Playing Live and Vocal Coaching
Back on June 1st, I played a couple hours of music up the street at Tomato Joe’s Pizza and Taps. And, over the next few weeks I’ll be up there a couple more times.
Tomato Joe’s Pizza & Taps
Saturday, June 22, 2024 | 6pm-9pm
Facebook event link
Saturday, July 6, 2024 | 6pm-8pm
Facebook event link
Notes about the gig
Tomato Joe’s has an outdoor patio and good pizza. We had the veggie pizza last time - very tasty.
I have been looking for a local venue to set up shop and perform a couple times a month. My goal is be able to work on my music and move from playing songs to performing them. I wrote about that more than a year ago in my piece titled, Suboptimal.
The difference between performing and playing is about flow and comfort. When you are playing a song, you still expend energy on chord changes, lyrics, vocals, etc. where when you’ve practiced enough to “perform” - those elements are far more natural, loose, and relaxed. You are still working your craft but the work pours out of you far more naturally.
I felt I was about 50/50 performing versus playing. My goal for next Saturday is to be closer to 70/30.
Vocal Coaching & Leo
Several months ago, I received an unexpected call. My phone rang and I saw that it was Leo Meza. It was a surprise since I had not heard from Leo since 2013.
Leo was Sara, my daughter’s. first vocal coach. We had met him when she was in a small theater production.
Leo is a gentle, soft-spoken, funny, and encouraging vocal coach. He worked with Sara for a few months and it was his work that gave her the confidence to attend the performing arts high school in downtown Los Angeles.
After we moved to downtown Los Angeles we fell out of touch with Leo.
I answered the phone.
“Leo?” I asked.
“Hi Matt. Do you remember me?”
“Of course.”
Leo continued, “I’m calling some people from my past as part of my therapy.”
He went on to explain that a couple years ago he had a stroke. He started feeling odd and then his sight started to fade. By the time they go to the hospital, he had lost all his sight.
His sight would never return.
Now, after more than a year of recovery and much work to do, Leo was reaching out to people as a way to break his silence. He had closed down emotionally, experienced some abuse at his first recovery center, but was making an effort at starting to move past that and return to whatever vocal coaching he was able to.
As it turns out, Deb and I had been talking about my vocals and some things I hoped to develop to improve my vocal delivery.
I told Leo I would love to come out and have a session with him.
We’ve been attending his coaching for several months. After one session I had a bit of an epiphany. I knew I had to take seriously the exercises he was giving me and commit fully to the emotionally delivery of my vocals. The change was significant.
At one point, Leo called me after a session to thank me for using him as a vocal coach.
“Hi Matt. I wanted to say thank you for using me as your vocal coach. I know you could find another vocal coach, one who isn’t blind.”
The comment broke my heart - enough that got choked up.
“Leo. Your blindness has zero impact on how effective you are as a coach. I’m not going to you as an exercise in charity. I’m going to you because you help me improve. You are great at what you do.”
At my first session with Leo, he told me his hourly price. I told him that was too little and doubled it.
Since then, Deb and I have made him business cards and offered our suggestions on his rates. We’ve offered to build him a simple website but, at this point, he is fine with the word of mouth growth he is experiencing.
While I’d like to say that I am always consistent in my practice, that is not the case. But far more so than I ever have been.
Several weeks ago I approached him with the song, Highway 20 Ride by The Zac Brown Band. The song is about a divorced father driving across the state to visit his son. It came out after my first divorce when I was also driving every other weekend to pick up my youngest.
Vocally, the song is not challenging until the end. But there are a couple areas I wanted to be able to deliver. In previous lessons, Leo had already demonstrated that I could hit the notes. I am able to hit several notes above the highest note.
After we practiced it during my vocal coaching, I spent a couple weeks working on it. I came back to Leo for a session and went through the song. I committed to the final vocal moment and hit it.
Both Leo and I got choked up.
Deb, who is used to seeing me weep about any number of things just looked at both of us like we were crazy. But, she also understood it.
The best I can explain it is that it was not just the song. It was about me reaching an important milestone. It was about Leo seeing the progress he helped create.
There is something healing and fulfilling in that for both of us.
Here is a short video of the ending of the song. Deb took it on her phone during my last performance at Tomato Joe’s - so the sound quality isn’t remarkable. I’ve improved my delivery more since then but I was pretty happy with how it came out.
Note: It is a promo video for next Saturday’s performance - hence the text on the video.
What’s Next?
That small section of song has opened up some opportunities and ideas in my recordings. Things I’ve always wanted to try but have not.
So, thank you Leo for your coaching and encouragement. Thank you Deb for pushing me in that direction.
And about those recordings… we are still finalizing three recordings. I had mentioned the “sundries” of life and we’ve had those a-plenty the past several weeks. Out of town a couple weekends and other engagements. It looks to be clearer the next few weeks, though we are having some work done around the house.
But we are excited about the progress made - even with a few recordings two days ago.
Thank you to my readers for joining me on this journey.
With Love and Gratitude,
Matthew Moran
June 19, 2024
If you live in the Antelope Valley/Santa Clarita Area and are interested in vocal coaching, contact me and I’ll get you in touch with Leo.
PS: I wrote about a Father’s Day greeting I received over at Freakshow Confidential. Check if out if you get a chance. Link below.
There are a few interesting points worthy of comment. The point that leaps out at me, front and center, was Leo's comment about his blindness.
You can tell Leo, with complete sincerity, that his blindness makes him a better vocal coach. Beethoeven wrote his best stuff when he was deaf. Bats are blind, and they not only have keen auditory acuteness; they have radar.
It is not accidental.
When one sense is destroyed, the neuronal capability (or the power of your nervous system) that went into that sense will now be diverted to another sense. And so if you lose your sense of sight, nervous energy that had been devoted to the intepretation of images will now employ a very advancdd degree of interpretative power at understandiing sounds and touch (I don't think someone who could see could learn Braile easily)
Another Issue Re Playing v. Performing
There's another variable at work here: The audience. A very receptive audience can further electrify the musician. See the footage of the Who performing, at the Isle of Wite or Wriight in or aound 1970, and their rendition of the song with the refrain "See me, feel me." The audiience is on cloud 9 and so is the band's performance.
Thank you!