would hum myself to sleep. so eventually they were like, "let's, let's put this into something useful," and got me some singing lessons. talk to me about nerves. do you get them and how do you get over them? yeah, i get nerves all the time getting over them. it's always a tricky balance. sometimes the adrenaline helps you, but also you don't want the nerves to affect your singing or your technique if you're getting all tense. researchers here at the royal college of music in london say that practising and then performing is very different to practising performing. and so while it's difficult to get regular access to the real theatres and venues, they can simulate the experience here in their performance labouratory. and that simulation begins before they step out into the lights. one of the things we've learned from our research is that our bodies' stress response

to performance can be as if not more powerful backstage than it is on stage. it's that anticipation of performance where anxiety can really hit. and this helps us tailor our training to make sure we're not only preparing them for what happens on stage, under the lights, in front of the audience's eyes, but also how they're coping backstage. how do they manage that anxiety? how do they get themselves physically and mentally into a place where they're ready to walk out on stage and give their best performance? the parallel to that in the surgical world would be allowing surgical i students to go through the process of gowning up, washing up, doingl a preoperative briefing - with their team and making sure that they're all on the same page. and once the students are on stage, george waddell can control everything. he can change the venue. he can change the reaction to make the night go as well or as badly as he wants. the performance laboratory is running in unreal engine, the video game software.

each member of the audience is an individual video games character. they all behave independently and they don't all always show up. i got lucky tonight. and what's really interesting about this space as well is there are 64 speakers hidden in the walls and ceiling. so if you change the venue, that changes the acoustics, which forces you to change your performance. voice echoes. getting that sense of the acoustic makes it not so huge a jump when you're then performing on stage compared to in all the practice rooms we have, which tend to be a much drier sound. so when it's suddenly a much bigger space that you have to fill, it's great to get a little bit of an experience of what it might sound like ahead of time. so — there's the prep, there's the lights, there's the sound. but let's talk about that audience. it's a weird crowd in tonight, i can tell you. we want to test our performance focus. we want to make sure

they can hold it together. so that might be very subtle, a little cough, perhaps... coughing. ..and it might be more dramatic. mobile ringtone plays. the performer is expected to ignore this, i guess. that's right. and even if there's a momentary lapse, it's about then continuing after that. i mean, performers make mistakes. it's how they react after that mistake that sets apart the professional. for many of our performers, it's not actually this full house that is the most intimidating to them. it's perhaps when the marketing hasn't gone so well... he laughs. ..and there are just a rare few in the audience. this can be quite intimidating, trying to bring that energy to a sparse crowd. i've been there. now it is possible to practice more than just musical performances here. public speaking, business presentations — the venue and the audience are ready for any type of rehearsal. and then...there�*s this lot. yes, you can even simulate an audition panel.

george can make each of the judges purr like sharon osborne, or sneer like simon cowell. so what are they going to make of this little stand up routine i knocked up with the help of chatgpt? good evening. how's everyone doing tonight? i mean, have you seen those vocal processors? they can turn a voice that sounds like a dying cat into something that could rival freddie mercury. how'd it do that! ? thank you. i think we've heard enough. yeah, i think i'll leave it to the experts. # ..to me. # crowd cheers. # i'm living my best life, best life...# welcome to miami — a city of golden beaches, glamour and entertainment...

..and the home of the miami heat basketball team. # i just want to celebrate, life's too short. ..# tonight, i'mjoining fans for a match. it's an experience not to miss when visiting the city, as much about the pre—game entertainment as it is about the sports. but this isn'tjust a sports team. this is a tech start—up. most people wouldn't think of this when thinking of a professional sports team, but we have a very robust technology operation. as spectators move around the venue, data is carefully being gathered by everything they do and purchase, before being analysed on the team's own data platform that they call 601 analytics. we knew that we had reached an inflection point, and this was roughly eight, nine years ago where we have all of this technology in the building and we wanted to know what the technology was telling us.

