[Tim Murphy]

Random Thoughts on Live and Broadcast Performance

These notes are occasioned by my recent radio broadcast which we're discussing at Accomplished Members. http://www.prairiepublic.org/radio/h...now?post=36227

First, you learn a lot by hearing yourself. You get ready for radio and TV and live performance by privately recording a lot and honestly critiquing yourself. I've got quite a bit of experience in live performing and recording. (50 of my 60 years!) I hate the way I say, "um" all the time, as I'm thinking my way through complex, extemporaneous sentences, but hey! Wm. F. Buckley did that too! I didn't do it in high school, but then I wasn't thinking very hard about what I chose to say. Kids these days insert "like" or profanity into their sentences, every fifth word, but "um" is a less obnoxious crutch. Not a problem reciting the verse, but in conversation with my interlocutor I can't get rid of it.

I don't record with headphones on, because they make me claustrophobic, but I always perform sound tests, whether live or in studio. I tend to overwhelm microphones, the opposite of most speakers, and every mic is different. Depending on the mic, I might need a distance of anywhere from eight to 24 inches. So get to the gig early. If you're in a church or museum, half of your audience is probably half deaf, so PROJECT. In recording studios I used headphones for years, and I recommend them to beginners.

Critiquing myself these days, my voice has substantially deepened and deteriorated, thanks to the rivers of whiskey and barns of tobacco. I also chomped into my tongue during a brain seizure, blood all over hell! and my sibillants will never fully recover. Fortunately, there are a lot more poems, and I’d like to think they’re better.

One year I hosted the first books panel at West Chester, and despite ample amplification four of the five poets must have been inaudible at the back of Sykes Auditorium. The exception was Clive Watkins, and even Clive should have jacked up the volume. The one time I read at Sykes, I turned off the PA system and just used my full voice, and nobody had trouble hearing me. It’s a big hall, maybe three hundred seats, but it has great acoustics. By contrast, I read in churches that have dead acoustic spots, and you should know where those are and ushers should steer the elderly away from those pews. Have someone listen to you rehearse in half a dozen places, and you’ll know the acoustics of any hall.

Particularly when performing live, or working on television, know your text inside out, so as to maximize eye contact with your audience. The late Michael Donaghy and Dana Gioia and I are the only poets I’ve seen who performed entirely from memory (because of the brain seizures I can’t do it any more); but the better you know your text, the better off you are. This goes for reading Scripture in church, too. I go to Latin Mass occasionally, and the priests have the Ordinary of the Mass down cold, but when they get to the Epistle and the Gospel, it’s just embarrassing. Practice, Father! I can’t sight read Latin, and neither can you. In a room or a hall, I pick out three good looking people in three parts of the space and swing the reading from one to the other. If you’re in the audience, you think I’m reading directly to you.

Tailor your presentation to your audience. A high school, a college, the Boy Scouts and a Rotary Club are all very different audiences. For obvious reasons, I have to be very careful about this, for I’m not out to shock and offend my listeners. And I can be pretty shocking.

Stage fright: fifty years into this, it’s still a problem for me. One of the best readers in the world, a dear friend, takes Valium two hours before a performance. He comes across as so relaxed, so at home in front of a crowd, you’d never guess it. Michael Donaghy and I always consumed a modest amount of alcohol to calm us down. One of the best poets in the world came up to me before a reading at Sykes and said, in panic, "Surely you have a flask in your car!" Indeed I did. And finally the old chestnut, Rhina Espaillat’s advice from her father: “Imagine that everyone in the audience is clad only in underwear, and they all owe you money.”

I'm trying to get better, and any tips would be deeply appreciated.

[Charlotte Innes]

Tim,

Just popped over here from the Accomplished Members commentary on your radio broadcast, to say this is all great stuff, great advice, and I'm saving it for future reference, and readings!

I particularly appreciate the comments about mics. I have yet to master the art of using one--too near, too far, moving around--it's always problematic for me.

I also want to say that if you're ever thinking of coming to LA, we have a visiting writers series at the school where I teach (Pilgrim School), and you'd be very welcome. We've had some great visitors:

In poetry: B. H. Fairchild, Dick Davis, Kim Addonizio, Marilyn Nelson, and many, many more.

In fiction: Aimee Bender, Jane Smiley, Helen Benedict (fiction/nonfiction), Gregory Dowling (for his detective fiction, and art history knowledge!), and again, more.

Send me a message if you're interested--or if you have ideas on who else might be good live! Meanwhile, if I have any more thoughts/questions about live performance, I'll post here.

