Saturday 20 March 2010
Polite Singers
Ever since the review of my Sept 09 gig at the Spice of Life by Sebastian Scotney (LondonJazz blog) I have been thinking about singers and their capabilities of getting an audience to shut up!
"But she had a battle on, to win over the attention of a loud birthday group who had taken a table right in front of the stand" (click http://londonjazz.blogspot.com/2009/09/review-sarah-ellen-hughes.html to read the whole thing)
Sebastian thought I was too nice, and should have told them to be quiet and listen. In fact, they did quiet down during one of the numbers... with a quiet piano/vocal intro, that presumably made them feel fairly self-conscious.
I went to the Spice again a few weeks later... and delightfully one of the 'sitters-in' at the end was Gwyneth Herbert. She knew how to capture the audience. The song was accompanied only by Ian Shaw on the piano, and this did help to bring people's conversation down to a minimum. However, she also had a magical way of getting eye-contact with each and every person in the place - and would pause after certain words, not continuing until the person she was looking at returned the favour. Spellbinding.
I have heard a report of Lianne Carroll, performing once at Ronnie's, turning to a noisy table at the front and asking them to quieten down 3 times before belting out a sharper-sounding request which sent them fleeing from the place! Cleo Laine also is someone who wouldn't stand for noise during her singing.
So should I be someone who glares and belts? It's not really in me, but there must be a balance to be found between timid/nice (not particularly desirable qualities but ones that my personality dictates) and authoritative/not standing for disrespect.
I did a gig the other week at Boisdale Cigar and Supper Club - in Belgravia - with the Boisdale Rhythm and Blues Orchestra. During a ballad - after the piano solo - I wanted to re-enter at the middle 8 rather than come in again at the beginning. So I leaned over and said 'can we go back to the middle 8 please.' The band were aghast at my politeness!
So there we are... back to a nice singer. Perhaps this harks back to some advice I was given as a student about to make the daunting journey down from Lancaster (big fish) to London (big pond)... "It doesn't matter how good you are... people will only book you if you're a jolly nice chap!"
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Good piece and an important topic! I think about this a lot at gigs and sometimes think we musicians should accept our role as adding to someone's evening, not dominating it. I think it comes down to the audience's expectations and personally tend to work out my approach on the following equation: Has the audience A) come here for the music or is it incidental B) paid to see music C) paid to see 'you' specifically perform. If the answer is A or B then I try to accept my role as adding to the atmosphere and get attention through the music (and often some lyric-changes to see who's listening - worked well this Sat). If it's C I think you do whatever you want, it's your show :-). Unfortunately too many gigs are A and B... Robin Phillips, jazz pianist / vocalist, www.robinphillips.co.uk, @therobinp
ReplyDeleteYes, I totally agree with Robin that if it's a gig that satisfies A) you must accept the role as 'atmospheric performer,' although I don't necessarily think this would be true of point B)... If someone has paid to listen to music and decides they want to talk through the performance, this is distracting from others who have paid to listen to music and wish to actively listen.
ReplyDeleteIf a gig falls under category B or C, I think it's important to assert your authority as the performer. It's difficult though - I'm sometimes too caught up in the music that I don't even notice a noisy table!
B seems to be the difficult one, because if a group of people have said, let's catch up at this great place that does live music, are we spoiling their time by telling them they can't talk and threatening ourselves by pushing people away from these venues for socialising? Perhaps it all comes down to the programming, making sure there is time to talk and time to listen!
ReplyDelete...which is a great new tactic I might use when venues try to squeeze those long and many sets out of you....
ReplyDeleteAs a punter, someone who pays to see and hear someone, agree with both of your comments. B is the difficult one but if I have paid for the music such as at the Spice I don't want a group of loud people spoiling it for me. If people want to talk there are tables at the back. How you deal with those sort of people is difficult because asking them nicely to shut up is just as likely to have the opposite effect of what you want.
ReplyDeleteMaking eye contact really works. I sometimes teach and I find the best way of getting attention is to look at someone until they look back. Sometimes there's a long silence and that probably wouldn't go down so well in your line of work!
I think at the end of the day you have to ask politely (because that's the way you are). Appeal to their nicer side and point out that other people want to hear you sing. The rest of the audience will be on your side and there are likely to be a few more forceful people who can do your dirty work if your polite approach doesn't work.