Scenario/Introduction:
For this third entry for the first week on this assignment, I'll be covering both the Strengths and Weaknesses that came out of the session. They will both be covering the whole group as this is a collabrative process that must be evaluated constantly to hopefully improve once the performance date is near.
The Strengths:
Strength 1 - Practical Improvisation: This has to be the strongest Strength that came out of this session since nearly the whole of it was comprised of performing practical work whilst thinking of creative ideas of our own making to help keep it going. There wasn't really a moment where we stopped doing anything which had resulted in our group to have a baseline for what kind of story we all wanted, the style of performance that we were going to have, being Commedia dell'Arte and having something that we cn build on for next weeks devising session.
Strength 2 - Positive Feedback From Group: When it came to presenting our thoughts and ideas to the group as to what we could do for this performance, we had all complimented our efforts and experimented with eachothers ideas to see if they worked or didn't work. There was never really a bad idea since all of the ideas we had is what we've implemented into our devising process so far to be built upon in next weeks session.
Strength 3 - Using Physicl Exercises To Build Focus: If there was one thing that I'd noticed from this session that every other group didn't do, or did it later on, was that we did some physical exercises to build our focus and get our blood pumping. This as well made all of us a little more pro-active but it also did help towards building all of our ideas, which we had a lot of from this session. This is something we do regularly in other lessons as it does help and I'm surprised that no-one else had thought of doing it also.
Strength 4 - Amount Of Ideas Produced In A Short Time Span: The amount of ideas that the whole group had thought of in such short time was amazing. Literally as soon as we had our groups sorted out, we all had started to present our ideas, even before using the spider-gram sheet. This would be another reason that I didn't mention in my previous entry as to why there wasn't really much recorded down on our sheet for this session.
The Weaknesses:
Weakness 1 - Not The Whole Group Was Being Practical: Even though they had presented a few ideas to build upon, whilst also agreeing with mine, Sophie and Jake's, both Milo and Frankie didn't really contribute as much as I would of liked in terms of practical work. It was only really me, Sophie and Jake again that actually got up and acted out something to build ideas whilst they sat there and spectated. I'm hoping both of them will be a little more practical for next lesson as I think they both have a few more ideas that they had kept to themselves for this one which they could present next lesson, these ideas could be the best ones yet.
What I Thought Of This Session Overall:
Seeing as this was our first session on this new assignment, doing something we've all never really done before, I felt that our group, as well as the others, had performed to their maximum potential even if there was a few that didn't contribute to the groups. My group had zero to no support from the lecturers for this session which is what we're going to be marked on for this assignment when it comes to the marking period. I thought that my group had stood out from most because of how much more practical we were in the session also inspiring others to do the same things, like the exercises, that we had done to create their own ideas.
So, overall, if I was to give a rating out of ten for this session, I would give it a 9/10 for all of these reasons that I've listed. It's not 10/10 simply because the whole of my group didn't contribute towards the session. So, again, hopefully for the next devising session, both Milo and Frankie will do this. We'll also have Brandon brought into the session as he was away and I'm sure he'll have plenty of ideas to present to the group for this devised performance.
Monday 12 January 2015
Sunday 11 January 2015
'Ode To Billy Joe' By Bobbie Gentry - Week 1 Entry 2: Devising Session 1
Scenario/Introduction:
In this second entry for the first week on this assignment, I will be listing down what me and my group had done in the first session of devising. I'll also be listing pictures of our spider-gram sheet from the session before we had begun to do the practical work.
The First Devising Session:
Before beginning the devising process, I needed my group of 5 other actors. I had managed to form a group including Me, Sophie Nickerson, Jake Colley, Brandon Timson, Frankie Howard and Milo Welch. It is with this group of people that I'll be working with to devise a practical Physical Theatre performance to create original work.
The first thing we did once deciding the group was to plan on mainly what we all wanted to do for this assignment in a collaborative way. We were given a sheet of paper to use to include our ideas upon.
This is an image of the final outcome of what we had managed to create in the first session on this assignment:
The lack of information included on this sheet is overcompensated by the amount of practical, improvised work we had done in this session.
