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THE MOMENT BEFORE YOU WALK ON STAGE:

The singer needs to fully develop the moment before they ever step onstage to perform. You shouldn’t feel "I wasn’t as good at first, but I warmed up." A good singer doesn’t wait to get it going on, they walk onto the stage with it because they already have it going on in the wings. The moment before you step on stage requires an important emotional commitment from the singer. It’s not enough to think about what the moment before should be; you have to see yourself in it, drown in it, and be overcome by it. You create the moment, and talk and believe yourself into it. This is the wonderful place we call ‘The Zone’. And, most importantly, keep breathing and have fun!!!

WHEN YOU ARE ON STAGE:

There are two things you can do if a song isn’t going well, or it’s slipping away. Blame or take control. Sink or swim. Eat or be eaten. I prefer to get a grip on it.

Don’t wait for the moment to justify one of these actions, for that will be too late. Do it now. You’re drowning; rescue yourself. All the motivation you need is the way you are feeling about the song. You are most likely blaming yourself and everything else because it’s going so badly. That turns you inward and makes you introspective and inactive and alone, so that you are retreating from the song. You need to find an action that will involve you with the song, and you need to find it immediately and get back to the moment.

Go for broke. Don’t do the song like exploratory surgery; this is not a life-and-death performance!!! Don’t lose faith, make a strong choice and go with it. To heck with whether it’s right or wrong - commit to it. Keep the faith in your choice and plow along with it. Keep it strong. If you have opposite thoughts of equal intensity (I want to do it, I can’t do this or don’t want to) you’re taking the right kind of risk by doing it. Turn off the little negative voices inside your head.

The most important element in singing is not the forming of sound, but the creation of a relationship. Most singers are dull and lifeless, concerned that they are making notes and pear-shape vowel sounds….yuk!! Audiences are concerned far less that we are with the quality of voices than with the emotional life that is being created. If you have both, you are truly an exception to the rule. Don’t get me wrong, every singer should do everything s/he can to have the best voice s/he can. So learn to get it and keep it healthy. Take voice lessons, record yourself when you sing and listen back to it. Yet some of the first great singers of popular music are not those with the greatest voices but those who know how to communicate feeling: Billie Holiday, Frank Sinatra, and Tony Bennett.

QUESTIONS TO ASK YOURSELF

• Where did your stage fright begin?

• When people tell you to relax, it will be over soon, does this help? What’s in this message? It will be over soon.

Put the past in the past by putting it in proper prospective. Plan an action program with a positive attitude. Take action.

• Proper Prospective ---- face it and get control of it. Say "SO WHAT", it’s not a man with a gun, it’s not a monster that will swallow us alive. It’s just a feeling that can damage us if we let it. "SO WHAT". We made it up, it belongs to us, and we own the emotion. There is no reason to let something we created own us. This bully is easier to stand up to than the bully down the street because we own it and it has no physical form. We need to say "SO WHAT".

• What are the facts when we are performing? Does the audience really want us to bomb? What do they want, what do we want?

Make a relationship that is highly personal and real to you when you sing. Create relationships with the audience; have them mean something to you.

The right thoughts translate the right feelings!!! If you have stage fright, just keep saying "SO WHAT!" I can do this, I want to do this, keep breathing, this is fun!!!

Have a Great Holiday Season, and the next column will be on breathing and supporting the voice.

If you have any questions of comments about this column, please send an email to me:

Tamara Anderson,
The Voice Studio,
voxdoc@sbcglobal.net