Getting to the next stage in your career almost always involves incorporating feedback from many sources. But objective feedback can be hard to get—and when you do get it, it doesn’t always seem to make sense. Here are tips for sleuthing out what people really think—and for putting that feedback into a context that gives it meaning to you as the artist.
Request feedback on something specific.
General feedback can feel like a personal attack: what’s wrong with me. To avoid this feeling, try to find out what’s “wrong” with something that’s not you. Ask for input on your performance of an aria, on your recital program, on your audition outfit. Once you separate your ego from the object of scrutiny, you can be more receptive to honest input. Of course, general feedback allows critics to say whatever’s on their mind, which is useful. But, if something’s really bothering them, they’ll work it in the first chance they get!
Don’t just hear what you want to hear.
Most people are not sadists and will go out of their way to reroute negativity so it’s as gentle as possible. That means that most useful nuggets of information can end up buried. If someone says, “It’s time to get that big voice under control,” don’t just gloat about having a big voice.
Take action on positive feedback as well as negative.
The tendency is to think of negative feedback as the only kind that invokes action. If it ain’t broke . . . right? But learning what stands out to people in a good way is just as useful. Use this input to put your best foot forward and to highlight what you do best. If your French is lousy but your coloratura is sparkling, by all means work on your French. Meanwhile, get in there and blow some panel away with your coloratura in some other language! Just because people use good news to soften bad news doesn’t mean that the good news is insincere.
Most people feel it’s not their place to give feedback.
For the most part, they’re right. Your coach probably won’t criticize your vocal technique, and the audition panel will not want to tell you to lose weight. This can be a good thing: you don’t necessarily want “constructive” criticism from people who may not understand the issues. Your coach is not your voice teacher and the panel is not your doctor—and neither is likely to be informed enough on those specific topics to offer you real guidance.
Sometimes, however, wisdom isn’t what you need. You just need to get inside someone’s head and find out what they’re thinking about you, helpful or not. It’s not that it’s hard to get feedback—it’s just not automatically forthcoming. If you want someone’s unbiased opinion, you pretty much have to ask for it.
It’s not most people’s job to give you feedback.
Sure, your voice teacher has to correct your vocal technique and your coach has to correct many-a-nuance of your performance. But the average listener isn’t sitting on the edge of his seat taking notes about you, you, and only you. It’s great if you find a director who will offer you feedback on an audition if you ask. But you might find that feedback to be vague or otherwise unhelpful—because critiquing you is not his job. His job is to fill a role. He probably doesn’t even know why he didn’t hire you. He just liked someone else better! By all means, ask—but don’t expect everyone else’s opinion of your performance to be as comprehensive as your own.
Compensated feedback is a double-edged sword.
On one hand, if you want someone to take the time and concentration to give you her full and unbiased attention, and if you want her to go through the emotional wringer of having to tell you things that will hurt your feelings, and then you might get mad or cry—and now both her and your days are ruined—she probably deserves to get paid. On the other hand, if you are paying someone, you are the customer and, therefore, always right.
The critic needs to keep the money coming, if not from you yourself, then at least from the referrals you make because you’re such a satisfied customer. People who have their dreams crushed are usually not satisfied customers. (True story: I was once told I wasn’t fit for this industry by a judge who then proceeded to add me to his mailing list for lessons and masterclasses. I barely had time to let out a guffaw before clicking “Unsubscribe”!)
Try not to explain yourself.
I know you have perfectly good reasons for the choices you made, but there’s really no way to give them without sounding defensive. And if you sound defensive, that person will never bother giving you constructive criticism again. Instead, show others that you’re taking their feedback seriously. We are so used to heated, two-sided, litigious, and pundit-esque debates in our culture that a speaker can be completely disarmed to hear a listener respond with “Good point,” “You’re right,” or “I hadn’t thought of that.”
Of course, if someone is really harping on a point that has a logical explanation, you can let him know. For example, if you’re being lectured for not using enough of the stage and you have a broken ankle, I think you’re allowed to say something.
People like to give feedback on things that are easy to give feedback on.
Do you ever notice how much time is spent discussing one another’s audition packages and audition outfits? Is that because these are the most important components to a successful singing career? Far from it. But they are components that take the least amount of skill to analyze. Someone has to have quite an ear to diagnose a specific technical fault in a professional or semiprofessional singing voice, or a thorough theatre background to be able to give feedback on your acting beyond “Don’t move around the stage so much/move around the stage more.”
Clothes? Anyone who can pick up a trash magazine knows how to trash someone’s outfit. And your “five”? A few simple facts (cover your languages, pick from different eras, stay in your Fach) and they don’t even have to listen to you to provide commentary. You can spend your whole career going back and forth over these details when, instead, you should be improving your core skills. Sing beautifully. Act well. Polish your languages. Hone your musicianship. It’s not that your audition package isn’t important (it is), but rather than consolidating 200 contrasting opinions on what it should be, look for feedback on elements of your performance that are below the surface as well.
It’s just someone’s opinion.
If you’re feeling lost because you keep getting contradicting feedback, remember that they are just opinions. Even questions that seem like they should be cut-and-dry—like “Am I a mezzo or a soprano?”—are going to evoke contrasting voices (no pun intended). After all, if something were so obvious that everyone could agree on it, you would have figured it out by now and wouldn’t be asking for feedback.
This is where a trusted source comes in handy. We have teachers to guide us through the varied input we receive from all sides. We have friends and mentors who know us and who know the industry and can give us personalized advice. And, ideally, your most trusted confidant is yourself. Learn to weigh the opinions, distribute grains of salt where needed, and make your own call.