The first thing that me and the group wanted to discuss was what kind of style of performance we wanted our devising process to go around. As you can see on the sheet with the spider-gram, we had decided to go with the style of Commedia dell'Arte whilst also using the stock characters that were brought with it.
It was until after this point that we all had a bit of difficulty on deciding what kind of story we had wanted for this performance. I had presented my responses to the group, as did they, but we all had positives and negatives which we all couldn't comprehend.
To counteract not doing anything because we couldn't decide, Me and Sophie had brought the rest of the group onto their feet to perform some physical exercises to get our heads in gear. Doing these exercises was to also bring forth ideas since we'd be more pumped and focused. The exercise we had done was what I call 'Army Jumps'. For this exercise, we all had to jump looking in one direction to then turn clockwise after 16 jumps which would then progressively go down to 8, 4, 2, 1, and then for the finale we all do one big spin. We had done this exercise before earlier this week in another lesson, and because it seemed to work for that session, we had used it here as well. I feel that this shows how much of a good team we have formed together as later on I mention that we had gained a whole bunch of ideas to use for our performance due to doing this exercise by evidently working together as a team to make sure we were all doing it in unison.
Now that we were all a little more energized and focused, we were ready to start doing some improvisation since the art behind Commedia is that all of the work is unscripted, which makes it perfect when choosing to devise a performance, especially when it's to do with Physical Theatre. I had looked upon the spider-gram once more to fill my mind with some ideas to build upon. Since the song 'Ode To Billy Joe' speaks a lot about the Tallahatchie Bridge, I had thought we could use this as a starting point for our setting in this story we were about to create. At the same time as me doing this, both Sophie and Jake were already improvising as their Commedia Stock Characters, with Jake being Pierrot and Sophie being a Zanni. I then jumped into the scene as a Harlequin and we tried to build on some ideas whilst performing.
What seemed to look like a fun-filled improvisation session had miraculously turned into a series of brilliant, mind-struck ideas as to what the story of 'Ode To Billy Joe' could be. All of these ideas had come to me, to which I had shared to the group.
The first idea I had shared was that instead of having one character called Billy Joe, as mentioned in the song, we use two different characters called Billy and Joe. These two characters were to be either a Zanni and/or a Harlequin, like Me and Sophie had done in our improvisation session. It was until this point I had another idea which was that we could have a character using several stock character stereotypes to create an entirely new character so that we're not restricted on doing certain things that they may not do.
Me and the group had started to go along with these ideas until I had a third idea, which had much to do with the story that we could set this performance around. This is the point were I bring the idea of using the Tallahatchie Bridge as our main setting into play. The moral of the story is that both Billy and Joe go up on the Tallahatchie Bridge to then encounter a miserable, middle-aged man (Jake/Pierrot). Billy and Joe then start to mess around with this man to cheer him up a little bit. They both then start to mention that they have a secret which they want to tell the miserable man, but, for some strange reason, they can't seem to remember the secret, which then causes them both to go a little crazy by spinning around waving their arms everywhere. After doing this multiple times, they then remember the secret: to jump off the Tallahatchie Bridge! To which they then do so, which leaves the miserable man confused as to what happened. The man then walks off the Tallahatchie Bridge to spread the news that Billy and Joe had jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge.
If it doesn't seem obvious already, the story for this stimulus can be considered to be a little far fetched and comedic, but the fact that it is will surprise the audience as others could potentially see it as a dark, horror filled story. This is what we had intended to do since the start, so we had decided to build upon this story with the traditional Commedia style.
After a short break, we had all returned to planning what to do next. During the break I had thought more about the story which we could do for this devised performance. This is when I draw some inspiration from the classic BBC Mystery Drama 'Jonathan Creek'. I had wanted there to be a mystery revolved around the Tallahatchie Bridge such as why Billy and Joe jumped off it in the first place. This then brought on another idea in my mind: what if going on the Tallahatchie Bridge brings forth suicidal thoughts? This would explain why there was a miserable man on there in the first place, maybe he was thinking about jumping off himself only to be stopped by Billy and Joe. Perhaps during the process of cheering up the miserable man, both Billy and Joe had forgotten their original secret, and because being on the bridge is rumored to bring suicidal thoughts, this had happened to them both at the same time which made them jump off the bridge to their supposed death. The miserable man spreading the news of this happening to the local town-folk then starts a full on investigation to try and find out where Billy and Joe went and to also confirm if they had died or not.
