Stage Fright

Journal:
Saturday, Februrary 20th, 4PM Stage A, Tennis Channel Hayden Studios

I have been working seven days a week since the Olympics began and happy to have the work. I can also use it as a lame excuse for why I have no idea what the rest of this blog will be about as I sit here and type.

I am on stage sitting behind a lock-off camera while a host rehearses tennis news items off the teleprompter. There is only her, myself and a makeup person on the green screen stage. I have my laptop set up on a gray rolling case. I am wearing a headset in case the director wants to me to change the camera shot a smidge.

I brought my bass to work with me. If I get a quiet moment later this evening I will attempt to take some pictures of myself for a humorous movie poster fake that I have had in mind for a while. I'll post the result here on the blog as well as on my Facebook page. If I pull it off it'll be pretty funny.


...

Something just brilliant is bound to come to me any minute now...

Or not...

Well okay,  it's a bit embarrassing, but that's never stopped me before: Since I haven't been on stage very much in the past couple of years I think I have developed a little stage fright. I have been planning to prepare material to play locally by myself a sort of open mic set to get me started. I find the prospect of being alone on stage pretty horrifying frankly.

I think one of the reasons I became a bass player is so that I could be on stage without actually being seen. Many bass players are bass players for this reason.

In a classic paradox, once I was on stage though, I started resenting the fact that no one seemed to notice I was there or what I was playing. This is one of the many reasons I developed my unique style and have waged 'war' on the established guitar-centric popular music world.

Now, my stage shyness, realizing that the other half of my personality has put it on a crash course with he spotlight, has quietly found ways to keep me away from the stage. A sneaking fear that has made it convenient to put off going to open mics let alone practice the tunes I'm going to play. I have trouble even thinking about getting booked for a regular gig.

It's not being on stage itself that is the problem. Once I up there I'm fine. It's taking the steps to getting there.

Like any phobia there's no rhyme or reason to it. I feel nervous about being on stage by myself and especially singing even though I've done it before. Like many areas of my life I need some outside factor to trick me into action.

I was in a quasi band with another guy who was fearless about walking up to a club owner and saying. "I think you should let us play here." He is no longer around though and I can't use him for a mouthpiece and a crutch anymore.

I remember the first time I played solo at an open mic a few years ago. Someone on the Jeopardy crew asked me if I was playing out any where. "I'm playing at the Kibutz Room this Sunday," I replied.

"Great, I'll come see you," he said.

Oh oh!

Now I had done it. I wasn't lying, I was planning on going to the open mic they have on Sunday nights and playing a couple tunes during the acoustic portion. My subconscious probably took solace in the fact that I would probably blow it off for one reason of another and now those dreams of safety and comfort were trampled by the fact that someone might actually show up to hear me.

So I practiced, showed up and played. My friend actually came, lisen to me play and bought me a beer. He'll never know how grateful I was that he unknowingly pushed me out of my comfort zone.

I have attempted to do that on this blog: to hold myself accountable by making my goals known here. It hasn't worked as well frankly. Perhaps it's easy to assume that a goal I set several weeks ago like, say... "I will play in front of an audience by February," will be forgotten by everyone and I can sneak past without anyone knowing.

So here I am asking you to give me a hard time about any goal I set, any claim I make. Don't let me get away with anything. I need to play that Kibutz Room open mic and others... Soon! Don't let me weasel out of it, no matter what excuses I conjure up.

No wait... I take that all back... DELETE, DELETE!!!

I've been on stage hundreds of times