237 – Adelaide’s Got Talent

Angus Tuck sent a note to say that he was rather chuffed hear our recent  Adelaide Show podcast and  comments on  our Lioness Shiraz .The fruit is grown on our Bakers Gulley vineyard at Kangarilla and made by the  wonderful Dandelion winemaker Elena Brooks. You mentioned that the wine is  lighter than expected for a McLaren Vale shiraz and I think this can be put down  a cooler elevation ( around 350 metres above sea level  )above  the floor of the Vale .We are  usually one  of the  last to pick in the McLaren Vale wine region.

We will be on WOW FM 100.5 on election night, March 17, 2018.

Podcast Awards

Fringe reviews. Deanna, you’ve just finished your season of God Save The Queen’s. How were the audiences and the Gluttony venue?

In 1973, Billy Joel sowed these words into the public consciousness: Sing us a song, you’re the piano man, Sing us a song tonight, Well, we’re all in the mood for a melody, And you’ve got us feelin’ alright. Ironically, that song about handing over the singing to someone else is almost impossible for people not to sing along to, even if they are PETRIFIED of singing in public. But are we still as petrified as we think? Tonight’s guest, Deanna Kangas from Voicehouse, has noticed a 40% increase in adults taking singing lessons in 2017 and predicts singing will become one of the top personal development and leisure activities in Australia in 2018.

We’re starting a little later than usual tonight because your publicist told us you will have been wrapping up vocal training earlier this evening and your voice will need a rest before we start. Is it really that demanding?

I want to come back to technique and breathing shortly, but first I want to get stuck into fear.

There is no word for the fear of singing and yet such a fear is right up with fear of public speaking when you ask people what they are most afraid of doing in public. Perhaps the song that best captures WHY many of us are too scared to sing in public, is Mr Tanner by Harry Chapin. I want to read the first verse:

Mister Tanner was a cleaner from a town in the Midwest.
And of all the cleaning shops around he’d made his the best.
But he also was a baritone who sang while hanging clothes.
He practiced scales while pressing tails and sang at local shows.
His friends and neighbors praised the voice that poured out from his throat.
They said that he should use his gift instead of cleaning coats.

So far, so good. But then he saves up and puts on a concert in New York, resulting in this summary from the critics:

So, that is what most of us fear – that we’d just be not good enough, which brings the chorus of the song into focus:

Music was his life, it was not his livelihood,
And it made him feel so happy and it made him feel so good.
And he sang from his heart and he sang from his soul.
He did not know how well he sang; It just made him whole.

To me, there are two main considerations here. Firstly, if we enjoy singing but are not good at it, should we get lessons? And, secondly, if we are enjoying the lessons, how do we decide whether to keep it a private joy, like Mr Tanner, or try to go public?

How does this sit with your revelation that more of us are taking singing lessons?

Ella Fitzgerald said, the only thing better than singing is more singing, and Edith Piaf said, singing is a way of escaping. It’s another world. I’m no longer on earth. Why do you sing?

Fergus Maximum: I’d ask how she responds to people who say, “I can’t sing”.

Ebony Guy-Villon: Did singing lessons for a while but all is lost now because muscle control and tone in the throat has gone.

Could you lead us in some exercises now?

Eugene Guy-Villon: Can you give us a Top C?

Is there a trick to changing key, or do you just have to practice?

Stella Mccartney once said, for me, singing is the most natural thing in the world. I’ve grown up with it and I know I’ve got that gift. Is it a gift, or can it be learned?

Nardia Symonds: What is the perfect age for starting singing lessons

There are many types of singing, road trip singing, stage singing, group singing, church singing, Bob Dylan singing, operatic singing, karaoke singing, shower singing. Are some of these kinder on our throats?

Of the musical styles, they must all pose different singing challenges. Let’s explore some

Opera

Country

60s rock

70s rock

Metal

Rapping

Crooners (we have a video of Frank Sinatra and Antonio Carlos Jobim in the show notes, doing a Bossa Nova Medley – surely this must be a relaxed, easy method of singing?)

https://vimeo.com/130014241

Musical theatre

Pure pop

Jazz and blues

Leonard Cohen, Tom Waits, Bob Dylan

How do you find your range? Who are the easy singers to emulate?

Nigel Dobson-Keeffe challenges the panel to pick the fake story from three stories from South Australia’s past.

The Advertiser December 1945
Died After -Singing At Social
While he was giving an item ai a social in the Prospect Church of Christ on Monday night, Adam Christian Stein, 70, of Harvey street.  Nailsworth, complained that he was feeling unwell, and died soon afterwards. Dressed in a top bat and evening clothes, he was sringing an old fashioned ditty when he was seen to wipe his forehead. Later he announced that he was feeling unwell and was assisted from the stage.

Border Watch April 1878
Naracoorte’s SINGING MICE.
One of the local shopkeepers gives us this testimony to a fact which is rare, though as certain as that canaries sing. A few winters ago, while one of his family was amusing herself at the piano, a mouse made his appearance on the threshold of the pantry, and, undismayed by the light or the presence of the family, chirped and carolled with intense satisfaction to itself, and to the great delight of its audience. Soon another mouse appeared nearby and yet another could be heard in the walls. Frequently afterward, but always in the evening, the rare songsters, sometimes one, sometimes many, repeated their performance. The piano keys were never struck that the mice did not follow, but when the instrument was not touched, the music from the mice would come, as if for a reminder. The family also noticed that if they were talking or singing themselves the mice did not partake but were silent.

News May 1948
Ex-Barber’s recital On Rail Station
A former barber of Magill today sang an excerpt from the Barber of Seville at a press conference on Adelaide Rail way Station. Joseph Schepsi, 42-year- old tenor, is in Adelaide to give two concerts. The first on Mon day at the Adelaide Town Hall. Scnepsi charged £4/4/ a seat at his first concert in Melbourne In 1944. His Adelaide ones will be £/1/-. and 10/6, plus tax. His accompanist will be Dr. Ruby Davy who will also play piano solos. Schepsi said today he was a hairdresser and tobacconist at Magill during the depression.

We opened the vault to go back 100 weeks to the chat with had with InDaily editor, David Washington about the importance of being news provocateurs.

Interestingly, we are moving into the final days of the election and WE will be becoming our own news provocateurs as we take over WOW FM for the night to bring you our “unique” style of coverage. That’s 100.5FM.