Power and Performing

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 06:43 PM

I perform best when I'm physically close to my audience. All it takes is one person to respond to what I'm doing -- wow, what a feeling. And I respond to that response and my performance is multiplied.

Once, when performing in a very noisy session (Jeri knows the session!), I stopped mid song because not only did no one seem to be listening, but I could neither hear my accompaniment (sitting next to me) nor felt some of the other accompaniment (ah, yes, Jeri can also figure out who...) were paying attention. I'll NEVER do that again. I heard from the people who *were* listening -- they wanted to know what they did wrong that I stopped the song. That's when I realized that I wasn't doing this just for my enjoyment; I have a responsibility to my audience (my gawd, MY audience!), too.

There is nothing more enjoyable and satisfying than an appreciative audience!

Bat Goddess

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Allan C.
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 12:39 PM

That bit about dropping a pebble into a pond...yeah, it is like that, but dropping one into a bucket of water will give you a better visual because you can see the ripples return to the center.

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Alice
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 11:44 AM

Yes, Jeri, I feel that power when performing, and it keeps getting better as time goes on. The feeling doesn't fade.

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 10:42 AM

Here it is, that floating feeling. It is another amazing experience.

Jon

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Jeri
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 10:37 AM

I'm glad to hear the feeling doesn't fade. Still, the wonderment that it's there at all may. I suppose people can expect it to happen and try to make it so. Maybe it's easy enought to figure out what you have to do, or maybe trying to hard makes it difficult.

Kat, I like thinking about circles spreading outward, as if the singer is a pebble dropped in a pond, and the people around him catch the music and emotion, and the ripples spread.

Matt, I don't know that what you said just isn't a different interpretation or expression of the same energy. I can't tell because you said so little. It sounds all metaphysical, but what it really comes down to is grabbing someone's attention, and having them understand and feel whatever you feel when you sing. Singing in front of a group intensifies it, but you can get the same thing singing to just one person, I think. The first time we feel it may be when we start singing a song our family or friends know, and they all notice, and really start to listen or sing along.

John P, we had a thread about the feeling of floating when the playing was really good. Maybe I can find it in a bit, or maybe someone has a link.

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Allan C.
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 09:32 AM

Dave O, probably the same way I did from 1982 to 1999. Real life got in the way.

I forgot to say in my previous posts that the feeling never goes away. Not only that, but it is different each and every time - even if the venue remains the same. Every audience, no matter the size, has its own collective personality, aura, or whatever you want to call it.

I guess one of the hardest things is to perform before people who are basically ignoring you.

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 09:16 AM

I never feel so completely alive as when I am singing for an audience.

How in world did I let that slide from about age 33 to 67?

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: John P
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 09:00 AM

There is nothing quite like being on stage and really connecting with the audience. There is a circular engergy transfer that happens -- the audience picks up on what the performer is doing and sends back the energy 100-fold. This enables the performer to keep it flowing and to increase the intensity. I have also found that when I am really connecting with the audience, I play a lot better. It is almost impossible for me to make a mistake when I am really getting the energy back from the audience. Not only am I uplifted emotionally, but my playing is uplifted as well.

An interesting thing I have found is that this energy feedback loop can take different forms -- I have felt it in a tavern where everyone in the place was up and dancing, pounding on the tables, and screaming after every song. And I have felt it in a room that is completely still, with everyone sitting and carefully watching and listening to everything that happens on stage. Very different manifestations of the same thing.

And no, it never goes away or becomes old hat.

John

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Clinton Hammond2
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 08:05 AM

If the "honeymoon", as mentioned above, ever does wear off, I'm quitting music!

;-)

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Allan C.
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 07:46 AM

I love kat's Tai Chi analogy. Yes it is like that. (And thank you for the compliments - I had quite forgotten my early sojourns on HearMe). Jeri, it goes beyond the music. A robot could produce the notes. It takes a performer to produce the feeling of that music. I have heard you do it.

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Amergin
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 03:03 AM

I know that feeling. There is nothing quite like the feeling you get when you know that every eye and every ear is paying attention. It is a feeling that I can't quite explain, but I do know that it is the best high I have ever experienced, not even sex comes close to to this feeling.

Amergin

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: katlaughing
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 01:43 AM

Song circles

Circles of sound

Ever-widening

Encompassing

Being At One, together

In ripples of sound

In the circle of Life.

Nothing quite like it, Jeri, my heart soars and sings, along with every fibre of my being when I make that connection and it always feels as though I am singing my absolute best because I get such a lift from the energy which is circling back and forth.

There is an exercise in Tai Chi called Push Hands. Two people stand face to face and without actually touching hands, do a kind of Tai Chi back and forth "dance", for lack of a better word. Anyway, you are each supposed to *feel* the other person's energy and anticipate what move s/he is going to make with their hand(s) next and meet them there with your hands. When done by experienced persons it is an elegant and beautiful thing to watch. I have seen similar power in that giving and receiving as in singing, at times.

