Before you look for jobs singing, you need to define and develop what you’re selling. Having a beautiful, trained voice is great, but it’s like having a great set of carpentry tools; folks don’t want to watch you work the tools. They want to live in the house you build for them.
Develop a performance, start small, just a few songs. Something that moves you, that you care about and feel strongly. Now perform it. Find an audience; coffee shop, church, friends and family. Video both yourself and the audience if possible. Then watch the video critically; how did it go? Was the audience affected the way you wanted them to be? If not (and first time out they probably won’t be), why not? Examine your performance first. Did the piece go smoothly? Any obvious bobbles that distracted from your emotional message? Did you do everything you could to communicate your message? Where you feeling what you wanted them to feel? Next look at your audience. Was it the right audience? Where they distracted by something outside your performance? Doesn’t take much; heat, bugs, a TV. Analyze your findings, make appropriate changes, then do it all over again.
Creating performance art takes time. Performance ideas that sound good in your head don’t always work when you spring it on others. Perfect example: most of my jokes! Music is communication. Communication happens between two or more people. What happens on the receiving end is just as important as the sending. Watch the reaction of your audience. Adapt your performance to get the effect you want. This communication is the difference between an artist and a guy that sings. Video your audience rather than rely on comments from friends and critics to speed up the process.
