What really constitutes a performance ... ?

[AUSSIEKEYS]

shall no one judge Virginia lest a plague of lip synchers descend upon her and swallow her whole

 

I say ..

 

WHO IS VIRGINIA JUDGE ?

[jarrell]

Still, though. I recently watched the broadway version of Legally Blonde. At one point, Laura Bell Bundy, who plays Elle Woods, does a whole routine of cheerleading, baton-twirling and tap-dancing. Then, she sings exactly on pitch. You can tell, it's not taped, either, because you can hear her working to maintain her pitch and breathing.

 

There are many other examples of this.

I think this points up the difference between many (but not all, of course) music "professionals" and "stars." A pro has to be a pro to work, but a star can make it without being a pro. Broadway artists are more like studio musicians - they have to prove they can do the job, in fact, they have to audition to prove it, and they are, for example, expected to be able to sing and dance, without help from prerecorded tracks. Similarly for studio musicians - they are expected to be able to play in realtime, without any preparation, music they haven't seen or heard before, no time to go off and practice or sequence a part. A pop star my come in already famous from a TV show or something, and then make an album, so they may not have developed the skills they would have had to develop if they came in from a professional music background.

[Jim Alfredson]

What next, are they going to have warnings on movie tickets?

 

"Warning: Christian Bale isn't really Batman."

[AUSSIEKEYS]

What next, are they going to have warnings on movie tickets?

 

"Warning: Christian Bale isn't really Batman."

 

yep thats right and

 

TOM CRUISE isn't GOD

 

or should that be MEL GIBSON to put a Quasi Aussie accent to this Aussie thread...

 

oh ok now claim he is originally American...yea ok born but not bred..

 

anyway have you ever seen him lip synch...well maybe in MAN without a Face ...

but give him a break ,You'd lip synch too if you were missing your face....or is that off his face, chasing theological immortality.

[AUSSIEKEYS]

or Ronald Reagan never was George "The Gipper" Gipp

 

boy he never really did stop acting the rest of his life

 

go on ronald "win one for the gipper"

 

[ironically I use that phrase all the time here in Aussie and all i get is blank faces..how sad..]

[AUSSIEKEYS]

 

 

[Joe Muscara]

or should that be MEL GIBSON to put a Quasi Aussie accent to this Aussie thread...

 

oh ok now claim he is originally American...yea ok born but not bred..

 

anyway have you ever seen him lip synch...well maybe in MAN without a Face ...

but give him a break ,You'd lip synch too if you were missing your face....or is that off his face, chasing theological immortality.

The original US distribution of Mad Max had all the voices dubbed. There was no warning.

 

Dubbing is a more general term for generally replacing audio in post. At the "large" end of the spectrum, entire movies can be dubbed from foreign languages into the local languages. Or accents: all of the performances from the 1979 Australian film "Mad Max" were dubbed for the US release -- except for one.(Nope, Mel Gibson wasn't the exception. His voice was one of the ones dubbed.)

 

Sometimes, dubbing adds an actor's voice who didn't do the performance at all. The most famous of these might be Darth Vader. Although David Prowse was the actor inside the original costume, the character's voice was provided by James Earl Jones.

source

 

 

[Joe Muscara]

Back to the subject brought up by the OP,

 

Britney Spears 'Upset' Over Australian Tour Complaints

 

Britney Spears has done it again, hitting the headlines during her first Australian tour over a row about lip-synching and a lacklustre performance that her tour promoter said had left her "extremely upset."

 

Australian media reported that fans walked out of the first of Spears' 14 Australian performances that was staged in Perth on Friday (Nov. 6) after just a few songs, describing it as "boring," "stiff," mimed and lacking interaction with the audience.

 

But the promoter of Spears' Australian "Circus" tour, her manager and some fans rushed to her defense, saying this savaging has left the U.S. pop singer traumatized.

 

"Britney is aware of all this and she's extremely upset by it," Paul Dainty, Spears' tour promoter, told the Australian newspaper on Monday.

 

"She's a human being. I'm embarrassed, with such a big international entourage here with Britney, to be part of the Australian media when I see that kind of totally inaccurate reporting."

 

Dainty said it was a total fabrication to suggest that fans had stormed out of the show as early as the third song after paying between $200 to $1,500 to see the 27-year-old singer who has rebuilt her career after a high-profile meltdown.

 

Before her world tour started in March to promote her sixth studio album, Spears had only done a handful of live concerts in recent years as her personal life ran out of control.

