How dost thou communicate?

Last Saturday I communicated my love for music in an hour and a half long solo performance.  When performing, my task doesn’t require a responsive audience as people have the option of wandering around the building or sitting and listening to me whilst the PA amplifies my performance around the entire 5 floors of the building. However, responsiveness from the audience aids my internal drive to put on a polished performance and never fails to be a confidence booster. 

The body language of a receptive audience is clear as day.  “(Music) provides a means by which people can share emotions, intentions, and meanings even though their spoken languages may be mutually incomprehensible” (Hargreaves, Macdonald & Miell, 2005). Last Saturday I watched two Argentinian foreigners closing their eyes for some songs (I took this as positive reinforcement!), clapping and verbally thanking me for the music. The relationship between me as performer and the audience members is built by a mutual respect – me respecting their participation as an audience member, and them respecting my music and performance. However, miscommunication can occur just as readily – an unresponsive or impassive audience blurs the lines of communication and makes my task extremely challenging.

In sharing my interest with the audience, I am creatively expressing myself and showing a part of my individuality that is special to me. Therefore, preventing a ‘bad’ performance is imperative and the leg work leading up to the performance is very important. The expectations of the audience i.e. tuneful, easy listening singing, good guitar playing, clear sound and familiar songs, means I have to work my body to ensure I can perform for an hour and a half without breaks. The muscle memory of my fingers on the fret board and toughening of my finger-tips when playing the steel strings is all part of the hardening up process to ensure that by the time I perform it looks as though I do it with ease.  This may or may not be a cultural expectation – the necessity of occupationally inflicted damage for the greater good. As the old adage says, ‘no pain, no gain’.

Sometimes I struggle with singing in front of people I know (possibly because I respect their opinion more); however positive reinforcement by these people and other audience members is one reason that I continue to perform. Signs with the score '10' on them were held up by family and friends on Saturday’s performance - reinforcing the positive communication that was occurring between us!

Hargreaves, D.J., Macdonald, R. & Miell, D. (2005). Musical communication. Oxford University Press: UK.