I then had a forth, final idea before the session for this week was to end. I had thought about a 'Jonathan Creek' episode that I'd watched recently which had used a radio broadcast flashback, which was near 100 years before present day, to give an introduction of sorts to the mystery contained within the episode. I had brought along the same idea to the group: what if we were to use the same introduction with the old radio broadcast but for the Tallahatchie Bridge detailing information about it's mystery of why people have been jumping off of it to their deaths?
This is when the session for this week had unfortunately ended, but we all had something which we could actually build upon for when it comes to next weeks session. We had all planned that any time in-between sessions was to focus on researching about certain topics to do with our plans for this performance. These topics range from things like:
In this second entry for the first week on this assignment, I will be listing down what me and my group had done in the first session of devising. I'll also be listing pictures of our spider-gram sheet from the session before we had begun to do the practical work.
The First Devising Session:
Before beginning the devising process, I needed my group of 5 other actors. I had managed to form a group including Me, Sophie Nickerson, Jake Colley, Brandon Timson, Frankie Howard and Milo Welch. It is with this group of people that I'll be working with to devise a practical Physical Theatre performance to create original work.
The first thing we did once deciding the group was to plan on mainly what we all wanted to do for this assignment in a collaborative way. We were given a sheet of paper to use to include our ideas upon.
This is an image of the final outcome of what we had managed to create in the first session on this assignment:
The lack of information included on this sheet is overcompensated by the amount of practical, improvised work we had done in this session.
The first thing that me and the group wanted to discuss was what kind of style of performance we wanted our devising process to go around. As you can see on the sheet with the spider-gram, we had decided to go with the style of Commedia dell'Arte whilst also using the stock characters that were brought with it.
It was until after this point that we all had a bit of difficulty on deciding what kind of story we had wanted for this performance. I had presented my responses to the group, as did they, but we all had positives and negatives which we all couldn't comprehend.
To counteract not doing anything because we couldn't decide, Me and Sophie had brought the rest of the group onto their feet to perform some physical exercises to get our heads in gear. Doing these exercises was to also bring forth ideas since we'd be more pumped and focused. The exercise we had done was what I call 'Army Jumps'. For this exercise, we all had to jump looking in one direction to then turn clockwise after 16 jumps which would then progressively go down to 8, 4, 2, 1, and then for the finale we all do one big spin. We had done this exercise before earlier this week in another lesson, and because it seemed to work for that session, we had used it here as well. I feel that this shows how much of a good team we have formed together as later on I mention that we had gained a whole bunch of ideas to use for our performance due to doing this exercise by evidently working together as a team to make sure we were all doing it in unison.
Now that we were all a little more energized and focused, we were ready to start doing some improvisation since the art behind Commedia is that all of the work is unscripted, which makes it perfect when choosing to devise a performance, especially when it's to do with Physical Theatre. I had looked upon the spider-gram once more to fill my mind with some ideas to build upon. Since the song 'Ode To Billy Joe' speaks a lot about the Tallahatchie Bridge, I had thought we could use this as a starting point for our setting in this story we were about to create. At the same time as me doing this, both Sophie and Jake were already improvising as their Commedia Stock Characters, with Jake being Pierrot and Sophie being a Zanni. I then jumped into the scene as a Harlequin and we tried to build on some ideas whilst performing.
What seemed to look like a fun-filled improvisation session had miraculously turned into a series of brilliant, mind-struck ideas as to what the story of 'Ode To Billy Joe' could be. All of these ideas had come to me, to which I had shared to the group.
The first idea I had shared was that instead of having one character called Billy Joe, as mentioned in the song, we use two different characters called Billy and Joe. These two characters were to be either a Zanni and/or a Harlequin, like Me and Sophie had done in our improvisation session. It was until this point I had another idea which was that we could have a character using several stock character stereotypes to create an entirely new character so that we're not restricted on doing certain things that they may not do.
