Phew! What a busy day.
This morning went to my rehearsal this morning and outside was packed, packed, packed!! Never seen such a long line. It turns out that there were three rehearsals plus a children's one as well.
Afterwards, went over to the Rio Handover auditions on the other side of the river. Whilst driving there I saw one of the London 2012 BMWs being driven - not a bad design actually. Couldn't look at it for long as it was in a side street and I had a stream of cars behind me so couldn't slow down to get a better look.
Arrived at the auditions and firstly they give you a form where you have to indicate your availability and non availability. There were a couple of people there who, like me, are already in the Ceremonies. They were fine with that just as long as you put down the dates that you are most definitely not available. From my understanding, the rehearsals for successful applicants will be catered around their availability.
The people there at the Rio Handover know some of the Cast Co-Ordinators for the Olympics - so there's definitely some talking going on in between the two groups so I'd be careful what you say as news may travel backwards and forwards.
They were auditioning people in batches of 30. There is no second or recall auditions for this one. In relation to what you have to do at the audition, to the "dancers" out there, I personally found it as challenging as my second recall audition - but a samba version. You go through a choreographed routine and there are bits in the routine where you SAMBA! If you can samba then you shouldn't have any problems with some of the choreo (not all of its based on the samba steps so if you're not from a samba background, do not be put off by this. Just go there and enjoy. They want to see positive happy energy and they are there to determine which role they can cast you in. We all had to swap rows so that each row has their turn at the front.
We were told that there are still places left as they are after ALOT of performers. In relation to bateria (drummers), we were told that arrangements for their auditions are not yet in place as they want to see the dancers first.
They kept saying that if anyone who hasn't registered would like to be in with a chance to audition (and the possibility of performing in the Rio Handover), to spread the news.
To recap, their details can be found here:-
http://www.flaghandover2012.co.uk/Today was the first day of their auditions and yes, it was good fun!