An Accompanist's Nightmare

Two days ago, I accompanied one of my students for her audition at LaSalle. When I started playing the piano, I had a bit of a nightmare....

1) The Piano was super sensitive...
2) It was very very loud
3) Couldn't control the tone much.
4) The chair at the piano was very high and the other chairs in the room looked too low, so I just stuck it out.

As she was singing, I tried very hard not to make the piano sound loud or drown her out. Luckily she said at the end of it that, "She didn't notice the piano", which was really the best answer I could have gotten from her.

Well, anyway, here's some tips for those who are accompanying vocalists for the first time:

1) Watch the balance between the piano and singer. Very often, it's very easy to drown out the singer. For singers who are less experienced or with softer voices, you will definitely have to play a lot softer so that the singers can be heard.

2) Listen to the singer and follow the singer's rhythm and breathing. Often singers have their own rhythms! It's important to strike a balance between keeping a steady beat, listening to the singer and taking the lead when necessary (eg when the singer gets nervous and starts to speed up, or when the singer gets lost in his/her own world)

3) Play so that the singer sounds good. Support the singer with the melody line if necessary (especially in parts where he/she can be pitchy) and enhance the harmonies in the chords, so that the singer sounds supported. Also discuss expression markings so that you can support the singer in creating the desired expressions.

4) Be alert. If something unexpected happens during performance, continue to play and cover up the mistakes in a most discrete manner. If you have to improvise the passage, do it so that the performance will still sound great.

5) Finally enjoy yourself and remember your role as the accompanist not the soloist. The best performance is when accompanist and singer are working hand-in-hand together to create a memorable performance.