Hope your Summer, wherever you may be is giving you an opportunity to rest and appreciate all the great things in your life. I truly believe that it’s that appreciation, that fuels the continuation of those great things.And don’t I get more and more philosophical each month???
I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about this blog…its value as entertainment as well as my own seemingly endless pontifications on the subject of singing and all its aspects.
My sister forwarded something to me a few months ago by an author named Sara Davidson. It was in a blog format, but it was actually a story in serial form and each month her blog would be a continuation of the story she was telling.
While I actually found the story a little silly, something about love and sex after the age of 50, and why even at that age, a woman cannot seem to identify a DOG when she sees one, I kinda liked the idea of the serial format.
So….I have decided to serialize my next book for you, my loyal readers. You get to read it way before it even goes to the publishers, and your comments will really help me when the time comes for final edits, so thanks in advance for that, singers.
Here’s the first installment of “Get off the Bandstand”, OR (The Rules of Behavior for the Aspiring Jazz Singer).
Introduction:
This guidebook is designed specifically for those singers who wish to pursue, or are already pursuing a career as a Jazz Singer. It doesn’t apply to any other vocal genre. And that being said, let me take a moment here to explain why that is before getting on with this book.
It is widely understood in the world of Tennis, that in order to be considered a complete player, one who is rated among the very best in the world, year after year after year, the player must be able to perform on a variety of surfaces.
In other words, the player should be as comfortable on a grass court as he or she is on a clay court, a hard court, or an indoor carpeted court. Each court demands a completely separate set of skills from the player because each surface creates different challenges.
For example, the ball will tend to bounce differently, lower, or end up in an unexpected position on grass where there are dips and even holes on the surface, than on a hard concrete court where there are none. Or, while one needs to be able to run to the ball on a grass court, he will have to perfect a sliding technique on clay to be a consistent winner.The thing is that to be a truly consistent and top rated player, one must be able to negotiate all surfaces accurately and play according to the protocols inherent in each surface.
And it’s the same for singers. Every gig is different. A singer cannot perform at a wedding the same way he/she does at a cabaret gig. And let me tell you ladies that if you try, you’ll probably never work a wedding again. Why? Because “stealing” the spotlight from the bride is a big “no no” in the wedding reception business. The guests are not at all interested in the singer’s little self-aggrandizing anecdotes. They just wanna dance!
And while you may be sitting there reading this and thinking, “Who cares about that? I will never work a wedding gig. Those are lame. I’m too good for that”, let me tell you that playing weddings can pay your rent for a year or more while you’re perfecting your scatting, building your book, or practicing your instrument.
Every Gig is Different!
If you get a call to sing back-up at a recording session, this is NOT an opportunity to try out your audition piece for American Idol. You see that, don’t you? Singing backup requires something different, something subdued, without too much vibrato that might make you stick out, because that’s the job you’ve been called to do.
How about a restaurant looking for dinner music? Is this the appropriate venue for a loud, bombastic “Come to the Cabaret”-type number, or maybe your stories of childhood and how you learned the song you’re about to sing?
When a restaurant owner says he wants dinner music, he means SOFT…elevator-style, the kind of music that people can converse over in levels no louder than a whisper.Additional factors distinguishing the differences inherent in singing jobs are not just the venue differences, but the genre differences.
There are experienced, competent singers, who work consistently, who pay their bills on their earnings from singing, who never become a famous celebrity, but who make a living AND a life doing what they love.They are as comfortable in an high class private country club with plush, elegant furnishings as they are in a bar with sawdust on the floor. They can sing in a variety of styles, like requests put forth by the customers, be it a 40’s big band tune, or a country song, or a bossa nova, or even a show tune, or a jazz standard.
These artists, and called Journeymen, (that is any experienced, competent but mostly unknown and uncelebrated performers).
There are thousands of journeymen in the music business, including guitar and keyboard players, saxophone and trumpet players, bassists, flutists, harpists, violinists, cellists, drummers, and yes, singers, all doing what they love for a living, and loving what they do every day.
These are the working professionals of the music business, and while they…[we] understand that every gig is different, and while it remains the dream of every one of them [us] to just DO OUR ACT, stand up there and express our deepest feelings, with our favorite songs, the ones that perfectly express our essence and which are arranged exquisitely, the way we want them; and our warm and witty stories that hold the audiences attention in an utter delightful magnetic clasp that only releases them when we are through, and the perfect venue where the plates and glasses make no noise when we are on the stage, and where the lighting is perfect and the sound system is set to the most attractive equalization for our voice, and one where every eye in the house is on US…Aaah YES!
While we dream all of that, we also know the reality!And that is that if we wish to work as professionals, we can almost assuredly count on being called upon to play, (sing) on different “surfaces” (venues), using a variety of strokes, (sing in a variety of genres, like Country, Jazz, Pop, Rock etc.), and need to be competent in every single one!
A working singer’s schedule for just 2 days: (sample)
- Monday10AM – back-up singing gig at ABC Recording Studio, (no rehearsal – need to read it)
- 12:30PM - Give a voice lesson to a student
- 2PM – Ladies Auxiliary Luncheon and Fashion Show
- 7PM – Happy Hour at the XYZ Bar and Grill
- Tuesday11AM – Art Gallery Opening – (may need to emcee)
- 2PM-4PM - Teach
- 5PM - Cocktail Party at the GHI Hotel – Ballroom A
- 9PM – Dance at the VFW, (may go overtime)
Naturally, every single journeyman performer aspires to greatness, fortune, and celebrity. The point here is that although that’s very true, one has to play by the rules of the game that are being played in the present moment!
TO BE CONTINUED…
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