A singer with few professional credits offers a Fach-busting range of roles, listing A-house star fees, purchasable via PayPal on the singer’s well-constructed, inviting website.
A relatively unknown management company advertises its (unspecified) major industry connections and services in promoting young singers on a website filled with good-sounding promises—and also plenty of grammatical, punctuation, and capitalization errors.
An aspiring opera singer’s publicity materials showcase not only her solo singing credits, but also chorus, wedding, voice studio, school shows, and several non-musical services and products for sale.
Are the red flags flying in your mind’s eye yet? The above are real-life examples of attempts to market with innovation and creativity. Each is trying to show versatility, talent, and special services. Each is trying to stand out. But there is something “off” in the presentation—so however well- intentioned, these “innovations” could very well backfire and do more harm to the performer’s image than good.
Think about it. What makes you want to go into a particular store? Shell out five bucks for a certain magazine off the newsstand while ignoring others? Reach for the slightly more expensive soap instead of another with the same ingredients?
It’s the advertising, right? To be more specific, it’s the way things are presented. It’s their image. Time and time again, studies have shown that packaging makes all the difference in the way products are perceived. The exact same hand lotion, presented in a pretty glass bottle with a fancy French name, will sell for many dollars more than if it were labeled simply “Hand Cream” and served up in plastic.
The same is true of singers. And because, to some degree, our personalities are part of our product, it can be difficult to keep our personal and professional lives separate. When we think about our professional images, things like résumés and bios, audition outfits, repertoire, and, of course, professional websites immediately spring to mind. These are, after all, tools of the trade and how we often most consciously publicize ourselves.
Singers also constantly strive to set themselves apart in a marketplace filled with intriguing choices. So it’s good to be unique—if you are unique in the right way, for the right reasons. Of course, great talent backed up by excellent training and instincts for what you should be singing is always going to attract the right kind of attention. Talent trumps a lot of eccentricities and may even be enhanced by them. But as an unproven singer, how can you learn to show off your unique talent and personality in order to attract the right kind of attention—the kind that will get you hired?
Below you’ll find the first five of ten right and wrong ways to present yourself, based on real-life examples (be sure to tune in next month for the last five). Don’t worry. Identifying details have been changed to protect those who hopefully have since learned better.
1. Any kind of sloppiness: misspellings, confusing punctuation, incorrect grammar, inconsistent capitalization, unclear writing, broken website links, erratic organization, low-quality reproductions of headshots, bad audio clip sound quality, etc.
Why it’s not OK: Your publicity materials, including your website, are often the first impression a potential employer receives. If your materials contain many errors (or even a single glaring one, such as a misspelled composer’s name), or they are not well put together, you give the impression of being careless and inattentive to detail. If you are this sloppy on paper/online, what is your musical preparation and dedication to your art likely to be?
When it is OK: It’s never OK to present poor materials.
A better solution: If you don’t have time to proofread your résumé or vet your website, then they’re not ready for prime time. Don’t make them public until you’ve had a chance to review them thoroughly. And if you’re not a good proofreader, ask a friend to help—though, even if you proofread well, it’s always good practice to have a different set of eyes look things over for you, just to be sure you didn’t miss something because of how close you are to the material.
2. Quoting “reviews” that aren’t really reviews, such as comments from audience members or teachers.
Why it’s not OK: Quite frankly, it’s embarrassing. It’s the professional equivalent of announcing defensively to the world, “Well, my mother says I’m the smartest and most beautiful and talented, so there!” Mom may well be right (and so may all those fans and teachers), but her opinion doesn’t pull any weight in the professional arena, unless your mom happens to be Renata Scotto. Quoting reviews from any place other than a legitimate publication comes across as desperate and out-of-touch.
When it is OK: See above regarding possibility that Mom is a highly regarded industry professional. Also, you can use quotes that are not from publications if they are, for example, given to you in writing from a well-known figure. For example, let’s say you premiere a work and the composer is delighted with your performance. It’s fine to ask him for a letter of recommendation and use a quote from that in your reviews or bio, as long as you identify it as such.
