Drama & Voice Coaching
English Language & Accent Tuition
with Joanna Hempel
Voice Coaching & Presentaion Skills
Contact:
Joanna Hempel
9518 4615
0433 896 420
joanna@atticstudio.com
Drama and HSC Coaching
Performance and Acting Skills
'Working on my monologues with Joanna got me into the Victorian College of the Arts' - 32 year old actor
'She is excellent' - HSC Drama student of Drama, Newtown High School of the Performing Arts
'Thank you - it was one of the most rewarding, enjoyable and special six months for me' - 21 yr old English Honours student, UNSW
Individual coaching sessions enable people to polish their acting skills with Joanna Hempel in the privacy of her studio. Be it for film, theatre or television, for an audition or a monologue as part of an exam, an actor's work will receive individual attention and refinement before the all-important performance or presentation. Coaching is carried out in weekly or twice weekly sessions.
Monologues: People working on a monologue benefit from private coaching with Joanna Hempel, often requiring help with editing a dramatic piece to fit the requirements of an exam or audition. Actors receive physical and vocal exercises which Joanna sets each week. Students of Performance Drama for the HSC and Year 11, as well as actors, singers and clowns have all received successful private coaching in the Attic Studio.
Movement with the rod, Yoga Breathing and Stretching are explored, often to music, to give an actor's physical work greater flexibility and extension, richer variety, tone and fluency.
Truth in performance: Joanna uses a variety of exercises that foster truth in expression. Spontaneity, concentration, trust and improvisatory skills are also taught. Incorporating yoga relaxation, breathing and visualisation techniques Joanna enables students to gain a sense of self-mastery, by degrees, using the body, voice and imagination as instruments. As a published playwright, Joanna introduces students to elements of dramatic structure in order to create a sense of form and aesthetics in their work. Some students come for a short boost to their skills, others come for several months. Sometimes paired work can be arranged.
To enrich the imagination, Joanna teaches her students to access the memory and deeper awareness. Some of the ideas find their way into improvised work and performed pieces or improvisations. Role play, the ability to hold a character, to understand what motivates and what limits a character, are explored, first in exercises, then gradually in work of greater depth and psychological complexity. This is especially valuable for working on a student's monologue in HSC Performance Drama at school or for anaudition piece.
Joanna Hempel has shared her techniques as a drama and performance specialist with high school students of drama and English, with teachers of drama and English in colleges, schools and at conferences inter-state & overseas. A graduate in Psychology and English from the University of Sydney, Joanna later trained in Theatre, gaining an M.Litt at the University of New England, Armidale. With a Polish background, she combines multilingual skills with her coaching of Drama, English Language and accent coaching. For the last four years she has been director of Soirees Litteraires with its monthly talks on European and Australian culture at the NSW Writers' Centre in Rozelle. For many years Joanna was Director of the Armidale School of Youth Drama, with six of her plays for teenagers published and today studied and performed in schools in Australia, Canada and the USA. She is now writing a novel based on her family's experiences from World War I to its arrival in Australia from Europe in 1950.