In Response to: “What We Can Learn From Acting”

In Response to: “What We Can Learn From Acting”

As a future music educator, I will likely take part in many Fine and Applied Arts department meetings in public schools. Although there is no doubt that I will be a strong supporter of all art forms, Kelsey's blog post “What We Can Learn From Acting”  enlightened me as to why I should definitely support theater programs in schools.

Acting is not an art that I am well versed in, but after reading the blog post, I realized there are plenty of parallels between drama and musical performance. Kelsey writes, “What separates a great actor from a mediocre one, is the ability to find the true core of a character instead of 'cheating' by using overplayed stereotypes.” A great actor must draw from his personal experiences to convey the most convincing emotion in his stories and reach the audience more effectively. Apparently, a large part of acting is putting yourself into your character, and creating your own back story for your character so you can understand their motives. I imagine sometimes the back story is already given or explained in the play, but sometimes it is up to artistic interpretation to decide on certain traits and motives for your character.

Great musicians must do the same. Our script is our sheet music, and we too have to convey a story to our audience to reach them in the most effective way. Some mediocre musicians would play a piece exactly as written, using accurate notes, rhythms, and written expressions but never fully creating a musical story to tell. Since composers don’t usually specify the story they are attempting to tell, it is up to the musician to interpret the song and relate it to his or her own past experiences, using the emotion the experience gave them in their playing. In my saxophone studio, my professor always has us write out a story that goes with our sheet music, and this improves the quality of the expression used in the performance. Sometimes when we listen to one another perform, we are required to write the story that we think the performer is trying to convey. When we discuss what we wrote, the feedback is always extremely helpful to the performer, and we know the performance was effective when many people interpret the piece in a similar way.

Reading this post also got me thinking about what a shame it is that there is often such a disconnect between actors and musicians. I recently have been in the pit orchestra for a musical called “Curtains,” an experience that I have found to be rather eye-opening. For me, this is really the only way I get to collaborate with other majors at the Hartt school, like musical theatre majors. I spent long nights rehearsing, something that is not always required from me as a musician. There is such an art to acting that I have come to appreciate much more as I watch my own peers develop the performance to make it extremely successful. This particular show is about a series of murders at a theatre, a rather grim topic that these actors were able to convey in a light hearted comical way. It was incredible to me hearing the laughs from the audience as they watched something as horrific as a stage hand being hanged in the play. A friend of mine came up to me and mentioned that she thought all the actors fit perfectly with the characters they played. This makes sense because Kelsey mentioned that a good actor uses part of his own life in the creation of his character. It is no surprise that the actors blended with their characters so seamlessly.

Acting, dance, visual art, and music are all ways to connect with ourselves by exploring our emotions and past experiences. They also make us more compassionate and understanding of others by exploring their stories and “walking a mile in their shoes” through different media. Through educational exploration of the arts, children are able to become wiser and more empathetic adults.