One of the most valuable lessons I learned in four years as a voice major is the importance of standing still.

I saw several music performances over the holidays, live and televised, and they reminded of this valuable rule: just stand there and sing.

Now sometimes just standing there singing is absolutely boring to the audience. But standing still is much better than two alternatives:
1) contrived motions that don’t make sense
2) unintentional movement

Contrived motions: This is a favorite faux-pas of religious music programs. Raising one hand, raising both hands, raising arms to the sky (everybody in unison, of course!) and the occasional stepping-in-a-circle all can be found at your local church at Christmastime. It doesn’t matter if the subject matter is birth or death, there must be hand motions! All I can imagine is that the choreographer doesn’t want to get in trouble for asking the choir to dance, so he or she designs moves devoid of any artistic sensibility whatsoever.

Unintentional movement: I got to enjoy some fine examples of this while watching a PBS special a few weeks ago. The program featured several ladies with lovely singing voices, dressed in flowing dresses and performing outside a stone castle. The scene was set for an enchanting concert, which was rudely interrupted by the bopping and nodding of the performers. This was not a rock concert, mind you — try folk songs and opera arias.

One singer apparently decided that the best way for her to change notes was to change the position of her head. Thus, anything shorter than a half note required a toss of the hair. Another singer kept her head fairly still but was determined to keep time to the music with her body. The result? A performance more fit for the karaoke booth than an Irish castle. Both women had beautiful voices, but their performances were marred by poor performance practice.

In both cases, contrived motions and unintentional movement, I think the performers would have benefited greatly by standing still. While a bit dull at times, standing still can add dignity and professionalism to almost any performance.