Me and the group had started to go along with these ideas until I had a third idea, which had much to do with the story that we could set this performance around. This is the point were I bring the idea of using the Tallahatchie Bridge as our main setting into play. The moral of the story is that both Billy and Joe go up on the Tallahatchie Bridge to then encounter a miserable, middle-aged man (Jake/Pierrot). Billy and Joe then start to mess around with this man to cheer him up a little bit. They both then start to mention that they have a secret which they want to tell the miserable man, but, for some strange reason, they can't seem to remember the secret, which then causes them both to go a little crazy by spinning around waving their arms everywhere. After doing this multiple times, they then remember the secret: to jump off the Tallahatchie Bridge! To which they then do so, which leaves the miserable man confused as to what happened. The man then walks off the Tallahatchie Bridge to spread the news that Billy and Joe had jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge.
If it doesn't seem obvious already, the story for this stimulus can be considered to be a little far fetched and comedic, but the fact that it is will surprise the audience as others could potentially see it as a dark, horror filled story. This is what we had intended to do since the start, so we had decided to build upon this story with the traditional Commedia style.
After a short break, we had all returned to planning what to do next. During the break I had thought more about the story which we could do for this devised performance. This is when I draw some inspiration from the classic BBC Mystery Drama 'Jonathan Creek'. I had wanted there to be a mystery revolved around the Tallahatchie Bridge such as why Billy and Joe jumped off it in the first place. This then brought on another idea in my mind: what if going on the Tallahatchie Bridge brings forth suicidal thoughts? This would explain why there was a miserable man on there in the first place, maybe he was thinking about jumping off himself only to be stopped by Billy and Joe. Perhaps during the process of cheering up the miserable man, both Billy and Joe had forgotten their original secret, and because being on the bridge is rumored to bring suicidal thoughts, this had happened to them both at the same time which made them jump off the bridge to their supposed death. The miserable man spreading the news of this happening to the local town-folk then starts a full on investigation to try and find out where Billy and Joe went and to also confirm if they had died or not.
I then had a forth, final idea before the session for this week was to end. I had thought about a 'Jonathan Creek' episode that I'd watched recently which had used a radio broadcast flashback, which was near 100 years before present day, to give an introduction of sorts to the mystery contained within the episode. I had brought along the same idea to the group: what if we were to use the same introduction with the old radio broadcast but for the Tallahatchie Bridge detailing information about it's mystery of why people have been jumping off of it to their deaths?
This is when the session for this week had unfortunately ended, but we all had something which we could actually build upon for when it comes to next weeks session. We had all planned that any time in-between sessions was to focus on researching about certain topics to do with our plans for this performance. These topics range from things like:
- Research into Commedia dell'Arte
- What real life people think about when they have the intention to commit suicide
- Research into Physical Theatre
- Bridges in real life that bring suicidal thoughts
- Trying to find anything that may be similar to our story
- Researching about the song 'Ode To Billy Joe', perhaps why it was created and discovering the real story behind its creation
Friday 9 January 2015
'Ode To Billy Joe' By Bobbie Gentry - Week 1 Entry 1: Response(s) To Stimulus
Scenario/Introduction:
For this assignment, in my chosen group of 6 actors, we will be required to work and progressively devise a Physical Theatre performance that must last for a duration of 15 - 30 minutes. For this assignment, in these blog entries, I will be discussing and identifying the dramatic potential of ideas, character and performance that I and/or we thought about using the song 'Ode To Billy Joe' by Bobby Gentry as the given stimulus.
In this first entry for the first week on this assignment, I will be listing my initial response(s) to the given stimulus to then after include the considerations that I had made as to what the song provokes. This can range from things like feelings, stories, themes, colours, inspiration, thoughts, ideas, character and its overall dramatic potential.
Here is the full song of 'Ode To Billy Joe':
Response(s) To 'Ode To Billy Joe' Stimulus:
Whilst listening to the given stimulus for this assignment, I had managed to conjure up a total of three responses.
Response 1:
The first response to this stimulus is when I only listened to the music of 'Ode To Billy Joe' whilst cancelling out the lyrics entirely to help create the image of what kind of setting the story of this devised piece could potentially take place in.
