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<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Good for you! Have fun with it.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Start with this fact: a competition is the easiest,
safest way to perform, because there's somebody there to tell you what to
do and when. Almost certainly, somebody will take your name early on, and
then call you up when it's time. (If you can, find out who the two
performers before you will be.)</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Secondly, introduce yourself and the piece.
Yes, even if they just called you up by name. I introduced myself at the
Steppes competition at Warlord, even though the judges were my good friends
Miguel and Conall. Tell them anything you want them to know about the
piece. If you don't know the author, don't say it. But if it's a
speech from the Iliad that you translated into the appropriate dactylic
hexameter, you want them to know it, so you tell them. The most important
part of the introduction was described best by A.A. Milne in the Introduction to
the book of poems *Now We Are Six*:</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>"When you are reciting poetry, which is a thing we
never do, you find sometimes, just as you are beginning, that Uncle John is
still telling Aunt Rose that if he can't find his spectacles he won't be able to
hear properly, and does she know where they are; and by the time everybody has
stopped looking for them, you are at the last verse, and in another minute they
will be saying "Thank-you, thank-you" without really knowing what it was all
about. So next time, you are more careful; and, just before you begin you
say, <EM>"Er-h'r'm</EM>" very loudly, which means, "Now then, here we are"; and
everybody stops talking and looks at you: which is what you want. So then
you get in the way of saying it whenever you are asked to recite . . , and
sometimes it is just as well, and sometimes it isn't . . .And by and by you find
yourself saying it without thinking. Well, this bit which I am writing
now, called Introduction, is really the <EM>er-h'r'm</EM> of the book, and I
have put it in, partly so as not to take you by surprise, and partly because I
can't do without it now."</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Your introduction is the <EM>er-h'r'm</EM> of the
piece, getting the audience comfortable with you and ready to start enjoying
your piece. Saxon scops would start by saying "Whaet!", very loudly, which
Master Cedric translated as "Everybody shut up; I'm about to recite
Beowulf!"</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Yes, I'm deliberately being a bit silly here,
because I'm trying to help you calm down. It really is the safest place to
perform. Nobody's is listening unless he or she wants to hear you
perform. Everybody else went away when they started the
competition.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Here's an important secret: *all* performers get
nervous before a big performance. Even professional ones. (Ronald
Reagan, movie star who graduated to the biggest stage in the world, said that's
why he always started with a joke. He needed the quick victory of a laugh
to help him calm down.) It's all right to be nervous.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Double check the rules on the website (they just
got sent to this list, too). Pick your pieces well in advance, and do them
several times in the car, driving to and from work.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Don't worry about the outcomes. There are
only two possible outcomes, and they are both good.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>1. You perform, everybody applauds, and you've
successfully entered your first competition, or</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>2. You perform, everybody applauds, and you've
successfully won your first competition.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>There are no bad outcomes. (Even if you mess
up, it will fall in outcome #1. The audiences at competitions are very
sympathetic, and every single judge has messed up on stage at least
once.)</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Have fun with it. I wish I could be there to
see you.</FONT></DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2></FONT> </DIV>
<DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2>Robin of Gilwell / Jay Rudin</FONT></DIV>
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<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial">----- Original Message ----- </DIV>
<DIV
style="BACKGROUND: #e4e4e4; FONT: 10pt arial; font-color: black"><B>From:</B>
<A title=tanner.g@sbcglobal.net href="mailto:tanner.g@sbcglobal.net">Geneva or
Tracy Tanner</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>To:</B> <A title=bards@lists.ansteorra.org
href="mailto:bards@lists.ansteorra.org">bards@lists.ansteorra.org</A> </DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Sent:</B> Wednesday, November 01, 2006 5:34
AM</DIV>
<DIV style="FONT: 10pt arial"><B>Subject:</B> [Bards] (no subject)</DIV>
<DIV><BR></DIV>
<DIV>Okay i have come out of the closet .. baring any major life instances I
will be at Melee's with or with out the family bumming a ride with some one or
driving my self AND I will be entering my very first bardic competition!!!!!
Okay now before I start running around overtaken by terror at what I have just
committed my self to. </DIV>
<DIV>Could someone please tell me what you do when you put your self in front
of however many very scarey people I will be shaking in front of :-) </DIV>
<DIV>I mean do you get called up ...</DIV>
<DIV>do you announce your self </DIV>
<DIV>do you pass out </DIV>
<DIV>be so scared you are stiff ..... WHAT ??? LOL </DIV>
<DIV>do you tell who wrote the song you are going to sing recite or tell, Okay
now that I have run on at the terror mobile LOL .......please help </DIV>
<DIV> </DIV>
<DIV>thank you Lady Gwen</DIV><BR><BR>
<DIV align=left><FONT size=3> </FONT><FONT size=4> <FONT color=#ff0000>I
choose to build my customer base to 150 strong in one <BR>year,and in
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dreams</FONT></FONT></DIV>
<DIV align=left><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" color=#ff007f size=3>Remember to
check out my web site where you can shop any time even in your
PJ's</FONT></DIV>
<DIV align=left><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" color=#ff007f size=5><A
href="http://www.marykay.com/gtanner1">www.marykay.com/gtanner1</A></FONT></DIV>
<DIV align=center><FONT face="Comic Sans MS" color=#ff007f
size=5></FONT> </DIV>
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