 

This included stints in psychiatric care, an ugly divorce, losing custody of her two sons, shaving her head and partying without panties.

 

Spears has been at the center of debate over lip-synching since she arrived in Australia last week, even though it's no secret that she mimes as she dances in her circus-themed show.

 

The Fair Trade Minister for the state of New South Wales, Virginia Judge, ignited the debate by saying Australians would not tolerate a "Mickey Mouse" performance by Spears, who rose to fame as a member of Disney's "Mickey Mouse Club" TV series.

 

Judge suggested concert tickets should carry disclaimers about whether parts of concerts were pre-recorded and mimed.

 

Dainty said it was well known that part of Spears concert was lip-synched and blasted any inference that this was hidden.

 

"It's been all over the Internet for nine months," Dainty said. "This show is about an incredible spectacle, which it is."

 

Spears' manager Adam Leber took to Spears' Twitter account to defend the singer to her 3.7 million followers.

 

"Its unfortunate that one journalist in Perth didn't enjoy the show last night. Fortunately the other 18,272 fans in attendance did. - Adam" he wrote.

 

The management from the Burswood Dome in Perth, where Spears' show was staged, told local reporters that they had not received any complaints from the 17,000 people who were at the show. A similar number attended Spears' show the next night as well.

 

Thousands of fans flooded Spears' personal Web site and Twitter to congratulate her on her comeback, describing her Perth performances as "amazing," "awesome" and "brilliant."

 

---

 

While I don't like the lip-syncing either, it is possible that the writer overstated the "exodus." At the same time, the argument that everyone knows she lip syncs is bogus too. I imagine a lot of kids have no idea this goes on.

[Dave Horne]

From the original CNN article ....

 

Virginia Judge, the minister for fair trading for the Australian state of New South Wales, announced this week that she was considering requiring artists such as Spears to include a disclaimer on tickets if parts of their show would be pre-taped.

 

"It is Britney's 'prerogative' to lip-sync, and it is my job to make sure consumers know what they are paying for up front," Judge said in a statement released by the government.

 

"Australians would not tolerate a 'Mickey Mouse performance,' Judge told Sydney's Daily Telegraph. "Let's be clear: Live means live. If you are spending up to 200 dollars, I think you deserve better than a film clip."

 

 

 

I don't know, that seems pretty reasonable to me - a disclaimer on the ticket or in the advertising sounds reasonable.

[Joe Muscara]

I don't completely disagree, Dave. My question is, does the disclaimer stop with lip syncing, or would they also "warn" people about backing tracks being used, or even samples? Depending on the warning, it could end up being discouraging when it's not truly necessary. I know there are different feelings about this even among forum members.

 

I have a friend who has been composing some amazing stuff lately. His band is a three piece, consisting of a drummer, a bass player, and him on vocals, keys, and guitar. But to perform the new tunes, he uses a laptop with Ableton Live to play some other sounds, including some percussion parts. It's quite obvious, the laptop is right in front of him, but no one complains or walks out.

[Joe Muscara]

Should this performance have come with a warning due to the prerecorded part?

 

 

[video:youtube]

 

 

[Dave Horne]

It's just a disclaimer, right? And in this case, it would seem to be just about the main act and that the main act was not performing completely live. A disclaimer.

 

If you want to listen to a canned performance, you know, at least in advance, the main act is simply mouthing his or her part.

 

If Frank Sinatra were alive, I don't think anyone here would get upset if the keyboard player used a sampled grand and even used backing tracks. I think most everyone would get upset if the main attraction, Frank himself, lip synced.

 

A few years ago I posted here about a dance group and the fact that the music (I believe the Atlanta Symphony) was canned. I would be upset if I did not know that in advance, that a ballet was being performed to a CD. I would have asked for my money back ... or not have gone in the first place if I had known in advance.

 

So what exactly is the argument here? Do we keep things honest and tell the audience what is real and what is .... prerecorded. Some folks get bent out of shape just talking about the use of click tracks.

 

I personally have no problems about complete honesty in performance. If the keyboard player uses a sampled grand, state it in the program. If the drummer plays along to a click track, state it in the program .... and so on.

 

If I were the father of the bride paying for a seven piece wedding band but only saw six humans on stage, I would feel cheated at having to pay for someone to press play for the seventh part. But that's just me.

 

 

 

[Cliffk]

My question is, does the disclaimer stop with lip syncing, or would they also "warn" people about backing tracks being used, or even samples?