The Setting/Theme/Characters: Whilst listening to the music, I had thought of a wasteland kind of setting with a slightly barbaric theme in the sense that the world is in a Post-Apocalyptic state and that the Human race itself has gone to the peak of madness (splitting off into different tribes, going to war against each other for territory), this then brought the idea of this story maybe taking place in a future time period sometime after the Apocalyptic event that may have occurred. This idea of the Human Race going mad was not the case for the whole of the population within this setting as there are some more civilized areas where people would try to build a non violent community.
The Story: The story that I'd thought of to go along with this type of music was that of a lone delivery man (Courier) travelling by walking/running to different places all around this Post-Apocalyptic setting to try and complete his job. Whilst travelling, this Courier would encounter a variety of situations involving a mixture of violence, use of persuasion and choosing sides as there is this theme of barbarism to potentially block his path and he'll need some support to help him on this dangerous journey.
What Colour Did I Think Of: When thinking about a colour to go along with this response, I would say that the colour Beige/Yellow would suit it perfectly. I say this because Beige/Yellow are both really bland colours and are most commonly seen in wasteland environments like, for example, a desert.
The Dramatic Potential/Feelings: In my opinion, this response is a good one and has the potential to be expanded to the point that the story me and my group could start to devise for this assignment can involve the feelings of sadness (if a certain character dies), happiness (if a set of characters have a good time in this setting and/or there's a happy ending to the story) and tension (for those moments where there's violence, remembering that the Courier, whom is the main character in this story, has no experience with firearms). This does indeed bring forth a great deal of dramatic potential and I'd love the opportunity to include some, if not, all of the ideas I've had for this response when it comes to the group devising discussion.
Response 2:
The second response to this stimulus is when I listened to both the music and lyrics of 'Ode To Billy Joe' at the same time to help create a more followed and developed story for this devised piece.
The Setting: Whilst listening to both the music and the lyrics, the setting of the story had changed from my interpretation of a wasteland to result in a farmland/countryside. I'd mainly gained this knowledge through the lyrics listed on the second line of the song, which I've listed above, where it says "I was out choppin' cotton and my brother was balin' hay".
The Story/Characters: I then started to think more about the characters in this story opposed to my first original response. I was thinking that the story could involve a family (Mother, Father, 2 Son's and a Daughter) with one of the sons being the character mentioned constantly throughout the entire song: Billy Joe. Perhaps at some point before this story took place, Billy Joe had left home due to him and his parents having a misunderstanding rendering his brother and sister to not think much of him. When the family had received news that Billy Joe had jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge, they only imagined the worst outcome, being death, but they all tried not to care about it since they were more focused on having the food which the mother had prepared for the family.
Since it was a woman singing this song, she could be the same person as the daughter in this story and she's telling the audience listening of her past stories with this being one of them. Later on in the song, it talks about how the daughter may have been seeing Billy Joe in several places even though he had supposedly died by jumping off the Tallahatchie Bridge. This had started to make the daughter in the story greave more over the death of one of her brothers which she never really knew since she would of been young when he left home. This sense of the daughter losing her sanity had rendered her in not eating as much food, which concerned the mother more and more. This had made the mother have the local priest, Brother Taylor, have sessions with the daughter to try and discover her problems and perhaps fix them so things can go back to normal. This is only until Brother Taylor mentions about seeing someone who looked like the daughter with Billy Joe himself up on the Tallahatchie Bridge whilst he was out of town on holiday.
The story then passes a year and the daughter has left home to follow her chosen career path. But there is still the case of the daughter greaving over Billy Joes' death, so this makes her go up on the Tallahatchie Bridge daily to throw off a banquet of flowers to pay her respects.
The Dramatic Potential/Feelings: I think that this second response may be one that I'd pick over the other since this response is more story driven and with the fact that I prefer a full on sadness performance over one that would involve a mixture of feelings. There is also the opportunity to mix both stories together, which can make with some good dramatic potential.
Response 3:
This third response is slightly different than the previous two as I've interpreted the words used in the text to create my own original story whilst also involving some unscripted choices.
Characters: At some point in the song, the lyrics mention that the character 'Brother Taylor' had seen someone that looked a lot like the, what I think is due to my previous responses, the daughter/sister character in the story, but I've changed this concept and made it so that the girl in the story could be an ex girlfriend.
