For Parents of the Gifted and Talented

by Gary Powell

Every parent will be presented with different challenges and opportunities concerning the development of their talented offspring. It might be the right time to think about your child’s development strategically and not just a strategy for financial success but a strategy for nurturing a balanced human being who also loves to sing. Soon I will have the Guide for the Parents of the Gifted and Talented written and made available here on my site.

Singer, Lauren Tenney

Meet Lauren Tenney, a 15 year-old singer referred to me this summer who has now landed her first major record label singing credit on “Cheetah Girls Karaoke”.

Weekly, I become a music career consultant for wonderful parents who recognize their child’s talent and want the best for them. The book will endeavor to address all your best wishes and even some hidden or unconscious wishes as well. In the meantime, I will share with you in this post a quick overview concerning several aspects of the young singer’s talent and career development.

As more performing opportunities arise for your children to showcase their talent, you parents of the gifted and talented will soon reach that awkward stage of being caught between the excitement of emerging opportunities (which are your child’s and yours) and those hard-earned-well-deserved cautious attitudes (which are solely yours).

We adults quickly make the shift of assessing whether or not upcoming amateur performances at service clubs, funerals, weddings and church events could or should be managed into career-building steps for your young performer. Many of you will find a plethora of opportunies for singing the National Anthem almost anywhere. (I sang it while precariously hiding behind a tree at a veteran’s funeral in Huntsville, Texas while in music school.) This period can create difficult decisions for parents who want not only quality opportunities, but safe opportunities for their sons and daughters. For most of you, the ensuing love-fest of these events will eventually turn into a chore.

No doubt your off spring’s talent, beauty and youth is rich for speculation. My first advice is that you, the parent, are the one who has to step back from the seduction of the business and try to get a good “read” on the people with whom you choose to associate your child. Second, really get truthful about the source of ambition which might be a bit tricky when the whole family engages around this highly charged topic. There’s nothing wrong with ambition; it’s just important to know where it’s coming from and whom it is going to affect and for how long.

If the path leads you to music recording producers, always do research on the credentials of these prospective producers, remembering that having no credentials is not necessarily bad and having great credentials is not necessarily good. Listen to their previous recordings and have someone you trust listen to them also. Ask lots of questions about their creative procedures. (I will help you with the right questions in the book.)

If producers use phrases like “it’s just magic”, “wow, magic happens” or “we just wait for the magic”, then please immediately knock on the next door down.

Be legal and contract wise. You should examine length of contract, percentage of future earnings, who owns the master recordings and for how long, delivery dates, termination clauses, etc. It’s not unusual for the contracts to be heavily weighted in favor of whoever wrote them. Although “work for hire” contracts are many times regarded poorly in the creative community, they are one way to get experience, a little money and a session credit which will shine on your resume while you are still young and developing. (I will discuss fully the pros and cons of engaging in “work for hire” contracts in the book.)

Some of you will want to seek advice from your university contacts. It’s a good idea in that these professors are generally genuine people and assess talent every day. The downside is that very few assess talent based in the popular arts and fewer still have experience in the commercial music business. Call them anyway. The academic path has long since taught them not to extend themselves beyond what they can support with facts and figures. Also, their genuine nature inhibits them from just making stuff up in order to win favor. You will find that young, starving or just untalented producers will attempt to win favor in all manner of slightly veiled seductions. If you don’t have antennas for this kind of charlatan, then choose a different profession/passion for your gifted child which actually requires credentials from mentors and teachers.

I hope this primer helps initiate your strategic thinking concerning your young performer. I will have the full book version with more helpful information available soon. In the meantime, consider subscribing to this site for automated email notifications of new posts which will hopefully be helpful and informative.

