Dare to Diva New Show Rehearsals at Curve Kick Off 2018

Dare to Diva company and its artistic director Carol Leeming are dighted they have been awarded an Arts council England Grant for the Arts. To produce a staged preview production for further development to a full production at a later stage at Curve theatre January 29th 7.30pm ,of Carol’s (Siobhan Logan) Award winning choreopoem Love the life you live Live the life you love, with live text, movement, live music and digital visuals. the event will feature a first half of a performative introduction by Carol of  her original Diva songs, poetry and introduction to the character of Maz aka Martin in the Love the life you live Live the life you love which will follow afterwards.

This Dare to Diva project is part of a supported development of Carol’s as an artist and Dare to Diva company by Curve Artist Development.  As part of this support to date, Carol has also shadowed Nikolai  Foster Artistic Director Curve and Julia Thomas Resident Director and attended rehearsals for the Curve productions of  Scrooge and George’s Marvelous Medicine. All of which has proved in valuable to Carol’s further development as a Director. In addition as a result Carol has been able to speak with and observe other theatre professionals at work at Curve e.g. Tasha Taylor Johnson Composer and Jack Weir Lighting Designer for George’s Marvellous Medicine and watch first hand Music Supervisor & Orchestrator Sarah Travis and Music Director Neil Mc Donald at work on Scrooge a large scale work.  This unique opportunity has proved to be invaluable to Carol at this sage in her development at as theatre maker.

A project team has been  recruited  lead by Carol (see photo Creative Team members above) as follows: Michaela Waldram-Jones is producer, with Emile Clark performer, Kwesi Johnson choreographer, Neil Hunter Music Arranger and Gopi Degala Digital Visuals. Carol is Writer/Director and Composer of the music for the work. In addition a local ensemble of musicians have also been recruited to play live onstage alongside a  local community chorus. These two latter elements of live musicians and live chorus on stage, is an exciting and more ambitious addition to this monologue drama.  Sydnee Thompson, a De Montfort University Performing Arts Mgt. undergraduate is on board to assist the Director and Producer and get first hand experience working in on a production to be performed at Curve.

 

 

 

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Carol Leeming awarded the Ena Young Award for Poetry by Leicester Writers Club November 2017

Carol once again was celebrating, this time for receiving another award for the excellence of her work. On this  time Carol received the Ena Young Poetry Award 2017 from the Leicester Writers Club. This award  follows a previous award last year for her film poem Enchanter and the Ena young Award specifically was for the  Dare to Diva self publication of Carol’s debut poetry chapbook The Declamations of Cool Eye which sold out its first edition.

The award  would normally be made at the prestigious and eagerly anticipated Leicester Writers’ Club Annual award Dinner. Due to another engagement Carol was unable to attend the dinner. as is usual. However the award was made by the President Emma Lee to Carol to her delight and surprise, at a Literary Leicester Event, at Leicester University the occasion being the visit and talk of the esteemed British Historian David Olusoga.

 

Carol Leeming Wins Prestigious East Midlands Women’s Award for Outstanding Woman In Arts Media & Music 2017 sponsored by DLuxe Magazine

Carol Leeming has won the  East Midlands Women’s award 2017 for Outstanding Woman in Arts Media & Music. This is such a great achievement, given the high calibre of the women nominated in this category from across the region. The Award was sponsored by Dluxe Magazine regional. The event took place a a luxurious setting of a hotel in Uppingham Leicestershire/Rutland. It was also a huge networking event with women and men in attendance from all sectors of business and the community.

The East Midlands Women’s Awards is in its first year, as founded by leading light and successful Life Coaching business woman Sandra Pollock, who attends similar events in the West Midlands and realized the need for an organization, to celebrate the wonderful women from various fields from business to community in the East Midlands region.

 

 

2Funky Arts Project Live 2017

Working as the 2Funky Arts Project Live Music Director, Carol Leeming worked with 8 young Urban music artists, along with 6 x  professional session band musicians., Tara Munroe as Coordinator and Vijay Mistry as Project Manager.  The Project also included Master Class Session for the young artists on Generating Income & Intellectual Copyright, Songwriting and Stagecraft with music industry professionals. Carol’s role also involved mentoring with all the artists, following up on the above mentioned topics, but also re: performance e.g. vocal skills. The main role  however was overseeing the music arrangements of the young artists’ material, with the session band musicians, to prepare for both a promotion only CD Record and also for a Music Industry Showcase performance held at 2Funky Music Cafe in December 2017. Carol was based  doing sessions at HQ Music Recording Studios, overseeing the recording of individual artist songs, in addition to a collective group  track. Both the CD Rise Up is now available and the Artist Showcase proved to be a an exciting evening of first rate Urban performances.

http://www.2funkyarts.co.uk/site/projects_62.asp?catID=471

 

Carol Leeming Wows with Cosmocular Ensemble World Music Fusion Band. At Cosmopolitan Festival & Welford Road HM Prison

Carol Leeming in the role of singer/song writer performed, to an appreciative July  2017 Cosmopolitan Festival audience  two scintillating new songs composition, with the 10 piece World Music fusion ensemble Cosmocular Ensemble. The songs River People and Sundance were commissioned by Cosmopolitan Arts Director Amanda Leandro and festival audience were both thrilled and excited and broke out into spontaneous dancing.

Carol also featured with the Cosmocular Ensemble for a very special performance that was held at HM Prison. The Ensemble headlined a week of music arts activities that had been held at the prison with the inmates and art workshop leaders. The initiative is part of a national program which aimed to improve morale overall in prisons and reduce violence and self harm.

In attendance at the Cosmocular performance, along with Prison Officer s and inmates was the Warden, who congratulated the Cosmocular Ensemble on an excellent performance. It was most appreciated by the inmates and Staff alike with a possible invitation to return next year.