The Story: What Brother Taylor actually saw was a past image of Billy Joe and this girl sitting on the Tallahatchie Bridge having a conversation, but Brother Taylor couldn't make out what the couple were saying at the time as he was not there to hear it in reality. The conversation that Billy Joe and the girl character were having was also with a recently born baby that they didn't initially want. Both Billy Joe and the girlfriend were in their early teens meaning that they couldn't afford an abortion, and since the baby has actually been born, they have no idea how they're still going to afford having it and are having this conversation up on the Talahatchie Bridge to work out what to do with it.
The conversation can be anything from putting it in a care home, just leaving it on the street for someone to come pick it up, telling their parents since they don't know about the child, even the thought of killing it was in Billy Joes' mind... but not the girlfriend. This got to the point that they actually had a full on argument with each other and Billy Joe got so mad that he just threw their baby off the Tallahatchie Bridge into the river below out of mental rage. This then put the girlfriend into a real state, a state that made her kill Billy Joe with his own pocket knife. After realizing that she had committed a murder, she disposed of the body and the weapon by throwing them also into the river below luckily with no witnesses.
The story then goes forward a couple of years and the girlfriend has near forgotten about this tragic event due to constant hypnotherapy sessions. It was only when she was watching the news on the TV that her memories started to crawl back into her mind. Billy Joes' deceased body had finally been found not far from the Talahatchie Bridge going down-stream. Because all of the guilt had fallen back into her mind, she had considered going to the police to confess for her crime. But before doing so, she wanted to visit the Talahatchie Bridge one last time to throw this time a banquet of flowers for the baby that she was going to suggest to Billy Joe to keep as a mother should never be separated from her child, no matter the circumstances.
The Dramatic Potential/Feelings: This was going to be the ending to this sad and aggressive story filled with moments of heartbroken, tear-filled horror. To perform this story also within this assignment will be an incredible opportunity to try and devise since it's my own creation/interpretation of the story in 'Ode To Billy Joe' and the dramatic potential is definitely there, perhaps even more so than the previous 2 responses.
For this assignment, in my chosen group of 6 actors, we will be required to work and progressively devise a Physical Theatre performance that must last for a duration of 15 - 30 minutes. For this assignment, in these blog entries, I will be discussing and identifying the dramatic potential of ideas, character and performance that I and/or we thought about using the song 'Ode To Billy Joe' by Bobby Gentry as the given stimulus.
In this first entry for the first week on this assignment, I will be listing my initial response(s) to the given stimulus to then after include the considerations that I had made as to what the song provokes. This can range from things like feelings, stories, themes, colours, inspiration, thoughts, ideas, character and its overall dramatic potential.
Here is the full song of 'Ode To Billy Joe':
It was the third of June, another sleepy, dusty, delta day
I was out choppin' cotton and my brother was balin' hay
And at dinner time we stopped and walked back to the house to eat
And Mama hollered out the back door, "Y'all remember to wipe your feet"
Then she said, "I got some news this mornin' from Choctaw Ridge
Today Billie Joe McAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge"
I was out choppin' cotton and my brother was balin' hay
And at dinner time we stopped and walked back to the house to eat
And Mama hollered out the back door, "Y'all remember to wipe your feet"
Then she said, "I got some news this mornin' from Choctaw Ridge
Today Billie Joe McAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge"
Papa said to Mama as he passed around the black-eyed peas
"Well, Billie Joe never had a lick o' sense, pass the biscuits, please
There's five more acres in the lower forty I've got to plow"
And Mama said it was a shame about Billie Joe anyhow
Seems like nothin' ever comes to no good up on Choctaw Ridge
And now Billie Joe McAllister's jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge
"Well, Billie Joe never had a lick o' sense, pass the biscuits, please
There's five more acres in the lower forty I've got to plow"
And Mama said it was a shame about Billie Joe anyhow
Seems like nothin' ever comes to no good up on Choctaw Ridge
And now Billie Joe McAllister's jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge
Brother said he recollected when he and Tom and Billie Joe
Put a frog down my back at the Carroll County picture show
And wasn't I talkin' to him after church last Sunday night
I'll have another piece of apple pie, you know, it don't seem right
I saw him at the sawmill yesterday on Choctaw Ridge
And now you tell me Billie Joe's jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge
Put a frog down my back at the Carroll County picture show
And wasn't I talkin' to him after church last Sunday night
I'll have another piece of apple pie, you know, it don't seem right
I saw him at the sawmill yesterday on Choctaw Ridge
And now you tell me Billie Joe's jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge
Mama said to me, "Child what's happened to your appetite?
