Tag Archives: Singing

Search Terms Make Me Laugh

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This is basically the first blog I’ve ever had.  I know I am late to the party, but it was something that I wanted to try and I if I’m in the mood it can be a lot of fun.  One thing I wasn’t prepared for, however, was how addictive it is watching your blogs stats.  Worpress (this blog is a wordpress blog, everyone) has some cool analytics software built in to the back end so you can see how many people came to your site, where they came from, what they clicked on, etc.  Most of my traffic comes directly from Facebook when I post links there, but there are a handful of views each day come from somebody doing a simple google search. Of all the data WordPress gives you, my favorite by far is knowing what search terms somehow landed people here.

I’d like to share some with you.

So this seems like a pretty standard day.  “Sex for Singing” is a little odd, but it makes sense that they would end up here, it has 2 of the 3 title words.  I mostly wonder why it has 4 independent views? did 4 different people google this? if it was just one person, why did they click on my blog 4 times?  You’d think after the first time they would figure out that I’m (probably) not going to hook-up with them no matter how well they sing.

This one is pretty standard. What I realized when I began looking through these is that there are people on the internet that just google Taylor Lautner all day long.  At least this day I also came up in a search including NYC.

Oh Goodness.  I know that “sex” is in the title of the page, but “Hot rough sex” you have come to the wrong place, sorry.
can anyone make sense of “football players downs their short pants”?  at least my friends Jerzy Jung and Christiano Ronaldo made it.

The weird things here are A) the search for “Taylor Laughter” – that made me crack-up.  and B) that I have never in my life blogged about Alan Valdez.  I didn’t even know that was.  just to make sure I wasn’t missing out on anything I googled him myself. … yowza.  I should do a blog or four about this guy:

Mike Fink…. Yes I wrote about my secret crush on a tall tale. I wonder why was he all the rage suddenly on November 2? Meanwhile, Lautner stays in the race.

Seriously, who googles this?  And it was even on 10-10-10.  You should have been out celebrating dude, that only happens once every millenium.  Even the Taylor Lautner people too the day off.

And lastly, today, which seems pretty average up until this one desperate persons cry help (?) at the bottom there.  Luckily I have also blogged about It Gets Better.  Watch a few and know that people out there care.

Anyway.  In general I’m disappointed in what drives people to this blog.  I guess I’m not posting enough intellectual material?  if you’ve got a topic suggestion (about comedy, music, sex or seriously whatever) leave me note and I’ll see if we can make this place more than a stop over for horny Twilight fans.  AND, Thanks very much for being part of my first blog journey, be sure to subscribe if that’s something you do.  Peace out. 🙂

Kerry Ellis IS Wicked.

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There is this woman.  Her name is Kerry. She sings the shit out of Defying Gravity.

Once upon a time my good friend Kaitlin and I spent about 7 minutes watching this video comparing every woman who has ever played Eponine in Le Mizerables. The entire video consisted of more than 20 different girls singing the climactic 10 words:” A world that’s full of happiness that  I have never known!”  Over and Over. and while it felt a little funny it was hard to take your eyes off of the subtitled names as the girls repeatedly belted away.

Recently I was able to relocate this video, which led me to look up other Broadway comparisons on youtube. Naturally, there are videos that do this for the show Wicked. And Naturally it’s the song Defying Gravity.  Now  I had heard Kerry Ellis sing this song before because friend Robert, of the Broadway Research League (here after referred to as BRL), had been intensely studying the song for the entire month of march 2010.  Thing is  that was a studio recording and with all of today’s tech stuff I can hardly tell if someone is AS increadible as the recording sounds.

So I’m watching this video comparing all of the different Elphabas when Kerry Ellis comes blaring through youtube. MAN. she sure is salty.

I am always entertained by how they each choose different places to riff and snarl.  It’s like any time anyone sings the song they have to mark it with their special sequence of added vocal gymnastics. It’s getting to the point where I can distinguish them immediately simply because one sings: ooo-oh ah oh OOOO vs. OOO ah  ah OOO  OOOO and so on.

Once I’ve established that Ms. Ellis is my favorite I do one quick search for her name and the song title and up comes this video.  She’s performing a version of the song from her album Wicked, In Rock live at the Royal Variety Performance 2008.  Even if Wicked is old news to those of you reading, I think this rock-concert version merits attention. If you are short on time… do yourself a favor… it gets ridiculous at 2:08. :0)

Favorite New Artist Jerzy Jung!

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About a week ago The Boy and I stopped by The Bitter End bar to hear his college friend Jerzy’s band. She’s great!  think her sound is in the vein of Sarah McLachlan, Sara Bareilles, or Vanessa Carlton. You can find Jerzy on Facebook, Myspace, and the iTunes store.  She’s got a new EP out, Hello Desire, below is the first song titled Black Dress, White Dress. Enjoy and check her out!

We saw this post coming…

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I hesitated in posting this.  If I’m going to blog about songs and music as a gay man then mentioning Dreamgirls is neither daring nor original.  All  the same, this recording does have TWO incredible singers in an almost laughable duet.  So there.  Laughter and Singing! Stay tuned for Sex next week!

Do yourself a favor, if you aren’t interested in watching the whole thing,  Skip ahead to 5:14.  I cannot stop smiling at the polite silence between Hudson’s riff and Holiday’s riff.  (Holiday’s riff alone- my god!) This may be the most soul I’ve ever scene in one place.  In the future I’ll be more original.

La Cage vs. MJ vs. Gaga

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Eventually I was going to have to mention that I work at Samuel French. SF is a play publisher and licensing house.  This means that theaters, churches or schools apply to us for performance rights for any of the titles in our catalogue.  Recently we were astonished when a public school in New York City (less than a mile from Broadway) was approved to perform La Cage Aux Folles.

We were suprised not only someone so near would be approved, not only that a school with kids aged 7-12 was doing La Cage,  But also …because it was school for children with special needs.  All of my office mates wanted to go, but I was really torn from the beginning. I wanted to absolutely make sure that we weren’t attending in a mean spirited way.  I went.

Before the curtain the director made a very impassioned speech at the beginning explaining to the roomful of parents WHY she had chosen to do La Cage aux Folles with Middle-School kids. She spoke out against gay slurs and general intolerance of difference. After a short scene inwhich young kids simulated calling each other fags on the playground the director resumed her talk, and explained that her greatest gift to these children would be to teach them that EVERYONE operates differently, but that doesn’t mean that ANYONE is less.

I was really moved by how she pulled everything together and later on I was really effected by the 12 year old boy from a special needs school singing I am what I am…but I did laugh. a lot.  Not at the kids, but at the show itself.  This school and changed, rearranged, added and cut and insane amount of material.  To give you a slight idea…here is the songlist from the evening:

We Are Family*
Speechless**
The Way you Make Me Feel**
With You on my Arm***
Human Nature**
I Am What I am***

Intermission

Bad**
Look Over There***
ABC****
Best of Times is Now***
Papparazzi*****
We Are Family (Reprise)*
I Am What I Am (Reprise)***
Human Nature (Reprise)**

KEY for Song credit:
*Pointer Sisters
**Michael Jackson
***Jerry Herman (the creator of La Cage Aux Folles)
****The Jackson 5
*****Lady Gaga

This show was hysterical. Aside from the fact that the whole show ended with the a reprise of Michael Jackson’s Human Nature, I most enjoyed “ABC” which was actually sung outside the story arc of La Cage by a student who was was discontent with the casting of “spring play twenty-ten” and wanted a solo although cast in the ensemble.  this was all explained in the preceding monologue.  How Meta!