Try these links to learn about TAG (Talented and Gifted) Programs in Texas:

Park Cities Talented and Gifted

(An advocacy group in the Highland Park Independent School District)
– Janet Hale, Chairman / Dallas, Texas

Texas Association for the Gifted & Talented

Eanes ISD Gifted & Talented Program

– Austin, Texas


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Battle Hymn of the Republic

A Composer’s Perspective

by Gary Powell, Vocal Arranger/Producer


“Battle Hymn of the Republic”
             Gary Powell, Arranger/Producer

Shortly after September 11th, 2001, a new century of American flag-waving began. It’s hard to know whether this display of nationalism was a sign of solidarity or just unconscious rage. When our behavior is unconscious, some simple math will reveal that the forthcoming ramifications from that behavior will also be cloaked. Whether war is in our nature or just our birthright, it may be time to step back and search out new teachers and healers.

On November 19th, 1861, Julia Ward Howe was sleeping in her hotel room at Willard’s Hotel in Washington, D.C., now the Willard Intercontinental. Having just visited troop maneuvers outside of town, her pastor suggested she write more appropriate and inspirational lyrics to the stirring folk tune, “John Brown’s Body”, which the troops had been singing that day. According to her memoirs, her own inspiration was born both from a “feeling of discouragement” and a desire to make a contribution to the war effort.

Fast forward 140 years and I now felt uncomfortable with musically waving the flag without acknowledging the loss that had come before and the loss that was now close at hand. With that in mind, this, a cappella arrangement, begins and ends with the simple haunting word glory. The musical treatment of that word and the word itself play opposite each other by design. In between these mournful bookends, you might hear flag-waving, hope, despair, victory or defeat, for it is certainly all there. For myself, however, this entire piece is about loss.

If war is a natural state of humankind, then it’s time to own it and change it. If war is unconsciously taught through the trauma of its victims to their children, it’s time to heal it. However, simple platitudes will not affect change until our enmeshment with violence transitions into a balanced coexistence with whatever the truth is about us. This is my best effort to musically represent that balance.

FURTHER READING:
The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness (1973) by Erich Fromm
Thou Shalt Not Be Aware: Society’s Betrayal of the Child (1981) by Alice Miller

LEAD VOCALS: Rayvon Foster, Alicia Jones
WOMEN’S CHORUS: Alicia Jones, Chris Martin, Robin Huston
TENORS: David Stephens, Gary Powell
BASSES: John White, Gary Powell

Recorded January, 2002
Musical Arrangement Copyright 2002 Jesmax Music, BMI

Listen to Rich Harney’s Jazz Choral Piece

“Jesus, Lamb of God”

by Gary Powell, Producer

“Jesus, Lamb of God” Rich Harney, Composer

Austin jazz pianist and composer Rich Harney has been gracious enough to give me permission to share his jazz choral piece, “Jesus, Lamb of God”, with you.

When recording choral ensembles, I prefer to let the music dictate or at least guide me to the appropriate recording technique. Budget, studio space, singer capabilities or even singer availability are all part of the equation. The singers, in relation to the music, must also be considered in choosing how to produce the recording session.

For Rich’s piece, I chose the choral recording method which creates the richest, most homogeneous sound. It’s a nice way to produce chorale compositions because it “blurs the ears” from hearing individual parts. Because of the tight voicings of Rich’s piece, however, we also took special care to scale the size of individual voices and vibratos. As you will hear, we have created a wide and airy sound with only nine different singers. All but the lowest alto and basses sang multiple parts on multiple recording passes, which is another nice way to homogenize the sound and performance gestures. Career studio session singers all become fluent in these vocal gestures with the ability to create, take dictation, harmonize, read and change quickly all within the ensemble at hand.

Performance gestures include the initial transient (how each note begins), tone, vowel sounds, vibrato, envelope (how it all changes over time) and release.

The men and women were recorded separately and in a “mid-side” microphone configuration. Distances from the mics varied from four to six feet depending on the tone and volume within each singer’s tessitura.