Personally, I'm all for legislation being introduced. And it would depend on the nature of the show as to how specific it should be. So, if the headliner were a singing act, like a Britney Spears or a Backstreet Boys, then at the very least I'd want all the lead vocals to be live. Anything less would need to be highlighted. Maybe then performers who used to sing live and who've fallen into the easier option of overdubs would be suitably embarrassed enough to dust their rusty asses off and start making an effort again! For the newer 'talent' for whom lip syncing is de rigeur, this might make 'em start looking for real jobs. We can but hope.

[Threadslayer]

Who'd really want that clapped-out cracker cooter, anyway? Stretch marks and cellulite.

 

Well c'mon. Don't sugarcoat it. Tell us what you really think!

[Cygnus64]

 

A few years ago I posted here about a dance group and the fact that the music (I believe the Atlanta Symphony) was canned. I would be upset if I did not know that in advance, that a ballet was being performed to a CD. I would have asked for my money back ... or not have gone in the first place if I had known in advance.

 

 

Not only that but the tickets are the same price for the canned and live performances.

 

If I were the father of the bride paying for a seven piece wedding band

 

My niece had a 7 piece band for her wedding, and they were expensive. In her case, I would have preferred they played to a tape. They were really, really bad.

 

In the case of some, umm, err, "artists" , I think the fans would be better off with the tape. After Ashlee Simpson had her big snafu on SNL, some show made a big deal that she would be actually singing live. I saw it, she's horrendous. In the case of these people, whose audience is probably 8 year old girls, it's kinda like having a disclaimer that the dude at the mall with the red coat isn't really Santa Claus.

[Dave Horne]

We have truth in advertising laws, right?

 

This is just truth in performance.

[Tonysounds]

If you want to see a live musical performance, go see a real band.

 

Great minds think alike.

[Tonysounds]

I have zero interest in lip-synched performances, nor even ones that aren't well synched for that matter. I'm just wondering how much "protection" they feel the audience needs. I know how much that would be if tonysounds was the minister.

 

While I'm pretty liberal, it's funny that in some respects, I'm a Zero Tolerance kinda guy.

 

And frankly, it's appalling that most shows, which are WAY overpriced, seem to be offering less live music for constantly increasing ticket prices.

 

Like I said, I'm a zero tolerance kinda guy.

[David Loving]

tonysounds, you are +100

[Joe Muscara]

I personally have no problems about complete honesty in performance. If the keyboard player uses a sampled grand, state it in the program. If the drummer plays along to a click track, state it in the program .... and so on.

The program?

 

Personally, I don't even care for shows where the goal is to recreate what is on the record on stage note for note. Then they're just adding a dance routine, costumes, and lights and I don't really care about that, but that's not the style of music I prefer.

 

I guess my point is, I don't want to see smaller, real acts get screwed because no one warned the audience that the keyboard player would be playing some sampled instruments, or a backing track was used as I described above. Don't say it won't happen, because I've seen things like this happen.

 

A few years ago, the TX legislature passed a law about devices that block info on license plates. People were trying to hide info so they could be harder to catch on camera not paying tolls. The way the law was written, anyone with a license plate frame that covered enough of the plate could get cited, even though they weren't trying to hide the plate, and the plate was clearly readable. Some towns found this a wonderful new source of revenue. In the next session two years later, the law was clarified. Meanwhile, a bunch of people got hassled and paid fines for no good reason.

[Cygnus64]

A few years ago, the TX legislature passed a law about devices that block info on license plates. People were trying to hide info so they could be harder to catch on camera not paying tolls. The way the law was written, anyone with a license plate frame that covered enough of the plate could get cited, even though they weren't trying to hide the plate, and the plate was clearly readable. Some towns found this a wonderful new source of revenue. In the next session two years later, the law was clarified. Meanwhile, a bunch of people got hassled and paid fines for no good reason.

 

+1. Lawmakers should stay the hell away. Every new law opens a hole for 5 other laws that pervert the original law to extremes. Anyone with the interwebs, the Google and one ounce of common sense can figure out that Britney lip-syncs along with half of the other acts aimed at 8 year olds. This Judge lady is just trying to get her name in the paper.

 

All this would do is hurt the fans of that type of music.

[Eric Iverson]

Yes - I don't know too many musically knowledgeable people who would go to hear Britney anyway; maybe for the spectacle, if you like that sort of thing, but who among us thinks she's a great singer, songwriter or instrumentalist?

