Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Stanron Date: 04 Sep 15 - 04:46 PM There is for many of us the performers dichotomy. You come off stage. Nobody threw anything, nobody threw up. It wasn't a disaster, it might have been a moderate success. In retrospect it was fantastic. You come off stage re-assured and confident that you can do this! So you practice and invest your time in the next performance. Then there's the other side. It starts as the slightest niggle and grows as the date gets nearer. The 'It might not be as good as last time.' quickly turns into 'I'm not sure I really want to do this.' Just before you go on it's developed into a raging 'Whatever gave me the idea that I wanted to go on in front of this lot?' and perhaps even 'The last thing I want to do is perform!' And then you are on. Everyone is looking. It's all gone quiet. You shuffle through the folder, maybe tune up the guitar, anything to delay the dreaded moment, until you can't put it off any longer and you start. You come off stage. Nobody threw anything, nobody threw up. It wasn't a disaster, it might have been a moderate success. In retrospect it was fantastic. Of course you are going to do it again. Or is it just me? |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Tattie Bogle Date: 03 Sep 15 - 08:05 PM A virtual one will do, thanks, |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,Pete from seven stars link Date: 03 Sep 15 - 04:41 PM Congratulations tattie ! |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,leeneia Date: 03 Sep 15 - 11:14 AM I'd give you one if I knew how. |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Tattie Bogle Date: 03 Sep 15 - 05:07 AM ......or the intros and the faffing......and the echoes..... Tuesday night session, I did a song I hadn't done for ages, hadn't planned to do, hadn't revised beforehand, hadn't brought lyrics for. Only decided on it when I heard the previous singer's choice of song: one followed on the other. Forgot one line, made something up to fill the void, finished the song. Now can I have my gold star please? |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Musket Date: 27 Aug 15 - 09:34 AM I appear to have developed an echo. |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Johnny J Date: 27 Aug 15 - 08:35 AM This thread is getting almost as long as some of the songs.... |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Musket Date: 27 Aug 15 - 03:33 AM I moan about music. I left my local folk club at a record 2.00am this morning and I have missed an early meeting I should be at. Frankly, I daren't drive.. Talking of coffee.... |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Musket Date: 27 Aug 15 - 03:33 AM I moan about music. I left my local folk club at a record 2.00am this morning and I have missed an early meeting I should be at. Frankly, I daren't drive.. Talking of coffee.... |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Backwoodsman Date: 26 Aug 15 - 03:23 PM "Not sure that trumps people complaining coffee served hot is a dangerous food that should have ice added." They cannot be serious, man! :-) |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST Date: 26 Aug 15 - 02:28 PM 'everything: for example, complaining about the design of somebody's music stand, for pete's sake. Here's a person who has completely forgotten to be interested in the music to come.' Not sure that trumps people complaining coffee served hot is a dangerous food that should have ice added. He who is without sin... |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Backwoodsman Date: 26 Aug 15 - 01:19 PM Love you too, Leeneia... 😘 |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,leeneia Date: 26 Aug 15 - 10:47 AM "Old folkies moan about everything?" Not necessarily, Megan. I can name you at least four cheerful and pleasant old folkies. I bet that if you did research, you would find that the people who complain about everything * started out life as fussy babies. They went on to become whiny kids, sulky adolescents, dour middle-aged people and now, crabby oldsters. ============= * everything: for example, complaining about the design of somebody's music stand, for pete's sake. Here's a person who has completely forgotten to be interested in the music to come. |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Big Al Whittle Date: 26 Aug 15 - 08:16 AM sometimes it comes forwards to you.... other times it sort of mooches sideways... them old folksongs are only in your head |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Deckman Date: 25 Aug 15 - 11:43 PM To quote one of my most favorite song writers ... TOM PAXTON ... "This world goes round and round, What goes up must come down, Green leaves will turn to brown, It all comes back to you, You find what ever you feel, You loose whatever you steal, Just like spinning wheel, It all comes back to you," This world goes round and round ... " bob(deckman)nelsom |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Don Firth Date: 25 Aug 15 - 09:30 PM "Young folkies moan about old folkies. Old folkies moan about everything." Given a sufficient number of orbits around the sun, young folkies become old folkies, and comments about old folkies may come back to bite one on the behind.... Don Firth |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,Musket Date: 25 Aug 15 - 12:14 PM Aye and some moaning is gold plated, copper bottomed and index linked 😎 |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Backwoodsman Date: 25 Aug 15 - 11:16 AM Moaning is a right earned by those who have lived long, done much and seen even more. A bit like the pension. 