A great way to finding Job opportunities and experience in theatre is searching job finding websites such as theatrejobs.com, linkedin.com and stagejobspro.com. Here you can find a vast range of roles that are involved in theatre and other live events.
Actors - the roles of an actor consist of performing as a character in a dramatic or comical way. Actors perform in film, TV, theatre, adverts and music videos. behind every actor is a director, who tell them how to perform, what to perform, and the way to perform. this is how actors and directors interrelate.
Musicians - a musician's roles consist in creating and/or performing music to an audience or recording in studios. Musicians will compose and perform various genres of music, some tend to stay in one type of style i.e bands. some bands will evolve their style of music to fit them or try something new. some musicians will work as freelance artists, working with others to perform pieces, or work as salaried members of; orchestras, theatre companies, bands and choirs. musician can also be the roles of composers, instrumentalists and/or singers. singers and musical directors will interrelate with each other by working on pieces together. the Musical director would tell the musicians what to perform, when and how in a live event.
singers - a singer's roles consist of singing songs on stage, radio, television and music videos. a singer must memorise singing routines, lyrics and singing lyrics in the right sections of a song. a singer or vocalist will work solo, in bands or as an ensemble depending on what genre of music and where they will perform i.e. on stage as a band, as an opera singer in theatre or as a choir in a musical event. singers can compose their music and/or help when recording pieces in studios. just like musicians, singers can perform various genres of music depending on what they like or if they prefer to stay in one style. singers will seek out and research into finding music to help them compose and find their suitable genre of music. there are various styles of vocals and singing depending on the type of music. for example, rap is normally associated in hip-hop and grime but is frequently used in rock and metal. this is known as nu-metal. an example of bands that perform this style of music are Korn, Limp Bizkit, Deftones.
Dancers - a dancer's roles consist of performing to an audience in various styles. these styles include; musical theatre, contemporary, ballet, ballroom, street and breakdancing. some dancers perform as solo artists or as a company, depending on what event and style they are performing for. a dancer must be very fit and dedicated to dancing if they want to have a successful career.
depending on the size of a theatre or live event, there are many roles for a technical crew. for example, a small scale live event would have just one or two lighting technicians who will rig, program and operate lights. for a full/large scale event, you would have a chief LX, LX 1,2 and 3, Riggers, operators, followspot operators etc..
Lighting technician - a lighting technician rigs lighting, haze/fog machines, programmes desks and operates shows. in a small scale event you might only just have one but for large scale you would have about 3-5. lighting technicians will follow designs of a performance from either themselves or from a lighting designer, depending on the scale of the event. lighting technicians also have the duty to maintain and manage the equipment and fill out paperwork.
Chief LX - a chief electrician has many jobs such as supervising the other electricians during a production or show, running plans for power distribution to the event and running cabling, patch the lighting board for a show if there is not light board operator and sorting and buying resources and equipment such as gels, gobos and lights that the lighting will want to request.
lighting operator (lighting board) -
lighting followspot operator -
