There's a Time and a Place

I don't know how old I was when I discovered lip-syncing. If they didn't do it on The Lawrence Welk Show or The Partridge Family I probably wasn't aware of it until some Super Bowl halftime show in the 80s. I imagine someone explained it in a way that made it seem like the latest technical advancement and necessary for acoustic perfection or something like that. But I'm sure at that age (and this age) I responded that it was stupid.

I can't say that I've ever been to a real concert; I mean the kind with thousands of people looking at a tiny singer on a giant smoking stage or looking at the tiny pores of a giant singer on a Jumbotron. The closest I've come to an arena full of people was at the opera in Verona. The place has 2000-year old stone seats and was built when arenas were used to watch real gladiators (not the ones on your big-screen tv). The lions didn't lip-sync in their day and I'd like to think Figaro wasn't lip-syncing in the show I saw ten years ago, but I may be mistaken.

There's one place I definitely wasn't fooled; a summer sagra (town festival) last year. Sagras on the island are spectacular; hot, starry nights in the lagoon, strands of little lights strung between the pink and green Venetian light posts, young kids running around without their parents, sweaty volunteers serving fried fish, and live island music written and performed by real islanders for other real islanders (and one American). I don't know the name of the band, but I know some of the members. I call them Five Old Guys from the Island. It's perfect convertible music and I've learned all the songs by heart in the local dialect.

This year at the sagra I noticed something strange. The singers weren't sweating enough to be hitting such high notes and they sounded exactly like they were riding with me in the convertible. The spectators were participating; singing and dancing like always. But the band wasn't. They were lip-syncing.  

Take other artists. Cary Grant didn't send Hugh Grant to the stage to fill his shoes. We aged and he aged with us. Painters don't start making photo copies of their masterpieces; their strokes just change. Some day beautiful ballerinas stop getting leading roles, but if they make a few lower leaps at a higher age, they still deserve kudos. So why do singers stop singing on stage?

If I spent a night lip-syncing I'd sadly go to bed thinking, "Wow. I used to be really good." I'm speaking from experience. Conversations with new people often turn to the past; I talk about things I was proud of. I used to run marathons. I used to travel alone to exotic countries. I used to look good playing volleyball in my bikini. But the applause for the way I was brings a sadness for the way I am. My past performances can't be lip-synced so they have to be tweaked. And if they can't be tweaked they should be remembered, but set aside to make room for new things to be proud of. Don't forget, no one really cares what Grandma Moses did in her forties.