American Idol Blog – How To Sing With Emotion

Posted on 09. Feb, 2008 by Per Bristow in American Idol, Communication, Performance, Singing

How about American Idol this week? Was there something we can learn from? Not that we always have to learn things – it’s quite all right to watch shows for the pure enjoyment of it.

However, there were two sequences that stuck out for me as great examples to learn from. I’m talking about one guy’s “mistake” – a mistake I’ve made many times – and one girl’s great success…  

First, we had the guy who had planned some “witty comebacks” in the event he would be hammered by Simon Cowell.  Unfortunately for him, his pre-planned witty comebacks failed miserably.

I learned from my first date that the plan of saying something witty in a nervous situation falls flatter than a soufflé from a rooftop. 

Have you ever walked into a situation planning what to say and then walk out beating yourself up over how idiotic it sounded, or over what you should have said instead? Maybe you also realized that you really weren’t present most of the time, because you were in your head, anticipating and trying to find the right moment to say it.

In this case it was even worse, because the guy had already programmed himself for failure, by expecting that he was going to be hammered. Not only could we sense the resistance from the get-go, but the resistance turned to hostility when his “wittiness” fell flat.

Rather than being self-conscious about finding the right moment to say what you have planned, you are better off being open and spontaneous. Maybe you’ll even come off as witty. 

And then we had the girl who sang “How can I live without you” just days after her dad had passed away: Wow. That she could pull it off in the first place was quite remarkable. But what made her performance so powerful? Did you notice that she was not trying to express pain? She was going for the opposite. She was singing to celebrate, to honor. It’s not that she was holding back the pain. It’s not that she didn’t feel the pain. It was there all right. Bit what she did was to focus on the opposite, and by doing so, her emotions became even more powerful. It became even more emotional for us – the audience.

This is what we need to learn as actors, singers, presenters and performers: If you feel it, you don’t need to act it.

The classic example for actors is in regard to playing drunk: When a beginners actor tries to play drunk, he will stumble and try to speak in a slurry manner. The real drunk does the exact opposite. The real drunk does everything he can to walk straight and speak clearly.

Singers easily fall into the trap of trying to “emote”. They try to produce the emotion they think is appropriate for the song. The tendency then is that they come across as fake and self-indulgent – and distance themselves from the audience. There is a difference between producing emotions and allowing emotions to happen.

This girl didn’t try to act/produce sadness, pain and loss. She felt it for real and sang the song going for the opposite instead – to honor and celebrate. That is mighty powerful.

This is why I believe in training the singer, speaker, and actor to release their instrument (physical and “inner” voice) to feel free, confident and spontaneous. Then you don’t need to produce or “act” emotion, but become a really interesting, truthful and unique performer.