I sang in public again

The Lake Superior Freethinkers had a Darwin Night at Beaner's Central in Duluth and had put out a call for entertainers.  I decided that, after a few years of being timid about singing public solos, I would give it a try with "Die Gedanken Sind Frei (My thoughts are free)", a centuries-old German protest song.  I have it pretty well memorized as well as "Arirang", a very popular Korean song.  So, I said yes and was put on the playbill.

Being in a house with a very good musician, it is kinda tough for a late-bloomer like me to practice.  But I did, doing two or three sessions most days.  Surprise, sometimes my wife said I did it well.

Then in the middle of last night, I forgot some of the words to "Die Gedanken".  I carefully thought through them and could recite them again.

I practiced a couple of times today and decided that was enough.  I didn't want to wear my voice out.

We arrived at the appointed time for performers and I introduced myself to the emcee.  She went over her introduction of me, we ordered some food, and waited for things to start.

I was second in the line-up.  I started getting fears about a "senior moment".  I was concerned about standing too close to the mike or too far away.  I think I forgot some words and had to go over them again in my head.

The first pair was done, both long-time musicians.

I was introduced and I climbed on to the stage.  I figured out just the right distance to speak into the mike.  I could not see the audience except as dark shapes.  I said most of what I wanted to say, and started singing: "Die Gedanken sind frei, Niemand kan sie erraten…"  My volume was good, my flow was good.  I think I faltered once.  Tah dah!  I did it and received hardy applause from the two dozen or so in the audience.

I introduced the Korean song "Arirang" with a few words and started belting it out.  Again I faltered a couple of times but recovered.  Again I received some hardy applause.  I made some more remarks about the song that I had forgotten to make before I started, got some more applause, and left the stage.

Then I got even more response.  My wife was pleased.  A choir director who I had sung with years ago said that I had come a long way.  A former professional musician was effusive in his praise.  A few other people gave me big grins and made appreciative remarks, some whom I didn't know, some whom I knew were musicians.

This has gotten me a bit more ambitious about performing, but I don't know if I'll follow through.  After all, I have all these books to read, blog entries to write, wood to cut, and software problems to figure out and correct.

Maybe if I can practice a couple of songs a day and get them memorized, maybe I'll stay up late for somebody's open mike night.

Learning to sing should be easier than learning the alphabet

As I was driving to my voice lesson, I considered that there were only 25 sounds in a two-octave range: C-Db-D-Eb-E-F-Gb-G-Ab-A-Bb-B-C-… and 12 to the next C. If you work at it, you can memorize a few notes, sing one of them, walk to a piano, press that note, and find you are right on.

Well, why not work on memorizing all 25? Since as a struggling kindergardener you memorized 26 letters in the alphabet, shouldn't you as an intelligent adult be able to memorize all 25 sounds in a two-octave range. Even fewer sounds if you can't manage two octaves, yet!

A trick is to memorize a song and use the starting note as your first "memorized note". I can do it with the first note of Arirang, maybe three out of four times. Only 24 to go!