Whilst researching solo artists, I came across a series of videos by Michael Rosen, a children’s novelist and poet. In these videos, Rosen acts out and animates the stories from his books in a way that I found inspiring. Below is one of his videos:
Whilst the content is fictional, the way in which Rosen tells his story may be influential to how I tell my own story. Throughout his work, Rosen animates his stories with exaggerated facial expressions, physicalisation of movements and sound effects made with his voice.
Though I do not think I will use exaggerated facial expressions to the same extent as Rosen, it is something I will consider incorporating in my work. I find the way in which he physicalises actions with his hands, alongside his use of sound effects, effective storytelling devices that allow the audience to become more involved in the performance. As such, I may wish to use these techniques in my performance. This will aid in making the piece more interesting and engrossing, something that is still a concern with my performance.
I also appreciate the level of detail within the text, an aspect which I believe makes Rosen’s videos more appealing. Due to this, when thinking about my own story, I will use vivid descriptions of locations and romanticise the action, so as to add an extra layer of intrigue for the audience. Furthermore, Rosen’s delivery is moderately fast paced which I think will best suit my piece – permitting a lot of detail whilst also allowing a consistent flow of varying content. This is all in aid of making my performance as detailed and engaging as possible.
Therefore, Michael Rosen’s work has been a significant influence on my work and has significantly changed how I wish to go about the storytelling in my own piece. My priority with the performance is to have a high level of detail so that the audience can easily depict the scenarios I am describing.
All in all, it is vital that my performance is highly descriptive so that the audience can effortlessly visualise everything in the story, which I believe adds a level of interactivity to my piece.
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Michael Rosen Image:
DEED (2016) Michael Rosen [Online]. Available from http://www.deed.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2015/04/Michael-Rosen.jpg [accessed 24 March 2017]
Kids’ Poems and Stories With Michael Rosen (2008) No Breathing In Class – Michael Rosen
. Available from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1cfVQyrQ3Q [accessed March 24 2017].