A better solution: While it’s very frustrating to not have usable quotes for publicity purposes, it’s better to not have them than to use questionable ones. Be patient! Invite local critics to all your performances and persevere. Sooner or later, you’ll get some reviews you can use.
3. Overblown, unsubstantiated praise in your bio or unsubstantiated claims to major league support.
Why it’s not OK: Look, let’s be blunt. You may think you’re the second coming of Pavarotti—but if you were all that and a homemade cannoli right this very minute, your publicist would be writing your bio and you’d have lots of quotes from major publications. If you’re writing your own bio and struggling to find ways to make yourself sound important, you won’t fool anyone and you’ll only make yourself look silly. Avoid phrases like “one of the fastest-rising stars on the opera scene today” or “the most exciting young voice of a generation.” If you have to write those things yourself, then you are currently neither of the aforementioned. Along the same lines, if you want to claim ties to important people in the business, you better be willing to name them or risk others’ doubts about your honesty.
When it is OK: Overblown, unsubstantiated praise is never OK, although it might be forgiven in your parents’ Christmas newsletter. And if you want to name drop, you have to actually drop names for the ploy to be successful.
A better solution: Don’t be ashamed to be a beginner. Everybody starts somewhere. Write simply about what you have done, and make sure that you are applying for auditions that are appropriate to your experience level. If you feel you are capable of a higher level of audition than your current résumé warrants, you’ll just have to find a champion or two willing to talk you up and get someone to take a chance on you. While you’re at it, make sure those champions are willing to allow you to use their names. If they aren’t, they’re not really your champions.
4. Comparing yourself to famous singers, especially when your résumé is short on impressive professional credits.
Why it’s not OK: It makes you appear arrogant and sets you up to have something difficult to prove. It’s extremely subjective, and if your listeners disagree with your self-assessment, they may dismiss you out of hand.
When it is OK: If someone else said it about you in a review or article in a professional publication (hint: your voice teacher’s studio newsletter doesn’t count) or if it is a public, direct quote from a well-known industry professional (such as a conductor who describes you, for example, as “a young Leontyne Price”).
A better solution: If you want to describe your voice in such as way as to invoke thoughts of a famous diva but don’t have suitable reviews to quote, think instead of the compliments you’ve received. What words do you hear over and over when people describe your voice? Choose a few, but don’t go overboard. Your publicity materials’ purpose is to intrigue potential employers and make them want to hear you. Let the auditors draw their own conclusions about your voice. They will anyway.
5. Inflating your experience by:
• Trying to make a pay-to-sing sound like a pro credit.
• Saying you performed a role when you actually only covered it.
• Saying you did mainstage when it was just a student performance.
• Saying you did a role when it was merely a scene.
• Claiming you are engaged to sing at an opera company when, in fact, you have been accepted into their Young Artist Program (which is not the same as being engaged for mainstage).
• Trying to disguise the fact that you haven’t sung anywhere important by listing your roles separately from the companies where you sang them.
• Listing important conductors and directors you’ve worked with without specifying that it was as a chorister.
And also note:
• You have not been “critically acclaimed” unless the acclaim appeared in print. Nice things people said about you don’t count as reviews.
• Unless you sang the role on Broadway, you have not appeared in a Broadway musical. You appeared in musical theatre.
Why it’s not OK: Seriously, you aren’t fooling anyone. Everyone who has résumés coming across his desk has seen it all and knows all the tricks. A holey résumé can be spotted from a mile away, and it’s very easy to verify credits.
When it is OK: You can get away with this with your teeny-tiny hometown performing arts organization or in a concert bio. Maybe. But why would you want to? It only makes you look sad.
A better solution: Again, there’s nothing embarrassing about being a beginner. Keep your materials simple and straightforward, and focus on your strengths.
Long story short: Simplicity, honesty, focus, and attention to detail will take you much further than complicated attempts at artifice. Be sure to catch next month’s column for the last five “shall nots.” In the meantime focus on being your best self. Let your talent and hard work speak for themselves.
