Most of the time, Beth and I thoroughly enjoy performing. Sometimes, though, we cannot wait until the final chord of the last song plays and the two of us can, like veteran trail horses, return quickly to our stable for a munch of hay and a good night’s sleep.
The biggest determinant of our enjoyment has always been the level of connection with the audience. We aren’t the type of performers who can block out the crowd and concentrate solely on our material. For better or worse, we have always sought to create community, a give and take that feels like a conversation among friends.
That’s why it shouldn’t surprise me that some shows, like some nights on the town, fall flat.
Of course, we are never to blame when that happens! Certainly, not! It must be the audience who is at fault.
When a crowd doesn’t respond, performers might try harder to win them over to one’s side. This can be very subtle with almost unnoticeable tweaks to one’s performance. Alternatively, it can be a large and annoying shift, a kind of begging for attention that is like Dracula desperately searching for a victim before sunrise.
We try to be the former and not the latter, but some days…
It is true that some audiences are truly intolerable. In our experience with children, this is often the case when they are overtired, under-supervised or they would prefer to be active instead of attentive.
Because we are sincere in our desire to create community, sing a few good songs and teach a couple of nice lessons, we get a bit peeved when the wee folk refuse to meet us halfway. Luckily, this is altogether rare in a school setting with teachers and principals onsite to insure that the children’s better angels are present. Occasionally, however, the regular teachers leave us with substitutes and we see the other side of these angelic creatures. Yikes!
Today, for example, I could tell pretty quickly that our after school audience was a bit off. It became crystal clear when Beth rang a singing bowl and the children reported that they felt mad, sad and crazy instead of the usual – calm. What the heck was going on here?
The reasons are many, I’m sure, but my best guess is that these little beaners, just like our own, lost their ability to be attentive after a long school day. They were done listening to adults unless they were super interested in what we have to offer them in exchange for their need to act goofy or zone out.
Fifteen minutes into our forty-five minute show, we got it. We pivoted to some better material for this situation – songs for them to move, laugh and be a bit silly. And the show was saved into the W column instead of the L one. Phew!
