Post-Concert Netiquette
Hello fellow performers,
Concert is taking place in less than 24 hours' time. At this juncture, I feel that, given that some of us are not experienced performers, it is important to highlight a few things here:
1. Expect imperfections.
Good old Murphy always makes his appearance when least desired. This is not making any excuses for our performance later [every one of us did practise hard, right?], but it is a matter of life. There are many concerts which I have been a part of. There are some which I felt the bands I took part in performed better than average, but there are also others where the bands fell apart midway through a piece.
Never mind about us, most of us who are non-professionals. Even professional musicians like Beethoven have had their forgettable concerts.
Whatever individual mistakes we may make later on stage at 7:30pm, I'm sure most of us are honest enough to raise our hands and acknowledge that.
Like life, there are no second opportunities to re-play a note that you have missed. Don't beat yourself over that little note.
2. Enjoy yourselves.
Making music is supposed to be a fun activity, but playing notes is not. It's very easy to make notes, but it's very hard to make music. And to make music, you must put yourself in the right mood to do so. Some of the pieces which we are playing demand us to be aggressive, others require us to be gentler, and yet others demand us to put ourselves in the shoes of other cultures.
And it is very very hard to put yourselves in the right mood unless your mood is relaxed. I guess I don't need to remind you to take your making music seriously, right? :-)
3. Expect criticism.
This concert is a performance which anyone from the general public can view and listen, and people will be comparing us with other bands which they have heard. In this day and age where IT is such a common means of interaction between people, some members of the audience will no doubt be putting their thoughts of our concert on their blogs.
When people are behind their keyboards, giving their honest opinions about our concert, some of them will be negative, unfair, malicious and/or scathing. Others will criticize certain aspects of the performance - or even certain players or sections.
I appeal to all of you to remember that you are representing Moulmein Wind Symphony on stage in this concert. As a result, no matter whether you are a guest player, member or even exco member, any defensive retorts from you in cyberspace will be fully judged by everyone who gets to read it - and remember - the customer is always right.
As such, it is important to conduct yourselves in a professional manner no matter how unwarranted you feel the post-concert criticism we may get are. Please do not flame any of our critics, especially in cyberspace! Chances are that you will not be able to convert them and it could eventually lead to a flame war between the honest critic and yourself - and I'm sure all of you know how flame wars end.
Instead, prove to them that we can put up a better show next time round if you think that they are being harsh, nasty or unfair, and their blog entries on our performances will collapse onto themselves.
[To all members of the public, please note that the exco of this band explicitly, unambiguously and categorically does not approve of members disrespecting their audience in cyberspace, no matter what you say about us. You paid good money out of your own pocket to watch us, and because of that, you are fully entitled to rip the tickets in our faces, rant about how badly we sound to your friends or over the blogosphere if you don't like what you hear, and, if you are even nasty enough, hail rotten eggs right into my direction (and not anybody else's) because I am responsible for a large part of the concert - i am the concert master.]
Although we can never please everybody, we have tried our best to put up a good show, and that should be the only thing on our minds after the concert today.
[To all members of the public (2), if we did well, please congratulate us; and if we didn't, please be honest about that too, ok? We welcome all honest feedback.]
After which, please remember that there is a band chalet to go to from the 27th to the 29th of June 2007 inclusive, so please do try to come along, enjoy the food and drinks, and share your thoughts on playing in Moulmein, yes?
Ok, enough from me at 5am. Here's to a good concert later!
SS
Concert is taking place in less than 24 hours' time. At this juncture, I feel that, given that some of us are not experienced performers, it is important to highlight a few things here:
1. Expect imperfections.
Good old Murphy always makes his appearance when least desired. This is not making any excuses for our performance later [every one of us did practise hard, right?], but it is a matter of life. There are many concerts which I have been a part of. There are some which I felt the bands I took part in performed better than average, but there are also others where the bands fell apart midway through a piece.
Never mind about us, most of us who are non-professionals. Even professional musicians like Beethoven have had their forgettable concerts.
Whatever individual mistakes we may make later on stage at 7:30pm, I'm sure most of us are honest enough to raise our hands and acknowledge that.
Like life, there are no second opportunities to re-play a note that you have missed. Don't beat yourself over that little note.
2. Enjoy yourselves.
Making music is supposed to be a fun activity, but playing notes is not. It's very easy to make notes, but it's very hard to make music. And to make music, you must put yourself in the right mood to do so. Some of the pieces which we are playing demand us to be aggressive, others require us to be gentler, and yet others demand us to put ourselves in the shoes of other cultures.
And it is very very hard to put yourselves in the right mood unless your mood is relaxed. I guess I don't need to remind you to take your making music seriously, right? :-)
3. Expect criticism.
This concert is a performance which anyone from the general public can view and listen, and people will be comparing us with other bands which they have heard. In this day and age where IT is such a common means of interaction between people, some members of the audience will no doubt be putting their thoughts of our concert on their blogs.