👍😎 |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Megan L Date: 25 Aug 15 - 10:00 AM Young folkies moan about old folkies. Old folkies moan about everything. |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Backwoodsman Date: 25 Aug 15 - 09:47 AM Again, it's not so much the occasional glance a a book that I find irritating (providing there's no pregnant pause while the glancer hunts for the correct line!). No, it's those f***ing enormous black music stands (the huge ones built to WW3 standards, with the holes in them) that seem to have sprouted up in every performing-space nowadays. These seem to be a device for nervous people to hide behind, even those who sing unaccomperated. Before I burn the books, I'd take a burning torch to those f***ing monstrous stands. |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: The Sandman Date: 25 Aug 15 - 09:24 AM I agree wth Howard, but to quote Mandy Rice Davies, I would wouldnt I. |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,Howard Jones Date: 25 Aug 15 - 09:10 AM "The faffing about with pages, usually means someone just sang that particular song before I got my turn and I have to find another, or else the one I had chosen to sing is not the most appropriate, doesn't fit the mood of the room or is just plain wrong for the state of throat." But that's what I mean by preparation. If you expect to sing say 3 songs during an evening, don't practice only these but prepare a few more. Then if you have to change your planned repertoire for any reason you're ready with an alternative. No faffing necessary. If someone have genuine memory problems and has to use a book, then they should learn to use it so it is merely a prompt and not (as so often happens) a barrier between singer and audience. However I doubt that most book users have medical reasons. No one is infallible, and everyone makes mistakes from time to time and forgets words. It happens to experienced singers, including professionals, far more often than you realise, because they have learned how to cover it up. Most of the time you wouldn't know. This is another performing skill which cannot be acquired if you rely on a book. |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Liz the Squeak Date: 25 Aug 15 - 07:43 AM It's half getting the composure together, and half waiting for the buggers at the back to shut up. As for the book, it's a resource, it's a prompter, it's a comfort/crutch to hold onto... Several blows to the head nearly 30 years ago means I don't remember things like I used to, and good old tempus fugiting doesn't help. I've seen the likes of Roy Bailey and Martin Carthy freeze in the middle of songs and lose them, or consult books, so I'm pretty sure, it's not going to stop the world if I do it. The faffing about with pages, usually means someone just sang that particular song before I got my turn and I have to find another, or else the one I had chosen to sing is not the most appropriate, doesn't fit the mood of the room or is just plain wrong for the state of throat. LTS |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Big Al Whittle Date: 25 Aug 15 - 06:12 AM i was just listening to Josh white's 25 minute discursive version of John Henry - Josh ambles playfully through half a dozen songs and playing styles, demonstrating total mastery of his material. i just feel it should be more like that than amateur hour. and we should all aim for that. we don't achieve that - but its what we should aim for. in England of course we have this problem - there is this huge difference between what traditional singers sound like, and what the public expect from professional entertainers. i guess its the same in America. however the distance is so marked that 'serious' folksingers like Carthy try to emulate a traditional version of a song like Geordie, and its different from the sprightly version like Joan Baez, who presumably would regard herself as folk song populariser like Josh. what i'm saying is that the professional examples in England are sometimes halting and ragged sounding. and i think people confuse the studied raggedness of Carthy and the late Peter Bellamy for being rough and ready. personally, give me slick and professional every time. but thats probably cos i'm old and i grew up with the popularisers like Seeger PPM, Sonny and Brownie - largely American - i suppose. mind you we had our popularisers - the Spinners, The Corries, and much despised they were! the English folkscene is a bit schizophrenic! |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,Musket Date: 25 Aug 15 - 02:18 AM Don apologising for agreeing with me. I'll take that. 