I been cookin' all mornin' and you haven't touched single bite
That nice young preacher Brother Taylor dropped by today
Said he'd be pleased to have dinner on Sunday, oh by the way
He said he saw a girl that looked a lot like you up on Choctaw Ridge
And she and Billie Joe was throwin' somethin' off the Tallahatchie Bridge"
I been cookin' all mornin' and you haven't touched single bite
That nice young preacher Brother Taylor dropped by today
Said he'd be pleased to have dinner on Sunday, oh by the way
He said he saw a girl that looked a lot like you up on Choctaw Ridge
And she and Billie Joe was throwin' somethin' off the Tallahatchie Bridge"
A year has come and gone since I heard the news 'bout Billie Joe
Brother married Becky Thompson, they bought a store in Tupelo
There was a virus goin' round, papa caught it and he died last spring
And now Mama doesn't seem to want to do much of anything
And me I spend a lot of time picking flowers up on Choctaw Ridge
And drop them into the muddy water off the Tallahatchie Bridge
Brother married Becky Thompson, they bought a store in Tupelo
There was a virus goin' round, papa caught it and he died last spring
And now Mama doesn't seem to want to do much of anything
And me I spend a lot of time picking flowers up on Choctaw Ridge
And drop them into the muddy water off the Tallahatchie Bridge
Response(s) To 'Ode To Billy Joe' Stimulus:
Whilst listening to the given stimulus for this assignment, I had managed to conjure up a total of three responses.
Response 1:
The first response to this stimulus is when I only listened to the music of 'Ode To Billy Joe' whilst cancelling out the lyrics entirely to help create the image of what kind of setting the story of this devised piece could potentially take place in.
The Setting/Theme/Characters: Whilst listening to the music, I had thought of a wasteland kind of setting with a slightly barbaric theme in the sense that the world is in a Post-Apocalyptic state and that the Human race itself has gone to the peak of madness (splitting off into different tribes, going to war against each other for territory), this then brought the idea of this story maybe taking place in a future time period sometime after the Apocalyptic event that may have occurred. This idea of the Human Race going mad was not the case for the whole of the population within this setting as there are some more civilized areas where people would try to build a non violent community.
The Story: The story that I'd thought of to go along with this type of music was that of a lone delivery man (Courier) travelling by walking/running to different places all around this Post-Apocalyptic setting to try and complete his job. Whilst travelling, this Courier would encounter a variety of situations involving a mixture of violence, use of persuasion and choosing sides as there is this theme of barbarism to potentially block his path and he'll need some support to help him on this dangerous journey.
What Colour Did I Think Of: When thinking about a colour to go along with this response, I would say that the colour Beige/Yellow would suit it perfectly. I say this because Beige/Yellow are both really bland colours and are most commonly seen in wasteland environments like, for example, a desert.
The Dramatic Potential/Feelings: In my opinion, this response is a good one and has the potential to be expanded to the point that the story me and my group could start to devise for this assignment can involve the feelings of sadness (if a certain character dies), happiness (if a set of characters have a good time in this setting and/or there's a happy ending to the story) and tension (for those moments where there's violence, remembering that the Courier, whom is the main character in this story, has no experience with firearms). This does indeed bring forth a great deal of dramatic potential and I'd love the opportunity to include some, if not, all of the ideas I've had for this response when it comes to the group devising discussion.
Response 2:
The second response to this stimulus is when I listened to both the music and lyrics of 'Ode To Billy Joe' at the same time to help create a more followed and developed story for this devised piece.
The Setting: Whilst listening to both the music and the lyrics, the setting of the story had changed from my interpretation of a wasteland to result in a farmland/countryside. I'd mainly gained this knowledge through the lyrics listed on the second line of the song, which I've listed above, where it says "I was out choppin' cotton and my brother was balin' hay".
