Live performance is the most important aspect of developing a loyal, ongoing relationship with your fans. You can create a great YouTube video. But going out, on the road, having a live performance really cements that relationship. Justin Bieber had great YouTube videos, and his manager Scooter Braun saw it, and brought him down to Atlanta as a result of just seeing the YouTube video, but it Took time for him to develop and training as well for him to develop an engaging live performance. It takes time to develop an engaging live show. Various artists use a number of ways to really create the kind of environment that they can be assured that at the end of the show they're going to receive a standing ovation. And if you want to be a hit artist, that is what you're striving for, a standing ovation. You don't want to receive [SOUND] [APPLAUSE] Polite applause as I call it. Polite applause really doesn't get it. A lot of artists use various means to create the kind of environment to elicit that standing ovation. Some use great production. They'll have, they'll come out of the stage, they'll be propelled out of the stage as Beyonce and her group Destiny's Child did at the Superbowl one year. They came out and were shot up in the air and they landed at the same time. And of course that created a standing ovation, just for that portion of the show. They might also involve and utilize choreography. They might have dancers. Mini-entertainers. Lady Gaga, Katy Perry, Justin Timberlake. Even Kanye West has a great stage show. Great production. That they know will engage the fans in a very, very particular way, eliciting the standing ovations that they're looking for. But you don't just have to have these bells and whistles. In order to illicit a standing ovation and get that great response you want from your fans. There's certain whose virtuosity of talent alone is enough to create that kind of reaction. You have jazz titans like Mccorey And the great Wayne Shorter. Or vocalists like Adele who can just come out on the stage and the power of her voice and her vocals alone are enough to really get the fans involved have them transfixed in the performance in the moment. and create a dynamic live show. Developing the art of live performance is just as time intensive as developing the art of recording. There's two difference arts. The art of live performance. The art of recording. It takes a lot of time to develop both of these arts. In his book, Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell says it takes 10,000 hours to really become an expert at anything that you wanna do. That's why I say you have to work it. Performing live, you get the immediate response from the crowd. Sometimes that can cause you to improvise you in certain ways. You're inspired by what the audience is giving back to you in response to what you're doing. So sometimes you can have a great live performing act. And have you ever bought a record by an act that you saw, and you really liked them live. And you listened to the record and said, that really doesn't capture What I saw at the show. Well that's why I say it's two different arts and it takes time. Sometimes years to develop a great live stage show. It also takes time to become a great recording artist. When you're in the studio, there's no one there. There's no response but you have to be a position to try and give the same kind of emotion that you would give in a live setting in that closed studio environment. It's an art. It really does take time to develop that. Many artists spend too much time recording and not enough time in putting together their live show. I spoke to a live show producer a few months ago who indicated to me he had a client that brought him in to put together their show, and the group told him, you know we spent the whole last 18 months recording our album. And the live show producer said well how much time do you usually spend in putting together your live show? And they said we're going to spend two to three days practicing our live show to go on the road. And he said well wait a minute this is very interesting. How much money did you make from recording last year? [LAUGH] And the artist said, well, maybe $10,000. I said, and how much money did ou make from performing live? He said, well, maybe $80,000 to $90,000. So in other words 90% of their income was generated from their live performance, and only 10% From recording. But yet, they only put a couple of days of rehearsal for the live show. And eighteen months recording. It's kind of putting the cart before the horse, so to speak. So it's important to recognize that you have to invest the time To come up with a fan-engaging, dynamic live performance. I used to go to rehearsal of my clients the OJs. The OJs are not only great singers, they are truly a song and dance Team, they're a song and dance team. That's part of their performance. And obviously they're one of the greatest, they were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, so that combination works for them. Walter Williams and Eddy are some of the finest I call them vocal instrumentalists. I mean they're improvising throughout everything they do with their vocals, and it's amazing to see what they do vocally. But in addition to that, what their audience is really engaged and involved in is their choreography. The syncopated steps.The syncranization of vocals and the dance is just mesmerizing. I remember going to a concert many years ago and I was sitting in the audience. And as they did certain steps I heard people responding to the movement! They just really loved it. But what people don't know is that it takes hours and hours and days and weeks for the OJ's to put together their live performance. Maybe a month or more. And they would bring in a master A choreographer whose name is Cholly Atkins, Cholly C-H-O-L-L-Y. Atkins, A-T-K-I-N-S. Google him. Cholly Atkins started with a dance duo, in a dance duo called Cole and Atkins. It was a tap dance group that performed in theaters across the United States, during the 40's and 50's, but then they stopped booking tap dance acts at a lot of these venues in the early 50's, so Charlie decided that he was going to take the talent that he had as a show-person A great, dynamic dancer and entertainer and really transfer that knowledge to this burgeoning area of music called vocal groups and with du-wop groups who basically just stood Hood and might of snapped their fingers and stepped side to side as they were singing. And he got with the group called the Cadillacs, was the first group that he started and they had big hit records, on R & B records at that time. And He put together a dynamic choreographed show for them that set the R&B world on fire. And I bring this up because it was really the start of what you're seeing in popular music today. Incorporating dance with many people on stage. Most of those cases with Charlie Atkinson, the 50s and 60s, it was vocal groups of four or five people. But today you will see Katy Perry, you'll see Lady Gaga, you'll see Usher, with multiple dancers, dancing in time. A very intricate, syncopated choreography. Charlie Atkins was the one that really started it. And Charlie Atkins also became the chief choreographer at Motown Records, and choreographed all of the Motown acts. The Miracles, the Four Tops, the Temptations. He is the one that really started that element. And he also was the choreographer for the O'Jays. For years and years, until he died in the first decade of this new century. A great, great choreographer. I remember going to a hotel room, in my hometown of Cleveland, where the O'Jays lived at that time. And they brought Charlie in. And Charlie had them in a hotel room, and he was like a drill sergeant. No, do it again, no, do it again. [LAUGH] The OJ's took their shirts off, they were sweating, and they were there for four or five hours a day practicing their routines. Now here's the end to this story. The O'Jays have been performing and still perform today. They've been performing over 50 years. And it's a result of them putting that time in, creating that dynamic show that their audience knows every time they see them. They're going to have that same level of showmanship. The same type of spontaneous emotion that's really going to elicit great response from them from the audience. And the O'jays are aware of that and so are the promoters of the live shows and that's why they can work so much even to this day. So you can have a long ongoing career if you put the time in. Remember, you have to have it, you have to work it. If you have it and work it you can make it.