😎 |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Deckman Date: 24 Aug 15 - 08:33 PM GEEZE LOUISE, DON ... why don't you stop beating around the bush and just simply say what you mean ... in plain Inglish! bad bad bob |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Don Firth Date: 24 Aug 15 - 07:55 PM I'm afraid that a few people here have managed to hitch the donkey to the cart wrong end forward. It's not the younger people leaving folk clubs, song circles, and such because geezers like me spend too long drooling on their song books and crib sheets, it's the singers (like me, and Bob Nelson, and several others who've spoken up on this thread—including a number of younger singers!!) who have taken the time to learn the songs they intend to sing before going to the meetings. And who, then, have to wait around while singers new to the club or circle waste everybody's time leafing through song books and three-ring binders, trying to decide what they're going to sing, then dither and mumble their way through a song that, not only have they not bothered to learn and obviously don't know what it's even about, but they can't even be bothered to choose ahead of time. So we leave and form groups of our own. It's the singers who like the songs well enough to learn them that get fed up with the people who can't be bothered. I have to agree wholeheartedly with both Howard Jones and Musket. Sorry! But them's my sediments. Don Firth |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,mg Date: 24 Aug 15 - 05:25 PM if you recognize them from before, try to get in line before them and then do it. |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Backwoodsman Date: 24 Aug 15 - 04:23 PM I agree with Howard, Musket (apart from the bit about me, which modesty prevents me from commenting on, but I'm very gratified, and would like to say that Musket ain't half bad either! 👍😎), and Jack. I have no experience of transcendental meditation, unless staring into a pint of Monkey Wrench qualifies, so I'm unable to say whether I agree or disagree with GSS, but it sounds like something worth considering! |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: The Sandman Date: 24 Aug 15 - 03:56 PM JACK have you tired transcendental meditation, it helps you to stop getting irritated, next time you are in a supermarket and someone in front of you is enjoying the experience of taking their time, follow suit, sit down in the queue in the lotus position, and keep the next person waiting |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Jack Campin Date: 24 Aug 15 - 02:22 PM Are you suggesting that young folk don't go because old folk take too long to get started? To some extent, yes. Some old people's behaviour is irritating to other people the same age and completely intolerable to anyone younger. If I want the experience of standing in a queue while the customer being served can't be bothered getting their money out in advance because they positively enjoy spending all day there, I can go to the supermarket for it. |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,Musket Date: 24 Aug 15 - 11:33 AM Performances are also for those who got off their arses and went out to be entertained. Musical ability in a sing around isn't necessary and a love of what you are doing will come over loud and proud. But if people are giving you the courtesy of listening, do them the courtesy of doing you best. Or out another way, wot Howard Jones said. By the way, one way of improving, should you wish to do so is to listen and in the case of instrumentalists, watch others instead of having your head buried in the book, deciding if two weeks since you sang Wild Mountain Thyme is long enough a gap. Backwoodsman said that those who go for a piss when he is singing are the ones that irritate him most. I know he will be reading this but all the same, those who get up when John sings and plays aren't interested in music. I personally sit cross legged if necessary because here is someone who does learn, who does think about how his accompaniment should sound and practices songs before singing them. Yes, he too occasionally has an iPad in front of him, but as an aide memoire, (he is, of course, much much older than me) not as something he is reading for the first time. That he is an accomplished musician is, when you think about it, irrelevant, but nice to hear as a bonus. Another person who he and I occasionally hear is very much a beginner at the ripe old age of 60ish but each week you hear improvement, you can tell he is practicing and wanting to entertain. it isn't something you'd pay to hear, it isn't something you'd call entertainment (yet) but it is wonderful to hear the improvement week on week. His latest achievement was to throw the crutch away and fly commando. (Book shut.) |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Stanron Date: 24 Aug 15 - 09:59 AM Are you suggesting that young folk don't go because old folk take too long to get started? |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Megan L Date: 24 Aug 15 - 09:00 AM Never mind old folks when you die so will folk clubs so there won't be a problem with people not being word perfect. Should we now discus why there are so few young people in folk clubs |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,Howard Jones Date: 24 Aug 15 - 08:09 AM "In the same way, a person singing at the folk club doesn't have to be a performer ... Performances are for stage, screen and television." I couldn't disagree more. This attitude is at the root of the problem that this thread is discussing. I'm not talking about performing in a stage sense, and I agree that style of performance is often not appropriate for folk music. By "performance" I just mean the ability to deliver a song so that people will want to listen to it. If you are going to sing a song to an audience, then that's a performance. Folk music puts the song itself above the singer. It is not necessary to have a beautiful voice or to be a brilliant accompanist, and these can sometimes get in the way of the song. All that is necessary is to deliver the song effectively, so the audience can enjoy it. Before you set even out to the folk club, choose a few songs and practice them. Find which pitch suits your voice, think about what the song is about