The Story/Characters: I then started to think more about the characters in this story opposed to my first original response. I was thinking that the story could involve a family (Mother, Father, 2 Son's and a Daughter) with one of the sons being the character mentioned constantly throughout the entire song: Billy Joe. Perhaps at some point before this story took place, Billy Joe had left home due to him and his parents having a misunderstanding rendering his brother and sister to not think much of him. When the family had received news that Billy Joe had jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge, they only imagined the worst outcome, being death, but they all tried not to care about it since they were more focused on having the food which the mother had prepared for the family.
Since it was a woman singing this song, she could be the same person as the daughter in this story and she's telling the audience listening of her past stories with this being one of them. Later on in the song, it talks about how the daughter may have been seeing Billy Joe in several places even though he had supposedly died by jumping off the Tallahatchie Bridge. This had started to make the daughter in the story greave more over the death of one of her brothers which she never really knew since she would of been young when he left home. This sense of the daughter losing her sanity had rendered her in not eating as much food, which concerned the mother more and more. This had made the mother have the local priest, Brother Taylor, have sessions with the daughter to try and discover her problems and perhaps fix them so things can go back to normal. This is only until Brother Taylor mentions about seeing someone who looked like the daughter with Billy Joe himself up on the Tallahatchie Bridge whilst he was out of town on holiday.
The story then passes a year and the daughter has left home to follow her chosen career path. But there is still the case of the daughter greaving over Billy Joes' death, so this makes her go up on the Tallahatchie Bridge daily to throw off a banquet of flowers to pay her respects.
The Dramatic Potential/Feelings: I think that this second response may be one that I'd pick over the other since this response is more story driven and with the fact that I prefer a full on sadness performance over one that would involve a mixture of feelings. There is also the opportunity to mix both stories together, which can make with some good dramatic potential.
Response 3:
This third response is slightly different than the previous two as I've interpreted the words used in the text to create my own original story whilst also involving some unscripted choices.
Characters: At some point in the song, the lyrics mention that the character 'Brother Taylor' had seen someone that looked a lot like the, what I think is due to my previous responses, the daughter/sister character in the story, but I've changed this concept and made it so that the girl in the story could be an ex girlfriend.
The Story: What Brother Taylor actually saw was a past image of Billy Joe and this girl sitting on the Tallahatchie Bridge having a conversation, but Brother Taylor couldn't make out what the couple were saying at the time as he was not there to hear it in reality. The conversation that Billy Joe and the girl character were having was also with a recently born baby that they didn't initially want. Both Billy Joe and the girlfriend were in their early teens meaning that they couldn't afford an abortion, and since the baby has actually been born, they have no idea how they're still going to afford having it and are having this conversation up on the Talahatchie Bridge to work out what to do with it.
The conversation can be anything from putting it in a care home, just leaving it on the street for someone to come pick it up, telling their parents since they don't know about the child, even the thought of killing it was in Billy Joes' mind... but not the girlfriend. This got to the point that they actually had a full on argument with each other and Billy Joe got so mad that he just threw their baby off the Tallahatchie Bridge into the river below out of mental rage. This then put the girlfriend into a real state, a state that made her kill Billy Joe with his own pocket knife. After realizing that she had committed a murder, she disposed of the body and the weapon by throwing them also into the river below luckily with no witnesses.
The story then goes forward a couple of years and the girlfriend has near forgotten about this tragic event due to constant hypnotherapy sessions. It was only when she was watching the news on the TV that her memories started to crawl back into her mind. Billy Joes' deceased body had finally been found not far from the Talahatchie Bridge going down-stream. Because all of the guilt had fallen back into her mind, she had considered going to the police to confess for her crime. But before doing so, she wanted to visit the Talahatchie Bridge one last time to throw this time a banquet of flowers for the baby that she was going to suggest to Billy Joe to keep as a mother should never be separated from her child, no matter the circumstances.
The Dramatic Potential/Feelings: This was going to be the ending to this sad and aggressive story filled with moments of heartbroken, tear-filled horror. To perform this story also within this assignment will be an incredible opportunity to try and devise since it's my own creation/interpretation of the story in 'Ode To Billy Joe' and the dramatic potential is definitely there, perhaps even more so than the previous 2 responses.
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