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My band Toast played last night -- we had a particularly good night, with a large crowd, and one that stayed for the entire evening. Great night -- and we could feel the feedback spiral working…
In live music, there's an audience connection that is critical to how a performance goes. If you can make a connection with the audience, if you can get them involved, then a loop is established: they give you energy, so therefore your music takes and uses that additional energy, so therefore the audience becomes even more intent on the music, which in turns enhances the musicians' performance even more, and so on. You can feel it when the upward spiral is working, when musician and audience have become (closer to) one entity.
You can also feel it when it's going the other way -- and I've certainly had gigs where that was also the case. As a performer, sometimes you're getting nothing back from the audience, so eventually you just stop trying. At best, the band starts playing mostly for themselves (which can still be fun, but it's a different type of fun); at worst, you're just going through the motions, just playing the tunes without passion. You might even be playing them halfway competently, but you can feel the lack of energy and interest. Those are the nights when you wonder why you're doing this.
Luckily, those nights don't come often… But last night was exceptional; we'd managed to snag the audience and we could all feel it. You play better when that happens. You look at each other afterward and say "Hey, that was a really good night!"
And it was. For an applause addict like me, it was lovely.
Too bad we don't have that quick feedback cycle in writing.
In live music, there's an audience connection that is critical to how a performance goes. If you can make a connection with the audience, if you can get them involved, then a loop is established: they give you energy, so therefore your music takes and uses that additional energy, so therefore the audience becomes even more intent on the music, which in turns enhances the musicians' performance even more, and so on. You can feel it when the upward spiral is working, when musician and audience have become (closer to) one entity.
You can also feel it when it's going the other way -- and I've certainly had gigs where that was also the case. As a performer, sometimes you're getting nothing back from the audience, so eventually you just stop trying. At best, the band starts playing mostly for themselves (which can still be fun, but it's a different type of fun); at worst, you're just going through the motions, just playing the tunes without passion. You might even be playing them halfway competently, but you can feel the lack of energy and interest. Those are the nights when you wonder why you're doing this.
Luckily, those nights don't come often… But last night was exceptional; we'd managed to snag the audience and we could all feel it. You play better when that happens. You look at each other afterward and say "Hey, that was a really good night!"
And it was. For an applause addict like me, it was lovely.
Too bad we don't have that quick feedback cycle in writing.
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In moments like that, I fear taking breaks. Particularly second sets, which end after 11, I find that we often kill the crowd by stopping.
Obviously there's no instant feedback loop in writing, but there is in teaching. I'm giving a talk next fall about balance between teaching and scholarship/creative work, and have been thinking about the way that the different kinds of feedback compliment each other.
And hooray for good gigs! May there be thousands more.
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