acting & singing, your opinion

[VideoHere]

i really believe that singing and acting are strongly related for expressive vocals.

i might even go so far as to say that acting is a mandatory requisite for great singing.

if you can "act" (or convincingly pretend) you have the makings of a "star."

can you act sexy?

can you act hurt?

can you act funny?...etc.

what's your opinion? do you think it's a mandatory requisite that should be taught alongside technique?

[Snorth]

do you think it's a mandatory requisite that should be taught alongside technique?

Yes! When you're on the stage you should have trained the technique enough to not think about and focus on the words of the song.

I recommend focusing on technique first when you're working on a song, but then seperately work on the acting part. It can produce quite interesting results.

[ronws]

i really believe that singing and acting are strongly related for expressive vocals.

i might even go so far as to say that acting is a mandatory requisite for great singing.

if you can "act" (or convincingly pretend) you have the makings of a "star."

can you act sexy?

can you act hurt?

can you act funny?...etc.

what's your opinion? do you think it's a mandatory requisite that should be taught alongside technique?

Yes, within reason. I think singers should learn to relax. You can't always teach something to someone just because they might need it.

Case in point, the video for "Hot for Teacher" with Van Halen. Alex Van Halen (drums) cannot dance or do a choreographed move to save his life. They went through several takes with no luck so they just kept the least disastrous take and you can see him totally out of step in the video.

Another case of limited success is Lita Ford. She did not know how to dance. In the video for "Kiss Me Deadly," she was taught a number of poses and was shot from different angles and through the magic of film editing, it looks like she was dancing. Phenomenal guitar player, great husky, bluesy voice, couldn't dance a step. As for acting and emoting, I think it depends on the material but, yes, to some extent, we should be able to telegraph visually for live performances what we wish to convey. In recording, no one knows what you are doing in the sound booth and it all has to come through in your voice.

Robert Cray puts it all in his voice. Buddy Guy has a few stage moves and a whole range of facial expressions. They both get the message across. Cray can actually sing high notes whereas Buddy Guy howls the notes. And they are both still popular.

Others went at it from the other way. The Monkees, except for Davy Jones, had no musical training in instruments when the show premiered. Through the process, they learned to play and sing and so they always had chops for stage presence and the musical ability followed.

[Mr Bounce]

The better 'natural' singers I've met are extroverted, very outgoing and are good at joking around, playing roles, that kind of thing. They're also tend to be good liars :P

[Martin H]

Yes I definately believe that acting is important. It's all about evoking emotions in the audience. And you do that by creating an illusion - how you technically speak/sing and use your body is what creates the illusion.

Think of a magician. If he uses his skills/techniques wrong people will not be impressed. But if he uses them right people would be impressed and believe in the illusion. :)

[anonimuzz]

To me, real singing only exists when you can actually express a feeling. And acting helps tremendously with that, because not every experience/emotion you try to convey will reflect something that actually happened to you. So yes, both arts are related and should remain that way. But a great singer isn't necessarily a great actor; you don't really need Meryl Streep's skills to carry a tune, lol.

[WebAndNet.com]

Acting and singing are related, but arise from different senses and bodily controls. They are related in that these are both emotional expressions. Good singing starts with someone with good emotional hearing, good emotional mental interpretation of melody, and then the vocalizing-self-hearing skills to express all this. Good acting starts with someone usually with good emotional seeing, good emotional interpretation of the script's feelings, and then the physical-motion-emotion skills to express this.

[VideoHere]

Acting and singing are related, but arise from different senses and bodily controls. They are related in that these are both emotional expressions. Good singing starts with someone with good emotional hearing, good emotional mental interpretation of melody, and then the vocalizing-self-hearing skills to express all this. Good acting starts with someone usually with good emotional seeing, good emotional interpretation of the script's feelings, and then the physical-motion-emotion skills to express this.

that's the key to great blues singing....it's so much about the ability to emote the pain associated with that genre. that why i when i listen to the greats of years gone by, versus the newer blues singers i can hear the difference.

when i listen to guys like buddy guy and stevie ray vaughn, paul rodgers versus (and she's great too) joss stone as an example, i can hear the difference...when i saw buddy guy sing "damn right i've got the blues" that guy had the friggin blues!!!! lol

so if i had to make a choice between singing a song with great technique versus letting go of technique and the safety associated with it, i would. we have a guy (a tenor) in karaoke, who is a well trained vocalist, does theatre and off broadway, he does songs like suddenly seymore and john denver to absolute perfection, but when he recently tried "show must go on" (queen) i couldn't believe how "perfectly sterile" he sang that song.

[ronws]

when i listen to guys like buddy guy and stevie ray vaughn, paul rodgers versus (and she's great too) joss stone as an example, i can hear the difference...when i saw buddy guy sing "damn right i've got the blues" that guy had the friggin blues!!!! lol

so if i had to make a choice between singing a song with great technique versus letting go of technique and the safety associated with it, i would. we have a guy (a tenor) in karaoke, who is a well trained vocalist, does theatre and off broadway, he does songs like suddenly seymore and john denver to absolute perfection, but when he recently tried "show must go on" (queen) i couldn't believe how "perfectly sterile" he sang that song.

Then you will just have to be jealous of me. About 3 or more weeks ago, we went to see a double bill, Robert Cray and Buddy Guy at the Winstar Casino in Thackerville, Oklahoma. (I had been working there on a previous temp assignment.) They were phenomenal. Cray uses about 3 or 4 guitars. He plays one song. Then trades off with the guitar tech for another guitar for the next song. The tech is keeping them in tune. Cray likes old style guitars and he bends the heck out of the strings and the guitar needs re-tuning.

Buddy Guy sticks with one or two guitars but man, is he funny. He's got an hilarious banter that goes through the songs, between songs, and on. Especially with his facial expressions. Heck, I'm jealous of myself.

Cray is a more technically proficient singer but they both have a solid feel for the blues, which is first and foremost. And I enjoyed the singing of both.

[VideoHere]

Then you will just have to be jealous of me. About 3 or more weeks ago, we went to see a double bill, Robert Cray and Buddy Guy at the Winstar Casino in Thackerville, Oklahoma. (I had been working there on a previous temp assignment.) They were phenomenal. Cray uses about 3 or 4 guitars. He plays one song. Then trades off with the guitar tech for another guitar for the next song. The tech is keeping them in tune. Cray likes old style guitars and he bends the heck out of the strings and the guitar needs re-tuning.

Buddy Guy sticks with one or two guitars but man, is he funny. He's got an hilarious banter that goes through the songs, between songs, and on. Especially with his facial expressions. Heck, I'm jealous of myself.

Cray is a more technically proficient singer but they both have a solid feel for the blues, which is first and foremost. And I enjoyed the singing of both.

hey ron, how do you highlight just a piece of someone's quote? i hit "quote" and i get the whole thing. how do you highlight just a sentence within the quote?

[ronws]

Let's say you hit quote and you get quote, blah blah blah ... blah blah \quote. I can write this because I am not using the square brackets that signify it as an editing command. Any way, blink the cursor where you want to start deleting what is not necessary. When all you have left is what you want to quote, then you want to get outside of all that quote and \quote business, out in the open space, and then type your response.