 

It's common knowledge among musicians that pop acts do a lot of lip synching and playing along with tracks. I'd be pissed if I went to hear a jazz or classical artist where they didn't actually play, though! So far, that hasn't happened!

[Cygnus64]

I'd be pissed if I went to hear a jazz or classical artist where they didn't actually play, though! So far, that hasn't happened!

 

Perlman and Yo Yo did at Obama's gig.

 

Sydney Symphony and Utah Symphony did at their Olympics.

 

Pavarotti did, got sued and lost.

[Meisenhower]

I'd be pissed if I went to hear a jazz or classical artist where they didn't actually play, though! So far, that hasn't happened!

 

Perlman and Yo Yo did at Obama's gig.

 

Sydney Symphony and Utah Symphony did at their Olympics.

 

Pavarotti did, got sued and lost.

 

If I recall correctly, Perlman and Yo Yo simulated playing at Obama's gig because of the ambient outside temperature issues wreaking havoc with the intonation of the instruments, not for any other reason. I'm pretty certain that had they been playing indoors or outside on a nice spring day (instead of January 20th), they would have played live.

[ABECK]

There were segments in there where she was just slowly walking and she still sounded like death.

 

That clip is horrible - worse than I could have imagined. She's just not a singer. Speaks to the wonders of modern studio tools and techniques.

[SK]

With acts like Britney Spears, it's really not much about the music anyway - it's the show, thank you P.T. Barnum. A mixture of sensory overload special effects, pounding volume and celebritydom. No one is critically listening to the music, saying "I loved the texture of that last section."

 

Going out on a limb here maybe a general disclaimer on the back of the ticket would work: "For technical and/or artistic purposes, portions of tonight's music performance may be pre-recorded or electronically duplicated. This frees the performers from redundant, tedious musical chores to focus on choreography, to enhance the multi-sensory experience for their adoring ticket buyers."

 

Or musicians need one: "Warning: As an outcome of the Van Halen "Jump" fiasco, no portions of tonight's performance will be electronically duplicated. Avoiding choreography allows the musicians to focus solely on musical performance and technical accuracy. For sensory overload fans, turn up your iPod at home and sit in front of a strobe light."

 

Maybe that clears it up.

[iLaw]

I go to movies all the time and it never matters to me that I'm watching a heavily edited compilation of hundreds of live performances, with lots of overdubbed dialog, CGI, foley effects everywhere, and background music that the actors never heard.

 

What matters is the aesthetic effect of the final product. No doubt that part of the aesthetic effect of a live music performance is watching the performer do the magic in real time. But not every performance. Not even every live classical or jazz performance. Lots of 20th century art music has prerecorded tracks created by the composer as part of the aesthetic effect.

 

I'm betting plenty of Britney fans got the aesthetic experience they paid for and expected. If not, Britney needs to work on her show, that's all.

 

Larry.

 

[Dave Horne]

I'm betting plenty of Britney fans got the aesthetic experience they paid for and expected.

 

I'm betting Britney's fans never use the word aesthetic.

[EscapeRocks]

A few years ago, the TX legislature passed a law about devices that block info on license plates. People were trying to hide info so they could be harder to catch on camera not paying tolls. The way the law was written, anyone with a license plate frame that covered enough of the plate could get cited, even though they weren't trying to hide the plate, and the plate was clearly readable. Some towns found this a wonderful new source of revenue. In the next session two years later, the law was clarified. Meanwhile, a bunch of people got hassled and paid fines for no good reason.

 

 

Yep! The waythe law was written was that any part of a license plate frame that touched the word "TEXAS" at the top was a violation.

 

This pretty much made everyone who bought a car at a dealership be in instant violation the moment they drove off the lot, since most dealers attach plate frames with their name on it.

 

[EscapeRocks]

Lots of 20th century art music has prerecorded tracks created by the composer as part of the aesthetic effect.

Larry.

 

I freely admit to using some backing tracks in my band. There are a couple songs which Journey recorded using an orchestral string section. So, I played and sequenced the part into my Triton, and trigger it while playing the piano.

 

So, no I don't have a string section on stage, but I did "re-create" the part and play it into my sequencer.

 

Now then, I do agree this is far different, IMHO, than having the lead singer lip sync all his vocals at our gigs.

 

 

Funny aside:

 

My bass player had a "gig" with Janet Jackson many, many years ago for a brief performance she was giving. His band learned all the parts so they'd look right, but they were just window dressing....playing along to prerecorded tracks while she sang live.

 

He tells me it was fun, but really odd.