heartbroken, confused, sad again then she accepts her love has changed and that they do love each other but not in love anymore. Some of these feelings are what I was trying to portray but because this audience member interpreted the story in her own way the feelings are slightly different to what I was trying to show. This audience member liked the style of dance because it helped the audience interpret the story however they liked. And she felt it gave them a clear vision for their imagination to create the story themselves.

I feel this feedback is good because now I realise within dance, no matter what story I try and get across the audience members will create their own story from what they can see and from their own imagination. But telling a story through song doesn’t give the audience freedom to create their own story.

When getting feedback from the song the story was clear in the song and the audience didn’t interpret the story as their own as the song already told you the story.

One audience member said the feelings in the song was heartbreak, love, lost, giving up, at the end of fighting. A lot of this is what I was trying to portray but the heartbreak and giving up was something I try to show but I didn’t want it to be a main emotion but I feel through the lyrics they tell the story clearly and I couldn’t take the giving up aspects out of this performance as it was in the lyrics and not the way I performed the song. So by performing it as a song the story is told for you. I have realised in musicals they use songs to tell the story more than just dance because the story could change and be different for each audience member when a dance is performed, but with a song and lyrics the story is clear and the same for every audience member. This why in a ballet performance they just use dance throughout the whole performance as the audience can see the intended story as well as create their own interpretation for it. But if this is done in a musical the song and dance could tell completely different story’s which I found from doing these two performances. As that had the same story but with audience members interpreting the dance in the way they saw it the story changed. So in musicals the story could get muddled up for audience members if dance was telling a story and then a song tells the story. Because using lyrics makes the story clear to every audience member.

This audience member feels there should have been more movement in the song and I should have been more physically into the character. Although I feel this is good to see a contrast of the dance and just using movement and then not moving through the song and just using words and singing. Although I understand the song would have been easier to connect to if I had moved a bit more instead of just standing there. I feel when dancing all you have to do is dance and you can get a story from that and put emotions to it for the audience to emotionally connect to it. But when singing you have to sing move or be the character in order to tell the story and emotionally connect to it.

This audience member says she doesn’t know the song so she believes her interpretation was correct from what she saw and heard. Which is what performing to an audience is about as we can perform anything but in the end it’s down to what their interpretation is. As they create the story in their head as well as trying communicate the story to the audience. This audience member feels both the dance and song explained the story well although this audience member got different stories from both performances even though the stories were supposed to be the same. This is because the dance was interpreted in their own way whereas the song was clear with the lyrics.

This audience member felt like the dance was better because she was able to interpret it into her own image and relate it more to her own experience. This audience member said she was able to interpret each dance movement into her own image and interpretation. Which means the dance has more range of different stories depending on the audience member compared to the song. Although one audience member said the song was easier to understand because the lyrics told the story. This is one thing seen within society when watching performances now if it is easy and is told to you, you don't have to do much but if you have to create a story yourself it's too hard work. 

One thing I wrote as a question was did the dance communicate the story well enough but one person wrote I am not aware of what the story was. Which made me realise I probably should have told them what the story was at the end so they could compare their feedback with the story and they would see if the dance and song was told in a strong way enough for them to understand the story. Then I would get more feedback on what I could have done better to communicate the story more.

Even though some audience members that watched my performances preferred sung-through musicals this doesn't mean they will automatically prefer the song. Some of them preferred the dance to the song purely because they found more emotion in the story and they connected more to the dance because of my performance within the dance.  

Throughout these feedback sheets all audience members through the dance and song styles were able to communicate the story properly. So they wouldn’t change the styles.