Allan, you did beautifully, in person and on the radio. With experience in HearMe/PalTalk, even a microphone can become an audience:-) and I am sure you would do well regardless, in fact you did early on in HearMe, didn't you?

kat

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Sorcha
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 01:37 AM

Keep singing and playing and you'll get there, Matt. It's the music that has the power, not the performers. I suppose that is why I have never liked contests.....contests are about the performer, not the music. I can't deal with that. For me, it is the music and the audience connection.

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Matt_R
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 01:04 AM

Um...well...I just sing. I haven't philosophized about energy transfers yet. Guess this is too deep for me.

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Jeri
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 12:50 AM

Matt, the power I'm talking about isn't power over people, it's more power willingly shared. When things go right, you give them your energy, and you get it all back many times, and everybody feels it, I think. Everyone gains and no one loses.

As far as the attention, Sorcha, for me it feels like I'm not necessarily the center of it, the song is. Singing a song is like pointing at what you'd like people to pay attention to, and everybody's looking. For a little while, I feel like I'm more than just me.

...all this from someone who's never sung on a stage.

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Matt_R
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 12:08 AM

"Arms Wide Open" --definately. You wouldn't believe the power you have over people when singing it.

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Allan C.
Date: 17 Dec 00 - 12:02 AM

I can think of few things that both scare me and thrill me at the same time as perfoming. I am usually a wreck during my first song. (One of the hardest things in the world for me to do is to do a one-song-only spot!) After the first round of applause, I begin to feel better at ease. In fact, unless the lighting is too bright, I am able to relax enough to actually look at some of the individual faces in the audience. That usually happens during the second song. It is then that I am able to get a reading on how well (or if) I am connecting with the audience. If the connection is there, then the door is open to the possibility of ensuring that the audience is completely focused on me. That, in turn, gives me the focus I need to (I hope) take the audience where I want it to go.

Yes, there is power in that. But the power is simply a reflection of the energy given by the audience. If they aren't focused enough to give that energy, then I feel powerless.

By the way, I fully expected to be totally awful on the Mudcat Radio show (see June 21). I have never been on a radio show before and was almost certain that without direct audience feedback, I would flop. Perhaps a saving grace was that there were quite a few people in the studio that night and so I played to them, for the most part. I don't know how I might have done if I were simply playing to a microphone.

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Sorcha
Date: 16 Dec 00 - 11:38 PM

Hey guys--just a thought--it's not just a "ME" thing is it? I mean, it's not just that ME is the center of attention......I don't feel that way at least. For me, it is that the way I am getting the music across to the audience is working. Of course, I like being the Center of Attention at times, but I don't think this is what we are talking about is it?

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Troll
Date: 16 Dec 00 - 11:24 PM

It never wears off. It doesn't happen every time or even all that often but when it does there is no greater high.
You own the stage, the audience, the world. Once it happens to you, you can never go back to the humdrum world .
That stage is home.

troll

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Sorcha
Date: 16 Dec 00 - 11:10 PM

Yes, Jeri, I know exactly what you mean, and I live for those moments. I LOVE performing. I HATE competing. Audience feed back is perhaps the greatest thing in my life. And, the only thing better for me than "total attention" is "total participation".....when the entire audience is participating in some way in my/our performance. Singing, dancing, tapping toes, smiling, etc.

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 16 Dec 00 - 11:03 PM

How about has anyone had the experience when you feel that for the one song you are singing that the audience is almost in your power?

Jon

Subject: RE: Power and Performing
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 16 Dec 00 - 10:56 PM

Know exactly what you mean Jeri. The first time I performed on stage was in High School. 'Course I was still very much into my "desperate to be loved" stage, and my shyness was at an all time high. Funny thing happened. When I got on stage, all nervousness disappeared, and I felt REALLY comfortable for the first time. Only other thing that gave me the same feeling was playing baseball or being completely alone. Don't know if it was a feeling of power or not, but it sure was a feeling of being "home".

Rick

Subject: Power and Performing
From: Jeri
Date: 16 Dec 00 - 10:27 PM

No, this is about neither electricity or Viagra.

I just had a discussion with someone about the feeling one can get when leading a song or tune, or actually performing on a stage.

I sing songs in a session. I never thought I'd enjoy perfoming. In my fondest dreams, I'd hoped to one day be comfortable singing in front of others. What happened is I've come to love it. When I sing and hear other voices joining in, I feel powerful - I feel like I'm lifted up by the combined voices.

My discussion partner said that one of the most amazing and scary things was being on stage and singing, and the whole room going so quiet that you could hear a pin drop, and knowing that for that song, the audience is completely focused on you.

I guess there are at least two sides to this - the give and take of energy, and the attention you get for doing something worth paying attention to. For me, both of these things are something new, and my reactions intense.

So, do you know what I'm talking about? Does it happen to you? For those of you who've been performing for a long time, does the honeymoon end, the feelings wear off?