I really appreciate the nice things people have to say to me when I play a gig. If you're so compelled to say something, I must be doing something right. Some of the compliments really stick out. A favorite is when asked to play whatever I like from the material I've already done, when someone says, "Please play anything that you've already played, it doesn't matter what, we loved it all". I'm critical of myself so that kind of compliment makes me feel better about the errors I think I've heard.
One of the more bizarre variety of compliments I've gotten two or three times comes from people who are almost mad at me and insist there must be something wrong with me if I'm this talented and only playing where I am. They're never mean and seemingly very sincere. I never know what to tell them. Truth is, I get to play at a lot of really cool places but I've also been paying my dues and that's more or less how I respond.
I have a friend who had a really decent one-man acoustic show but gave it up. He didn't like it when people didn't pay enough attention to him at bars and clubs so he became a realtor. When I'm playing I never feel ignored. Maybe being hard to ignore isn't such a good thing either but it's more than that. It's applause but more than that to: a wink or nod of the head, a smile or a wave. I connect with most everyone and each and every one of them let's me know it. I love that.
Some of the things people have said to describe my voice are classic. What I get the most is Tom Waites, followed by Johnny Cash and Janis Joplin. I'm not a parakeet so sometimes people put a lot of effort into describing my voice. If you ask me, I have a very dynamic vocal range that starts with a dry and rusty rattle and progresses to a dry and rusty croak.
I once played an open mic and had jammed for a truly adoring crowd for over an hour. I'd bought several drinks over the course of the night and after I played I ordered one more. I had tipped generously all night but after the last drink I only had two quarters left to tip the bartender. I put the two quarters down, turned and walked away and out of the corner of my eye I see the two quarters sailing past my head! I turned around and in a not so very nice way asked him if his "mother had any children that lived!". My grandfather would ask me that all the time. I think it's endearing but the bartender didn't think so and I was kicked out. Sour grapes them.
I played a pretty big open-mic a while back and this guy running it was determined not to let me play. When it was my turn to jam with the band, he wouldn't let me use the house amp even though everybody else used it and so he plugged my electric guitar directly into the p.a. People could still hear the guitar and I started jamming on stage and people started yelling to turn it up. My mic was on so I told the crowd I wasn't being allowed to use the amp. The guy running the open-mic grabs a mic and starts yelling at me, telling me to shut-up and get off the stage. The crowd didn't know what to do, some people were yelling, "let him play", while others were yelling, "get off the stage". It was chaos and I split out of there without playing one note.
A funnier moment happened when this guy, probably in his fifties, jumped up on stage and started river dancing like the lord of the dance. I wasn't bothered but two bouncers grabbed him and carried him off stage. As they were escorting him out, I heard him yelp, "I'm sorry, I misjudged the situation!". Things like that happen more often than one would like but that's part of the spontaneity of the crowd. Anything can happen. Anything.
Over the years, I've discovered that the audience is just as important as the performer. Part of the magic of live music is that the audience gets to relate to that resonance in themselves. There is a solidarity from the shared experience of being in concert. Live music is a conduit. It connects us.
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Dan Singer / Blog
The Talent Show(Part Two)
It was a brand of mayhem not sinister but truly and wholly unrestrained. The guitars were horribly out of tune but they couldn't be heard anyway over the yelling and cheering. It was probably just a few moments but it seemed like a lifetime up on that stage looking down on everyone being... free.
The next thing I know, the principal, Mr. Broome, charged into the auditorium and yanked the power cables to the amps out of the wall. A hush falls over the crowd and a big space formed between the principal and the stage. He turned to the crowd and screamed, "What are you doing?!"
Without wasting a single moment the entire crowd of students all yelled back in unison, "We're having a talent show!!!" Out of nowhere, a girl runs from the crowd to plug the amps back in and the principal tackles her as she dives for the cables. Garth Rockcastle, who had helped come up with plan began the chant, "Let them play!" and it quickly caught on with everybody, "Let them play!" "Let them play!" "Let them play!" And then David Herbold jumped on the drum-set and began to play. The students had taken over.
Order eventually did prevail and everyone was marched back to their classes. While they were being rounded up, the 10th grade English teacher ran up to the stage and yelled at me, "Dan Singer!" "This is the end for you!" I looked down at her and said, "This is only the beginning".
The next day I found myself in the principals office with the principal, superintendent , guidance councilor , that english teacher and my mother. You can imagine what they told her. There was talk of another talent show. They thought we were going to take over the school.
My mother didn't react well to the news. She told them she thought they were crazy. They gave myself and another bandmate one day of in-school suspension and gave everyone that cut class two or three days of detention. The detention rooms the next week had to be moved to bigger rooms to accommodate all the students who attended.
Was it a talent show? Solidarity protest? Riot? Something happens when people all stand up together against something they think is wrong. Whatever it is, it makes the impossible possible. It makes anything possible. Rebellion and freedom.
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The Audience
I really appreciate the nice things people have to say to me when I play a gig. If you're so compelled to say something, I must be doing something right. Some of the compliments really stick out. A favorite is when asked to play whatever I like from the material I've already done, when someone says, "Please play anything that you've already played, it doesn't matter what, we loved it all". I'm critical of myself so that kind of compliment makes me feel better about the errors I think I've heard.
