Music Addict knows what I'm on about here.
James & David... I didn't mean to suggest out of place antics. When I said 'entertaining' I meant just that (as in what IS appropriate) and not simply 'acting crazy and stupid for attention.' When I was referring to the stand and sing types, I meant those that stare at the screen with eyes almost glazed over and a face showing not even a flicker of emotion save for boredom, arms either held tightly against the body or overly loose with shoulders slumped, one hanging down, the other bent up to hold the microphone to the mouth. To find the people with a voice able to blow away the audience enough so as to be forgiven for that is rare in my experience. Usually, people will just ignore their performances, carry on conversations and either applaud politely at song's end or not at all. Often, the conversations will include criticism of the singer - especially from their 3rd song on (even over continuing weeks/months/years).

Being entertaining is simply engaging the audience as you sing which can even be as little as simple eye-contact with a few audience members. You don't have to do a hip hop routine followed by the splits or anything fancy like that and sometimes, that just isn't appropriate. I remember as a spectator seeing Nathan Foley (prior to his joining Hi 5) in a talent quest years ago larking about with a huge smile on his face as he sang 'My Way.' He lived up to the title but certainly not the rest of the lyrics. It was totally out of place. Naturally, he won. lol. Even as just a spectator, I was not amused at that decision.

The singer doesn't even have to be flawless in their entertainment. I think audiences appreciate more the singers who make an effort to entertain them than those who don't. There was a guy at a hotel karaoke in Campbelltown (NSW) a couple of years ago whose best song was 'Bed of Roses' by Jon Bon Jovi. He basically would stand in place with eyes shut and sing but then, midway through the song, he'd stride awkwardly over to the bar, face the stage and continue with his style of singing there. It didn't matter that he looked nervous even to the casual observer and that his change of location seemed pointless as he was making an effort to do something better than just looking bored and unhappy - and the audience appreciated him all the more. It helped that he was blessed with a nice physique, had a few tats showing under the sleeves of his tight t-shirt, a pony tail and had a pretty good voice to boot but had he not walked away from the stage as he did (cordless mic btw) and just continued standing, singing with eyes shut, I don't think he'd have gotten anywhere near the amount of applause as he did. He was a pretty shy guy and very humble but was a definite favourite at the venue.

That's the kind of thing I'm talking about. Nothing extreme. At the other end of the spectrum, you have the ones who think they're better than they are and just come across as show offs. Some people never seem to grasp the concept of appropriate stage behaviour for some reason. Maybe some study of psychology and understanding how they project themselves would help there. I don't know.

I've seen you perform David and believe it or not, you're most engaging. Yes you stand there but you make eye contact and even shift weight from one foot to the other which can actually be a powerful attention getter dependent on stance. I'm guessing it's just a natural thing for you rather than anything planned. That's cool. You don't look bored like a LOT of karaokers do. Some others look scared but that's just stage fright, I think and understandable.

The point I'm trying to make with all this though is I think if karaokers engaged their audiences from the stage a little more (or a lot, as appropriate), then karaoke might have a better reputation all around.
Submitted by Johnny B on 17-09-2006

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