Eekwol is a natural at interacting with her audience. But what are we talking about when we say “interacting”? It can mean a lot of things, and different artists achieve it in different ways.
In the case of Eekwol, she did the following throughout her half-hour show:
- nice eye contact
- asked questions of the audience
- occasionaly invited hand movements, call and response participation, singing
- encouraged small kids to dance
- invited a boy up to dance on stage and gave him a CD
- invited interactions in a non-threatening, laid back way
- performed in a compelling way that drew you to her
In other words, she “made friends” with her audience. We were in a tent on a sunny afternoon. Eekwol was very much in tune with the moment and the type of event, which was a festival celebrating writing and publishing. Her content was “deep” but she didn’t take herself too seriously, given the occasion. If it had been an event focussed on, say, residential school issues, she might have presented the same songs differently.
My hunch is that Eekwol figured out a lot of what she’s doing just by doing it. But it’s possible for a green performer to speed up the process of getting comfortable with audience interaction by being more methodical and deliberate about it. Analyze your set list. Find the places where you can introduce banter between yourself and the audience. Ask yourself questions like: Do your songs lend themselves to call and response singing? Is there a question or two you can throw at the audience for a general response? etc.
Think about possible venues where audience interaction will be easier. Get yourself booked there or organize your own event, just to get the practise.
Quick Tips can sometimes only scratch the surface on these kinds of topics, but if this is an area you need to spend more time on, see the resources under “Related Stuff.”