One of the more bizarre variety of compliments I've gotten two or three times comes from people who are almost mad at me and insist there must be something wrong with me if I'm this talented and only playing where I am. They're never mean and seemingly very sincere. I never know what to tell them. Truth is, I get to play at a lot of really cool places but I've also been paying my dues and that's more or less how I respond.
I have a friend who had a really decent one-man acoustic show but gave it up. He didn't like it when people didn't pay enough attention to him at bars and clubs so he became a realtor. When I'm playing I never feel ignored. Maybe being hard to ignore isn't such a good thing either but it's more than that. It's applause but more than that to: a wink or nod of the head, a smile or a wave. I connect with most everyone and each and every one of them let's me know it. I love that.
Some of the things people have said to describe my voice are classic. What I get the most is Tom Waites, followed by Johnny Cash and Janis Joplin. I'm not a parakeet so sometimes people put a lot of effort into describing my voice. If you ask me, I have a very dynamic vocal range that starts with a dry and rusty rattle and progresses to a dry and rusty croak.
I once played an open mic and had jammed for a truly adoring crowd for over an hour. I'd bought several drinks over the course of the night and after I played I ordered one more. I had tipped generously all night but after the last drink I only had two quarters left to tip the bartender. I put the two quarters down, turned and walked away and out of the corner of my eye I see the two quarters sailing past my head! I turned around and in a not so very nice way asked him if his "mother had any children that lived!". My grandfather would ask me that all the time. I think it's endearing but the bartender didn't think so and I was kicked out. Sour grapes them.
I played a pretty big open-mic a while back and this guy running it was determined not to let me play. When it was my turn to jam with the band, he wouldn't let me use the house amp even though everybody else used it and so he plugged my electric guitar directly into the p.a. People could still hear the guitar and I started jamming on stage and people started yelling to turn it up. My mic was on so I told the crowd I wasn't being allowed to use the amp. The guy running the open-mic grabs a mic and starts yelling at me, telling me to shut-up and get off the stage. The crowd didn't know what to do, some people were yelling, "let him play", while others were yelling, "get off the stage". It was chaos and I split out of there without playing one note.
A funnier moment happened when this guy, probably in his fifties, jumped up on stage and started river dancing like the lord of the dance. I wasn't bothered but two bouncers grabbed him and carried him off stage. As they were escorting him out, I heard him yelp, "I'm sorry, I misjudged the situation!". Things like that happen more often than one would like but that's part of the spontaneity of the crowd. Anything can happen. Anything.
Over the years, I've discovered that the audience is just as important as the performer. Part of the magic of live music is that the audience gets to relate to that resonance in themselves. There is a solidarity from the shared experience of being in concert. Live music is a conduit. It connects us.
Reply
The Ultimate False Start(The Flying Pick Incident)
This story comes up a lot in the music lessons I teach. I bring it up when the student is worried about playing in public. The first time I ever played in front of a crowd other than parties or school was at a cafe that no longer exists behind the Chronicle in Glens Falls called The Backdoor Cafe. There were lots of books on shelves and board games around and there was a weekly open mic.
I'd told my friends that I was going to play and sure enough they all showed up. Not only that but the place was packed solid and packed full of people I didn't know. It was standing room only and the musician that played before me I thought was light years ahead of me.
I was almost ready to run for my life but something possessed me to take that stage in front of that dense mass of humans. I took a deep breath and went to strum my first chord and boom! The pick shoots out of my hand on the first strum! The entire audience gasped as it flew through the air in slow motion! I'll never forget it traveling away from me like we were in zero gravity and it just kind of floated away. It's not what I wanted to happen. That wasn't the plan.
The pick hit the ground and it just so happened a friend of mine who is also named Dan was sitting in the front row. Without missing a beat, he picked up the pick and handed it to me and I started my first song and never looked back.
I hope that gives people courage who want to try something new. Right from the first note, it couldn't of gotten any worse for me but it didn't stop me. Now I feel so blessed to be able to share this magic that I've learned. It was worth it.
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The Talent Show(Part One)
In tenth grade, my friends and I decided to form a band to play at the annual talent show. The show was always a lot of fun and everyone was really looking forward to it that year. The day before the show, however, the principal announced that it was cancelled and gave no real explanation other than "lack of interest". To say the least, people were disappointed with the decision.
Later on that day, the bunch of us came up with the idea to have the talent show anyway. A plot was hatched. The show would go on. We decided that if enough students skipped their 8th period class and came to the auditorium/cafeteria to watch us play, we couldn't get in that much trouble. :)
At the beginning of the day, we began telling people to spread the word but not to tell snitches and teachers. It caught on like wildfire. The majority of the student body was in on it. By the time 8th period rolled around I remember walking down the hall and seeing teachers standing in the hallway because their rooms were empty and they had no idea what was going on.