When people are behind their keyboards, giving their honest opinions about our concert, some of them will be negative, unfair, malicious and/or scathing. Others will criticize certain aspects of the performance - or even certain players or sections.
I appeal to all of you to remember that you are representing Moulmein Wind Symphony on stage in this concert. As a result, no matter whether you are a guest player, member or even exco member, any defensive retorts from you in cyberspace will be fully judged by everyone who gets to read it - and remember - the customer is always right.
As such, it is important to conduct yourselves in a professional manner no matter how unwarranted you feel the post-concert criticism we may get are. Please do not flame any of our critics, especially in cyberspace! Chances are that you will not be able to convert them and it could eventually lead to a flame war between the honest critic and yourself - and I'm sure all of you know how flame wars end.
Instead, prove to them that we can put up a better show next time round if you think that they are being harsh, nasty or unfair, and their blog entries on our performances will collapse onto themselves.
[To all members of the public, please note that the exco of this band explicitly, unambiguously and categorically does not approve of members disrespecting their audience in cyberspace, no matter what you say about us. You paid good money out of your own pocket to watch us, and because of that, you are fully entitled to rip the tickets in our faces, rant about how badly we sound to your friends or over the blogosphere if you don't like what you hear, and, if you are even nasty enough, hail rotten eggs right into my direction (and not anybody else's) because I am responsible for a large part of the concert - i am the concert master.]
Although we can never please everybody, we have tried our best to put up a good show, and that should be the only thing on our minds after the concert today.
[To all members of the public (2), if we did well, please congratulate us; and if we didn't, please be honest about that too, ok? We welcome all honest feedback.]
After which, please remember that there is a band chalet to go to from the 27th to the 29th of June 2007 inclusive, so please do try to come along, enjoy the food and drinks, and share your thoughts on playing in Moulmein, yes?
Ok, enough from me at 5am. Here's to a good concert later!
SS
posted by Mirificus at 3:31 AM
2 Comments:
Hi SS,
By saying all these, it shows that you already have a great impression that even before the concert begins,the concert will be badly played.
Come on...we all all old enough to know that be it a good or bad band, there's bound to have criticism etc. This is not as if it's the 1st concert that we are performing in our whole entire band life.
"You paid good money out of your own pocket to watch us, and because of that, you are fully entitled to rip the tickets in our faces, rant about how badly we sound to your friends or over the blogosphere if you don't like what you hear, and, if you are even nasty enough, hail rotten eggs right into my direction "
It is unnecessary to type all these. If you play badly, you'll already be dissapointed enough.
To be honest,by reading this blog of your's, it will only make my blood boil. There's not a need for you to "invite" people to rip the tickets or critize. People would eventually do comments.How would you like if everyone rip the scores that you are conducting in front of your face?
Well, my stand is, I don't see a point for you to blog all these. It'll only create more tension between the members and you after reading it.
Thanks.
Hi anonymous,
Thank you for your valuable comments, which show that you are a very dedicated member of the band and concerned about the image we in the exco are portraying it with every blog entry we put up as individual exco members, though united in a common goal to make MWS shine in the band scene.
Please read on - I hope I understand where you are coming from and I hope that at the end of my reply, you will also understand why I put up a blog entry like this.
I certainly did not want to prejudice anyone's opinions before we had even started on our first note. I did have a good feeling about the concert when I was punching away at my keyboard, and even now, I don't think that we have anything to ashamed of wrt Scherzo 2007.
No matter how many years there are down the road, I will be proud to thump my chest and mention it to everyone that I am proud to have been a part of Scherzo 2007, and that I am proud of everyone who performed, watched and helped in one way or another.
My blog entry up here was only intended as a guideline to band members on what [not] to do if they received critical comments.
All of us in the band are musicians, and good musicians are usually very emotional people.
This blog entry is simply an appeal to everyone to try to keep his/her emotions in check should s/he encounter blog entries which are rude, unflattering, or demeaning to the band's name.
I have heard horror stories of members of other bands slamming their critics and getting embroiled into flame wars, and this is something which I absolutely do not want to get from any members of our audience.
My blog post is also a measure to safeguard the band's reputation - that if we do get complaints sent over to us that MWS Band Member X is in a flame war against another blogger over a critical comment about our concert, s/he is acting in his/her individual capacity and certainly his/her actions and remarks do not represent the viewpoints of the band, its exco and its members.
As to your question, I would certainly feel bad if people ripped the scores I conducted in front of my face since it is a show of disgust or disrespect to me and/or the music I like. While of course I would certainly not be happy (who would?), such an act reflects more of the upbringing of people who did the ripping of scores/tickets our faces than anything about me.
I am sorry if I have offended some sensitivities here with this particular blog entry, and I hope that we understand each other better now.
PS To the rest of the exco members, please edit/remove this blog entry if anyone finds it offensive in any manner.
SS
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