The Pirate King
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My high school is doing Les Mis. Can I get my dream role?I've been really big into Les Miserables for about a year now. I know the CSR from front to back and I worked my way through the entire unabridged book.
Today it was announced that my school is doing Les Miserables as the spring musical this year. I'm a senior, and other musicals we've done previously are The Pirates of Penzance (I played the Pirate King) and Damn Yankees! (I played Coach Van Buren).
Now the director, who is a guy I've always been friendly with and who I count as a friend, knows how big I am into this show. I've been asking him if we can do the show for a year now and I never thought it'd actually happen. But now, it's a reality. We have a decent group of guys, mostly seniors, who can pull off a show of the caliber of Les Mis. I'm typically considered one of the best male actor-singers in the department, especially after the graduation of perhaps our best actor last year. In the past talking to the director I've said "I'd even love to play Thenardier", to which he replied "No way, we need your voice in other places". This is when it was just a hypothesis and we were just casting in our heads, and he said that one actor (who has now graduated) would be a good Javert, to which I said I'd love to play that part, to which he said "you would be good, too".
Quite simply, Javert is my dream role. I feel that I have a tremendous insight into the character, both on stage and on the page, and that I could do the character great justice. I'm a baritone with a decent high range, and vocally I'm not too concerned about it. What one needs to understand is that I would virtually sell my soul to play Javert.
Don't let this make you think that I only want that role. On the contrary. I'd very much also appreciate and love the roles of Valjean, Enjolras, Marius and Thenardier as well. Until auditions in February I'm going to do my best to get to know how to sing the songs (I have the libretto), but especially those of Javert. Simply, I feel that Javert is the part for me, and it would be thrilling to play my dream role at 18 years old. I'm considering getting private voice lessons to improve my technique and vocal presence. I know that both the director and vocal director (who's also our choir teacher, obviously) considers me to be a reliable male actor who would be up to the challenge.
This may be quite pointless, but I was just posting this to get all of this off my chest. I have five months to work my ass off to land the role of a lifetime.
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LaurelDP
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It sounds like the role is yours, dude.
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Trevor
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Do you suck?
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Glissando
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| Trevor wrote: | | Do you suck? |
<3
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The Pirate King
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| Trevor wrote: | | Do you suck? |
Nah, I don't. I feel like I have a great shot at the role now, and that with training I'll have an excellent shot.
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Electricity24601
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Pirate King, it sounds like there's an excellent chance you'll get the role. It's great that the director knows you are serious about putting your all into this show (and hopefully the role of Javert). My advice would be to prepare an awesome song for the audition, and totally blow everyone away. I'm sure you'll do great- let us know how it goes.
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The Pirate King
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| Electricity24601 wrote: | | Pirate King, it sounds like there's an excellent chance you'll get the role. It's great that the director knows you are serious about putting your all into this show (and hopefully the role of Javert). My advice would be to prepare an awesome song for the audition, and totally blow everyone away. I'm sure you'll do great- let us know how it goes. |
Thanks. Yeah, I know for a fact that at least our vocal director (who for this show will have even more say in casting than usual) knows about my Javert ambition, and I'm sure that in some way, by February I can make it clear to the head director, who I'm on very good terms with. In fact, after he announced the show he came up to me and said "you'd better hug me right now, man".
Typically for our musicals we have to choose from a few audition pieces in the show. Maybe this will be different, but if Stars isn't an audition piece, I'll still ask if I can sing it somehow. That's how determined I am. I'm going to ask our vocal director/choir teacher this week what vocal teachers he recommends, because when they announced the show he definitely said that he encourages choir people who plan on doing the show seriously considering taking private lessons. So that's a great way to show initiative, I guess. In five months or so I'm sure I could get a lot of work done.
If he throws us all for a loop and asks us to find a song from another show, then I'll go with "Hellfire" from that "other" Hugo novel, The Hunchback of Notre Dame. That song is potentially very Javert-ish.
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Fantine
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You've never had voice lessons?
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Trevor
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| The Pirate King wrote: | | Trevor wrote: | | Do you suck? |
Nah, I don't. I feel like I have a great shot at the role now, and that with training I'll have an excellent shot. |
Well if you don't suck, you'll do fine.
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The Pirate King
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| Fantine wrote: | | You've never had voice lessons? |
No, I haven't. The first time I'd ever sung in an organised matter was in The Pirates of Penzance when I was a sophomore. After which I joined our guy's ensemble at school. Last year I auditioned and made it into our vocal jazz group, and this year I made it into the top curricular choir. Never had private training though.
Is that surprising for some reason?
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may
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Good luck to you. Perhaps singing lessons help some, perhaps others not ~ over here (UK) one of the most successful West End leading men says he has never taken singing lessons... his voice is one of the best I've heard.
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mastachen
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Who are you talking about?
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Fantine
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No. You seem a wee bit arrogant for someone who has never had instructions on how to properly use their voice.
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Electricity24601
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| may wrote: | | Good luck to you. Perhaps singing lessons help some, perhaps others not ~ over here (UK) one of the most successful West End leading men says he has never taken singing lessons... his voice is one of the best I've heard. |
John Owen-Jones fits that description 
ETA: Voice lessons certainly can't hurt. I'm sure if you talk to someone like Jazzygirlsings she'll tell you how important they are. If nothing else you'll learn some good singing techniques that will keep you from injuring your voice, and at best your tone and range will start to improve. Good luck finding a teacher!
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The Pirate King
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| Fantine wrote: | | No. You seem a wee bit arrogant for someone who has never had instructions on how to properly use their voice. |
Do you mean a "wee" bit arrogant or "very" arrogant. I didn't mean to boast about my vocal abilities; I don't think I'm a great vocalist, but my skills took me through two good parts in musicals. I obviously see much room for improvement.
It isn't like no one's ever taught me how to sing...our choir director (an amazing first tenor, the guy's a genius) goes over technique with us often...but I'm looking for some more specific training.
I don't think the "never had voice lessons" thing is not uncommon in high school theatre programs. I can think of some females in the theatre/choir department who take lessons, but even the best guys don't. One of my best friends who's going into composition is basically self taught. I want to show initiative though, and improve my chances of getting a role and just improving my skills for later in life.
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Fantine
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If you think you've got potential, you should definitely start voice lessons. You'll improve SO much, it's crazy.
It's so helpful.
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The Pirate King
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Thanks so much for all the advice, everyone.
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may
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| Electricity24601 wrote: | | may wrote: | | Good luck to you. Perhaps singing lessons help some, perhaps others not ~ over here (UK) one of the most successful West End leading men says he has never taken singing lessons... his voice is one of the best I've heard. |
John Owen-Jones fits that description |
Has he never had lessons? I was referring to the one and only Michael Ball...
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Electricity24601
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| may wrote: | | Electricity24601 wrote: | | may wrote: | | Good luck to you. Perhaps singing lessons help some, perhaps others not ~ over here (UK) one of the most successful West End leading men says he has never taken singing lessons... his voice is one of the best I've heard. |
John Owen-Jones fits that description |
Has he never had lessons? I was referring to the one and only Michael Ball... |
If I'm remembering right, he never had private voice lessons. He was in productions and choirs as a child though.
That's cool that Micheal never had lessons- he's certainly done fine without them!
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