I made my way to the auditorium/cafeteria and couldn't believe how many people were there. Pure pandemonium. I raced up onto the stage and behind the curtain. The period before, during his study hall, one Mr. Jamie McClouth had set up the amps and guitars. I grabbed my guitar and before I knew it the curtain was open and there was a lot of people looking back at me. A lot. There were plenty of teachers there as well because they had followed students who were supposed to be in their classes.
Then out of nowhere, who should storm in but the...
To be continued....
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My First Gig
In second grade, I got my first gig as a music director. I was a rambunctious youth and never did what I was told and that included on the school bus. The bus driver was a very smart man and came up with the idea to have me conduct the rest of the bus through songs. I would prepare the lyrics, distribute them and then stand on the front seat facing towards the back of the bus and conduct everyone. The bus was made up of mostly younger kids and everybody had a great time singing. Thank you Don P. for getting the ball rolling.
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The Ballad of James Harris
I picked up an old folk song from a Bob Dylan box-set my friend Jamie McClouth had given me as a gift in high-school called The House Carpenter. It's about a ghost that comes in from the sea and lures a house carpenter's wife and family away and in the end the boat sinks and they drown. I traveled in my early twenties and played the song most places I went around the country. During my travels, I would also put up flyers looking for musicians for a band. Before I left home on my grand adventure, I started an e-mail account to use for the flyer and when it asked for my name for no particular reason I chose James Harris. I've never even known a James Harris. For years people would call me James Harris when they answered the flyer. Once I figured out if the person responding was any good, I would quickly tell them, "Hey look, my real name's Dan." Eventually I decided to come back to upstate New York and go to college and one of the topics I stumbled upon was ethnomusicology. One evening in the library, I found a book of stories about old folk songs compiled by an ethnomusicologist named Alan Lomax and I discovered The House Carpenter song in the book. As it turned out the song was hundreds of years old, had originated in England and originally the ghost was a demon and the demon's name was James Harris.
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My Conducting Debut
While at Purchase College, I got a gig as a music director for an inner city youth program funded by the Council for the Performing Arts. The musicians were made up of college kids and the actors and actresses were high-school kids from all over NYC. The first musical they chose was Dreamgirls which at the time hadn't been made into a movie yet and was relatively obscure. The night of the premier, everyone was on their game. We had a great first act. About ten minutes into the second act however something unexpected happened. A plastic tint caught fire that was suspended above the audience on a lighting fixture and little pieces of burning plastic started to fall on people in their seats. Although I was conducting, I noticed the smell and the smoke over my shoulder. Someone in my headset soon yelled, "Dan, Stop the music!" I cut everyone off and the actors on stage were dumbfounded until they saw the smoke and people running out with coats over their heads. Everyone was evacuated. They lowered the light fixture, somehow fixed it, everybody came back in and we promptly began from the top of the second act. It wasn't The Rite of Spring's debut in Paris but it did further reveal a few themes or threads in my life.
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The Recorder
In our music class in fourth grade, we were given plastic recorders to learn how to play. The first night with the new instrument, I discovered that I could play the entire book that came with the recorder and I even figured out some of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony on it. I was such a class clown and would distract the students so badly that the music teacher would have me sit at desk in the corner of the room every day. When it came time to show what we could do, a few students got up and played a song or two. The teacher was ready to move on when I raised my hand and asked if I could play. He said, "Absolutely not". He was convinced I was just going to get up and make noise. I kept asking to play until he finally gave in. I got up in front of the class and played the whole book and the Beethoven. By the time I was done, the teacher was in tears. There was a space in the center of the room full of students and he told me that was where I was to sit from then on.
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Stony Creek Debut
The alternator belt snapped and the car broke down on the way to my gig at Stony Creek last night. I caught a ride to the show and it went great. There was dancing and singing and everybody loved it and had a great time. They gave me a room at the inn and the next morning I caught a ride back to my car. We had to jump it three different times to get back to my place but we made it. I've already hooked up a ride for my gig tonight at Ashes in Warrensburg in case I can't find a mechanic today. Just another adventure. Surviving. Rocking and surviving.
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The Volkswagen
After graduating high school, instead of directly going to college, I traveled around the country playing music in a Volkswagen Westfalia pop-top camper: I lived for a year and a half in California, I stayed in Colorado for a good part of a year and I kicked all around the south until I got to south Florida and the camper blew up. I was at a Taco Bell drive-thru on my way to a midnight movie festival in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, when the catalytic converter caught the gas-line on fire. I was coming from a rehearsal and had a couple people with me when one of them saw smoke pouring out of the back vents. Everybody jumped out and ran to the back. I opened the flap and the engine was on fire and someone yelled, "Run!" We ran back a good distance and started to watch the flames engulf the camper. I had everything I owned at the time in the camper including my instruments so at the last moment I risked it and ran back to the camper and grabbed a guitar. Someone had asked the manager at Taco Bell for a fire extinguisher, but we were told their policy forbid them from giving it to us because we were outside. The firefighters couldn't get the fiberglass pop-up top up to put out the fire so they had to take axes to the camper and it was destroyed. A few things that couldn't be replaced were some how saved including the memories of all the adventures I had in that camper.
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