This past Friday I was able to be a part of a school event that combined theater, Mariachi music, and Cuban music. The school put on a great production–costumes, stage design, a great narrator and actors that interacted with the audience–in the re-telling of the classic, romantic tragedy of Romeo and Juliet (except for the main characters were Rosalia y Juan). I’m not writing this to talk about the storyline or the actual show itself, however. I’m writing to talk about a great moment that happened while I was performing a lead song during the show. A thing I tend to describe as “everything clicking” or “everything falling into place.”
I had been practicing the song for months, performing it in front of my peers and professors multiple times. For some reason that night, though, I found myself getting nervous to perform the song (it probably didn’t help that I was going to be singing up on a raised platform due to the stage setup, in heels). The theater was completely packed–many of the audience members were either fans or players of Mariachi or Cuban music–and little camera flashes or random shouts of excitement would happen periodically throughout the night.
When the music started, however, all the insecurities fell away. Everything just felt right. The music was swinging–it wasn’t too fast or too slow. I remembered all the words–which happen to be the trickiest things to remember when your nerves are going crazy–and all of the things I improvised actually worked out pretty well. Hand gestures, vocal inflection, and facial expression all tied together, making the performance look and feel natural (something that I have a hard time pulling off). Most of all, I could feel and see the audience responding positively to my performance, which always feels really good for any musician.
I don’t say any of this to toot my horn, so to speak, but to try to give you a clearer picture of what that “everything clicking” sensation feels like. It’s one of those feelings and situations that every musician strives for because it doesn’t happen all the time. You hope that when you’re in that moment, that all of your training and practicing doesn’t go out the window, but at the same time, you realize that that’s not as important as what you experience in that moment. Connecting with your audience. Conveying the message in that one song to everyone around you, making them feel what you’re feeling in that moment. I hope that every vocalist out there, whether beginner or advanced, experiences this at least once in their lifetime. It’s an incredible moment.
Anyone out there ever experience anything similar to that “everything clicks” moment when performing? Do you call it something different? How did you feel when that happened?