Thanks,
Charlotte

[Tim Murphy]

Charlotte, I'll let you know when I am California bound, it won't be long. My first experience of addressing a big audience came when I was twelve. Palm Sunday, the Passion according to St. Matthew, twelve minutes. My dad was chief lector for St. Joseph's, but he had laryngitis, and he could barely croak. So he whispered to the priests, "Let Timmy do it." The following year the priests asked me to do The Long Gospel of St. John at the Good Friday Solemnity, fourteen minutes.

I no longer need the peach crate required to lift a little boy to the microphone. I no longer need the microphone to fill a church with sound. But mics are tricky. It's all a matter of testing them, and having a good auditor, in the old sense, give you the necessary feedback. If you're blowing out the speakers with your plosives, stand back. That's why I am often eighteen inches out. Most women must be within six inches. Fact.

Most important thing, which I overlooked in my previous post, is learn to breathe. Not by the throat, but by your diaphragm. A little yoga will teach you this. If you draw in your breath from your belly, you can go forever, if you breathe through your throat you're gasping in ten seconds. The forever gives you time to cast a glance at the text, prememorize it as it is unscrolling, and nobody in the audience knows how hard you are working.

[Charlotte Innes]

Thank you, Tim, for the stories, the advice, and the promise! Yes, I do know yoga. In fact, I'm about to head for my living rug to do some, since it's pouring with rain here, and so I'm not ready to go walk out in it yet. (Besides, as everyone knows, we don't walk in the rain in California!) But, indeed, yoga has been invaluable to me in all sorts of ways--for breathing and for peace.

At readings, I've learned that the key for me is to read s-l-o-w-ly, as I tend to gabble and stutter otherwise. I've told myself (and others) to savor every word. Not only does that slow me down, but it also helps me read with emotion--and not just automatically read the words off the page. And yes, that gives me time not to lose my place. I also keep a thumb or finger near the lines I'm reading. I have an absolutely terrible memory--although poems I've read aloud a lot, start to stick, and that helps.

By the way, if you are coming to California, give me lots of warning. We're planning for spring readings right now....

Thanks again!
Charlotte

[Tim Murphy]

Stage Fright
i.m. Homero Espaillat

“I gotta take a pill before I read.”
“What the hell are you taking?” “Valium,
so terrified when I perform, I need
to calm myself for fear the Kingdom come.”

“Surely you have a flask. Tell me you have!”
begs a great poet in the parking lot,
paralyzed, bleeding. Palliative salve
pops from my glove box, and he swigs a tot.

“They’re in their underwear and owe you money,
but know you are no hundred dollar bill,”
said Rhina’s father. Let your smile be sunny,
never fall down, however great the thrill

for all who come to hear a poet rage.
There is a sink not far behind the stage.

[Catherine Chandler]

Great advice, Tim. Also, true about reciting slowly and practicing before you do a professional recording. I recited my First Books Panel poems from memory at West Chester (but had been practicing for weeks) and I was happy to be able to make eye contact with so many in the audience. As for mics, I prefer not to use them if possible (didn't use one at the Powwow reading in September), but if I do, you're right about getting there early and testing them out. Thanks for those lively stories, too, Tim. I can just imagine you standing in for your Dad. He must have been proud!

Jesse Anger has offered to record me reading some of my work at his studio next March . My first "professional" recording! I'm really looking forward to it.

[Tim Murphy]

Folks, listen to Cathy Chandler read, because this is how it is done rightly:
http://www.ablemuse.com/erato/showthread.php?t=11384

[Carol Taylor]

I had the experience yesterday of being interviewed with several other poets on a local Spanish radio station, promoting "El Día de la Cultura Salvadoreña en Houston." The interview was also recorded for the internet, but the audio isn't up yet on the website so I don't know how I did. Ok on the poems, I think, but the questions weren't provided to us in advance so my answers weren't rehearsed. The cultural event will feature art, poetry, photography, music, cinematography, literature, food, and dance, with several countries represented. I put together a bilingual chapbook for the event.

Carol

[Tim Murphy]

Good for you Carol. Rhina too does a lot of bilingual events. I launched the three new books at Bismarck State last night, on a bluff above the Missouri. I couldn't believe the book signing. Some people were buying six hardcovers apiece! Tuesday I broadcast again on Prairie Public, then Thursday I launch the books in Fargo. Fun.

[Maryann Corbett]

Thanks for all these notes and pointers, Tim, Carol, Catherine, and Charlotte.

A side issue, perhaps, but once in a while one has to decide between using a terrible sound system and trying to muster enough projection without it. Last night's benefit event was for a modest crowd, but in a coffee shop with a lot of ambient noise. The available mic and speakers produced, I'm sorry to say, a godawful metallic sound. Snap decision: to use or not to use? The poem I was reading needed an understated delivery, so I used them. Such is life. And poetry, and sound equipment, and food service.