and what you want to get across to the audience, think about phrasing and breathing. For preference, memorise the words (not least because doing so will help you with the other aspects) but if you really cannot then learn to sing from a book effectively, rather than just reading the text. None of this is difficult, and it is quite separate from matters of vocal technique which is of far less importance in this context. It is simply about preparation. If someone cannot be bothered to learn how to put a song across, why should they expect people to be bothered to listen? |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,leeneia Date: 24 Aug 15 - 01:13 AM "Guys....throw them away and learn to perform..." Forget that. When my nieces and nephew were little, I used to get out my guitar and sing children's song for and with them. How they loved it! Was I performing? No, I was simply being family to them. They didn't care if I sang well or if I hit a wrong chord. I was showing that I cared about them. In the same way, a person singing at the folk club doesn't have to be a performer. Such a singer can just be a pal, sharing a piece of worthwhile music in an environment which ought to be comfortable, in order to bring out the best in people. Performances are for stage, screen and television. |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,Ripov Date: 23 Aug 15 - 07:02 PM Dunno about partridges, but I remember a talk about the importance of correct "pronounciation". I never worked out if it was deliberate or not, but it certainly got the message over"=! |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: SunrayFC Date: 22 Aug 15 - 07:10 PM Were we in the same place as I didn't see any "poets"....loads of beards. It is a weird place. |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Big Al Whittle Date: 22 Aug 15 - 02:24 PM Thursday was a weird night...some very odd characters...not you Bob, well no more than usual. who would have thought there were so many strange poets in Yeovil? What is it about about Yeovil that inspires them? Why have they all got beards/ Do they know each other? |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: SunrayFC Date: 22 Aug 15 - 12:06 PM When I sang on Thursday they responded in good fashion. Sang heartily. A wonderful experience. No ringbinder. Guys....throw them away and learn to perform... |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,Musket Date: 22 Aug 15 - 07:12 AM Well hide my bleeding pint from me then! 😋 |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Backwoodsman Date: 22 Aug 15 - 03:19 AM Nobody ever heard of multi-tasking? I can do at least two things at once - hell, I'm watching a movie as I type this - so looking through my little book of set-lists to avoid repeating songs I did at a club the previous time I was there, and noting down my next song whilst listening to the person currently performing, is no big deal. I'm personally far less offended by the guy leafing through his ring-binder while I'm performing than I am by the one who gets up to go to the bar, or take a piss, every time my turn comes around to perform! 😎 |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Joe Offer Date: 22 Aug 15 - 02:18 AM I sing a cappella. If it's quiet, I can almost always start a song on the right note and stay in key. Conversation sets me off a bit, and guitar tuning and strumming and particularly autoharps make the tune and key disappear from my head completely. So, I sometimes talk about a song until the people quiet down and my head is clear and the melody comes back to mind. Seems much nicer than saying, "Shut the fuck up!" and then sitting in silence until the melody comes back into my head.... -Joe- |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,Musket Date: 22 Aug 15 - 02:03 AM Interesting. Some of us, myself very much included, are pointing out that trying to entertain people whilst ignorant people have their heads stuck in books rather than listen to you isn't exactly nice. Some on here think that is attacking those who need crib sheets. No. It's attacking those of any ability who think the audience is more interested in their next offering than what is being sung at the time. That ignorance is inversely proportional to ability is mere coincidence... |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity Date: 21 Aug 15 - 11:24 PM So, did you get any feedback, one way or the other? Talk to me. GfS |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: SunrayFC Date: 21 Aug 15 - 10:04 PM On Tuesday, I said very little.....I just sang my three songs.... |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Don Firth Date: 21 Aug 15 - 08:25 PM Wow! Time really flies! Don Firth |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: The Sandman Date: 21 Aug 15 - 07:43 PM I remember the Rev Ken Loveless giving a long introduction to the twelve days of christmas and pontificating on the correct pronounciation of partridge. and then starting with On the 12th day of Christmas my true love sent to me: A Partridge in a Pear Tree |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: Don Firth Date: 21 Aug 15 - 04:53 PM Actually, GfS, I scintillate in most fields. I'm a bit weak in quantum physics, however.... Don Firth |
Subject: RE: why do singers take so long to start? From: GUEST,Guest from Sanity Date: 21 Aug 15 - 03:53 PM Gosh Don, when you expound on music, you shine.... GfS |
Share Thread: |
Subject: | Help |
From: | |
Preview Automatic Linebreaks Make a link ("blue clicky") |