and so we went to market to see if there was anything out there. we couldn't find anything, so we started building it for ourselves. after a few years, we found it really impacted our business. so think about from the time you walk into a building, the time you purchase a ticket, you purchase something at food and beverage. i can even see when folks scan into the building, what gates they're coming in from so if we need to redeploy staff and release the bottleneck. we can see what people are doing in the arena. we can see whether they're transacting with us, what jerseys they're buying, where they're buying them at our fingertips. it's like having an app for your entire business. not only does the 601 analytics platform creates individual fan platform create individual fan profiles, it can also be used to analyse historical data and make predictions about future games. this allows the team to bring in the right resources, potentially saving money. it's perhaps not a surprise that data about all these

transactions is being gathered. but what strikes me is that this is a sports club taking the tech into their own hands and spinning out a successful start—up. it is an interesting model, but i think that's what contributes to our success because if you think of a tech company and the customers that they serve, how many tech companies actually lives in the customer's world, day in and day out and get their questions and their ask and understands their problems? their services are being used by more than 20% of nba teams, and their market is growing with customers beyond just the main basketball league. now the start—up are taking their products outside of the us too, theirfirst venue, using this tech in the uk opening in manchester this year. but back to miami, and the data being gathered at this stadium is helping in some slightly more unusual places.

you might think everything here is about the action on the courts. this is miami, so of course, there's a nightclub underneath the stand. # baby, why don't you dance with me...?# it's a straight up nightclub. it's ultra—lounge nightclub, loud music, lights going everywhere. cryo effects, confetti and stuff like that. so that's kind of what we do here. data is even helping you choose the music for the nightclub. it helps us put together music platforms that are very, very, very broad. so pre—game experience, given the fact of what our demographic breakdown is, i know that we need to play music that is going to cater from all the way to the sixties, all the way up to current music. with the game about to start, the fans are packing

into the stadium, but do they realise just how much data is being gathered about them? you don't realise it, but you are aware because when you log into your amazon account and it remembers the kind of paper towel that you last ordered, that's a piece of data on you, but you find it relevant and you find it helpful. we try to do the same thing and we're doing it because the fans expect it. with technology now impacting every aspect of running a business. i'm sure it won't be long before more sports teams are following the start—up model of miami heat. thank you. now this is the short cut of click. the full length version is waiting for you right now on iplayer. but for this version, that's it for our show. hope you've enjoyed it. we're about to find out whether this lot have. thanks for watching and we will see you soon. crowd cheers. oh, thank you, thank you!

hello. after what has been a mixed and decidedly chilly week of weather, things are not going to warm up an awful lot through the weekend. staying chilly, some rain at times, but it is going to turn warmer next week. however, not completely dry. still some wet weather in the forecast. certainly some wet weather for the weekend, all driven by this area of low pressure pushing up from the south. this frontal system here bringing rain northwards across southern england into wales, the midlands and east anglia. to the north of that, some sunny spells to start the day. a cold start with a frost across northern england, northern ireland and scotland. it will be another

sunshine and showers day. the showers wintry over high ground in scotland. some hefty showers breaking out for southern counties, and then some more persistent rain heading in from the south by the end of the afternoon, temperatures generally around 10—13 degrees. and then through saturday night, this rain will push its way northwards, covering large parts of england, clipping into the east of wales. further north and west, some clear spells. another relatively chilly night, there'll be a frost for some. further south and east, not as cold because of the extra cloud, because of the outbreaks of rain, all driven by this area of low pressure which will be sliding its way northwards through the day on sunday. some parts of england are going to have a lot of rain through the day, heavy and persistent rain that will make it feel decidedly chilly. some rain fringing into east wales, turning wet in eastern scotland, rather windy for some of these eastern coasts, but eventually brightening up for south west england, for wales, parts of north west england, northern ireland and western scotland seeing some sunshine as well. temperatures still stubbornly stuck in that range between 9—11; degrees, but temperatures will start to lift on monday.

a frontal system pushing in from the west. outbreaks of rain for some, but ahead of that, a southerly wind bringing a warmerfeel. temperatures back up really to where they should be for late april 12—16 degrees. and it'll turn warmer still as the week wears on. this area of low pressure tending to roll away southwards as all these different weather systems reorientate themselves. well, the wind direction will change, we'll pick up something of an easterly flow from the near continent, and that will bring some warmer air. highs potentially up to 19, maybe the low 20s celsius. but with that, there will still be some rain at times.

live from washington. this is bbc news the us�*s top diplomat tells the bbc his country is prepared to take steps against china if it continues to support russia's war effort donald trump's former assistant takes to the stand as the first full week of testimony in his criminal trial comes to a close. and more on the debate on us abortion rights — we speak to the director of the white house gender policy council. hello, i'm helena humphrey. us secretary of state antony blinken met with chinese president xijinping on friday to discuss relations between the two global powers. the us�*s top diplomat said there is progress in some areas. he praised beijing for its efforts to stop the supply of fentanyl reaching the us and the restoration of military—to—military communication. president xi agreed the two sides had "made some positive

progress" since he met his us counterpart, joe biden,