What's The Meaning of a Song?

II was working with an artist auditioning for musical theater and we were going through her repertoire. She brought out the song “As Long as He Needs Me” from Oliver.

I asked her why she picked this song, and she replied, “because it shows off my voice.” Now, most musical theater songs have a big range and will “show off“ your voice, so I pressed a little further: “Well, why this song specifically? What is it about?”

She didn’t really know. Well, that’s the first issue —  do your homework! If you’re auditioning for MT,  you need to know the song, the composer, the director, etc. Walking into a room to co-write? Do some research on your cowriters — know their magic, their track record, their music! 

Regarding this example, you really need to know what your lyrics are about — in fact, before looking at melodies, read the lyrics to many songs and see what inspires you, lyrics that mean something to you, words you want to say in the world  — those are song you want to be performing. That can be the first step in choosing songs to sing; the next step is to listen to the melodies. Pick ones that suit you or the style you’re auditioning for, and if you’re making a song your own and you’re not actually doing musical theater you can always change arrangements and melodies!

Back to “As Long As He Needs Me” — the message of the song — she is saying that no matter how my man treats me, I’ll be there for him. He can be cruel to me, he can wrong me, yet in spite of my friends saying I should leave, I will be there for him. In fact, in the story, her man, Bill Sykes, kills her. It’s a cautionary example of domestic violence. Wow, I saw this when I was seven years old. What a thing to see.

So I asked her — is this the message you want to give to the people you’re auditioning for? If there are two four or seven people behind that table when you audition or now via taping or zoom do you want to tell them that this is your personality? Because when you audition for anything, they’re of course looking at your talent, but first and foremost they’re asking themselves “Is this a person we want to hire and work with? When they embody the character, do they bring something special to the role?”Everyone can sing. At a certain level, everyone around you has incredible talent, and rehearsals can get you to learn the material, the choreography, etc, but first and foremost it’s about YOU as a person. They ask, “Do we LIKE this person? Are they bridging their authentic self?”

The artist said absolutely not! That is not my personality, that is not what I wanna say to people!

Look at the songs you’re singing and the songs you are writing — is it the message you want to give to the world? Is it how you want to present yourself? Is it your truth? 

Ask yourself - am I being true to myself and expressing my character and personality in the material that I am sharing?

Find your stories, connect with your message.

Read the lyrics.

Know your material.