datamusicata

At the Northeast Folk Alliance Conference, all the main stage showcase acts had only 15 minutes to perform. (www.nerfa.org) For anyone to suddenly show up and do their best fifteen minutes is going to be tricky. There is also the fact that it’s possible that the act only HAS fifteen minutes of good material and the rest of their show is dreadful...but that’s another can of worms. Let’s talk about how you do fifteen minutes.

First of all, you need to look at the length of your songs. If you have a recording, then you have a good idea of how long a song is. You may leave out the solo by the brilliant musician you brought in for that part and that would shorten the song. All my songs tend to be 3 to 5 minutes on record. Live they are often shorter, because just playing my part which might be a four chord progession six times is not going to translate into entertainment. It’s going to lie there and bore the snot out of the audience.  Pick enough songs to fill about 11 or 12 minutes.   Leave some time for you to talk and for them to respond.  if you like talking then only do 10 minutes of music.  Leave yourself room to do what you do.

So secondly, look at your arrangements and make certain that everything you are doing is moving the show along and is entertaining the audience, because that’s really why you are up there. If it’s just to hear yourself sing, you don’t need an audience for that. If you are going to have the audacity to get up on the stage, be entertaining, or stay home.

Now you have your arrangements and you have your song lengths and can ascertain that you will do the show in the allotted time. It is now up to you to put the songs in an order that also entertains, grabs the audiences attention, maintains it, displays an arc of sorts. By that I mean, that you create the idea of momentum in your show. Things are going somewhere and the audience can feel it. Next, you want to maintain that momentum and then finally, you want to give them a payoff; a climax; it’s best if you can give them something that makes them think that, in the words of Austin Powers, they are “spent”.

Traditionally, acts come on with an uptempo, energetic number that announces they are here and full of life. This song is traditionally not a long song either; it serves as a brief announcement that the audience should now focus on the stage.

An uptempo song always works initially, unless the act before you is nothing but energy. If that is the case then you need to rethink your opening. If you can’t out energy the previous act, then what can you do?

Go for mood, go for audacity, go for something unexpected, something different. You can even start with just talking to them. I remember doing a show with Michael Murphy (www.michaelmurphy.com) at Ball State University in Indiana. I was the opening act, but there was some kind of school cheering noisy thing that preceeded the show. I knew that I couldn’t compete with that volume and that energy, so when I got on stage (it was a 2500 seat theatre), I just smiled at them and looked around, taking in the whole room slowly. The room which was noisy and unfocused became intrigued with the idea that I wasn’t doing anything and they slowly quieted down and all looked at me.

When I had their full attention (it took about a minute of me smiling and looking around), I said hello and made some crack regarding some local political figure I had read about in the school paper. They laughed and I was off and running. No matter what you plan, you have to be ready to change it if it looks like your plan isn’t going to work in this situation. And that happens frequently.

I have been doing a comedic bit for the past year. I have honed it and honed it (all on stage) and it has gotten consistently funnier and more impactful. Knowing that I could depend upon it, I used it as the first thing that I said to the audience after the first number at a show I did in New York City last month. There was some scattered laughter, but not what I usually got as a response to this story. It just wasn’t that funny that night to that audience. You have to be prepared for that, but if you only have fifteen minutes, you can’t have that kind of reaction.

You have to put your best stuff together and try it live at open mics and record it in your home even on a hand held recorder. Listen to it. Does it move along? Does it show off what you do best? Put it in an order that you think works for you; entertains you; keeps you focused on the show.

If you are struggling for a note or a guitar lick, then don’t use it. Change the key, or leave that part out. Never let the audience see you trying and not getting there. It just makes them uncomfortable. Make it all look like it was effortless. And that takes tons of practice.

Practice your set a dozen times, two dozen times. Until you can do it in your sleep. Then when you arrive on stage you are prepared and relaxed and you can actually have fun with what you’ve prepared. Change it on the fly if it’s not having the impact you want. Go with anything spontaneous that happens in the room or with the audience. It doesn’t matter because you can always fall back on the show you rehearsed.

And lastly, take your watch and, if you are a guitar player, turn it around so that the face is on the underside of your wrist. That way as you look down at the neck of your guitar, you can see the clock and you know exactly where you are (provided you noted what time it was when you started). For piano players the face of the watch should be on the top of the wrist, so that you can see it as you play. If you do that, you will never go over time, never be caught unawares by the vagaries of showcasing.