If You Don't Know what the Song is About You Can't Sing it.

Whenever I'm tasked with learning a new song for a performance there's one scene from the movie, Mr. Holland's Opus (1995), that never fails to get me in the right frame of mind.

Mr. Holland, a high school music teacher played masterfully by Richard Dreyfus, reluctantly accepts the role of director for that year's school play. The daily auditions of one average talent after another leave him weary and frustrated. Then, as fate would have it,  a young lady named Rowena Morgan (Jean Louisa Kelly) takes center stage and stops Mr. Holland dead in his tracks.

When Holland looks up to see where this angelic voice is coming from he sees Rowena and knows immediately he's found the star of his production. While Rowena possesses amazing natural ability she's still raw and lacks training. At one point, while singing the classic Gershwin tune "Someone to Watch Over Me",  Mr. Holland notices that while her tone is pure as silk her demeanor is much too bright  for this song. He stops and asks her if she knows what the song is about. When she says no, he begins to tell her that this is a song about a young girl who is alone in a big city for the first in her life. It's a wistful song about someone who is anxious and afraid and wants only one thing at that moment,  someone to watch over her. Holland then very fatherly proceeds to tell Rowena, "If you don't know what the song is about you can't sing it."

How very true.

This is a thought I have pounded into my head weekly by my voice instructor and one I try to keep in the forefront of the minds of my students as well. My teacher has what he calls his 8 rules of being a great vocalist that he holds me to on every song I sing. They are posted on the wall of his studio and read as follows.

To be a great vocalist you must:  THINK

1) Breathing

2) Good Posture

3) Pitch/Intonation

4) Pronunciation

5) Open Throat

6) Jaw Relaxed

7) Know The Exact Melody and Words

8) Sell the Song - Remember – Every Song is an Act... and Every Song should be Acted. 

Obviously the scene above from Mr. Holland's Opus is most closely associated with rule number 8. Before I utter the first note I must know the lyrics, the melody and the story inherently and intuitively. Not until I can convince my teacher that I understand what the song is about and can sell it to an audience that it's my very own, does he say it's ready to be performed publicly. The audience must believe that this is truly happening to me at an emotional level and I'm letting them in on my secret by how I sound, what I say and how I act. There is no better example of this than when Frank Sinatra sings "One for My Baby". Well at least that was the case until this morning when, in our weekly Saturday morning lesson, my  nieces sang Taylor Swift's, "Love Story" after a month of me driving rule # 8 into their pretty little heads.

Please stay tuned for more Musings from Studio 618, and if you like them please tell a friend. 

Have an amazing weekend and Happy Mother's Day!!!!