WOMEN: Alicia Jones, Leslie Whiteley, Deborah Leigh, Dianne Donovan
MEN: John White, Rich Harney, David Stevens,
Bert Meisenbach, Gary Powell
PIANO: Rich Harney UPRIGHT BASS: Spencer Starnes
(Choir Recorded by Larry Seyer)

I have a multi-decade musical relationship with every singer except for Dianne Donovan who is new to my studio. Diane is an announcer and producer for KMFA, Austin’s classical radio station. Welcome, Diane, and thank you lending your vocal talents to Rich Harney’s piece. Also, I hope you will take special note of Spencer Starnes’ wonderful bass performance.

Enjoy reading more about Rich Harney’s piano part and this production.

Art is Not the Answer!

by Gary Powell

Historically, humans have preferred institutions for interpreting life. Between wars and inquisitions, we all know how well that turned out. I have always considered artists better interpreters than governments or religions. (Read “The Boys in Red” to better understand the role of institutions in the arts and sciences.)

Strolling through Austin’s new Blanton Museum of Art confirmed to me yet again that art is not the answer to existence, but it is the absolute question.

The ABSOLUTE ANSWER is always going to win a bigger audience
than the ABSOLUTE QUESTION. – Gary Powell

Add in celebrity-driven drivel masquerading as art and it’s pretty easy to understand the smaller audiences for any art which actually asks something from its audience. The new millenium has birthed “shock art” as the new compelling art. Setting yourself on fire is pretty shocking too, but not very effectual in continuing the relationship with your audience after the smoke clears.

So, mush forward bravely with all your work. (The word work has been carefully chosen here.) Your discipline and insight will hopefully enrich both you and your audiences regardless of size.

BLOGGING TIP: Most posts in the “Music Business Advice” category began as actual conversations with performers discussing their individual careers in the arts. I encourage you to subscribe and engage in this very complex topic by posting your comments. Requiring a subscription to post comments is how we protect this site from rampant “comment spam”.

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Daring to See It


“A Chance for Beauty” from Aristotle’s Prayer

by Gary Powell

When the integration of the disparate aspects of each of our own histories is complete….. something wonderful happens. Before that time, however, we chase, run in circles and regardless of the goodness of our actions, seldom do we feel “complete”.

We chase, run in circles and regardless of the goodness of our actions, seldom do we feel “complete”.

We trip, stumble and run after beauty, as we each define it, trying to capture and hold it tightly… all the while claiming it “mine”. Beauty is illusive in this game and like a wild stallion is most magnificent when not named, penned, owned or branded. I don’t know what your job is, but mine is to fully understand and finally gaze from within the beauty that is me. In this ever so illusive place all my parts become one, whole and at once BEAUTIFUL.

Aristotle said, “All men by nature desire knowledge…” The relationship between knowledge, self-discovery and beauty are all intertwined in this very personal lyric.

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Daring to See It

“A Chance for Beauty” from Aristotle’s Prayer“

Galileo Betrayed by Inquisition


“How Do I Go On from Here?” from Aristotle’s Prayer

by Gary Powell

There are different genres of betrayal, to use a musical term. By definition, betrayals are compromises of our trust either by greed or passion. However, there are worse betrayals.

The source of these betrayals is always detectable in psychology, but how do we divine the source and prevent it from happening again? More important, how do we recognize any responsibility we may have in it?

There are those secret-life betrayals which cause offense outside of all acknowledged agreements or honored traditions. A Herculean effort must be mounted just to go forward after this kind of disconsolate discovery. These are the private betrayals, but the public betrayals can be more injurious yet.

There is also the betrayal served to us at the secret discretion of the institution, the corporation or… wherever large groups of individuals with, what Austin therapist Amy Person calls “lost voices”, gather. All manner of atrocities have been perpetrated on humanity in the name of “US”, at the price of “ME”. This is the slow-burn betrayal which can unknowingly obstruct our productive and passionate contributions to this world for an entire lifetime.

All these different shades of betrayal are common and experienced by nearly everyone.

On the other hand, we are seldom aware when our APTITUDE or our POSSIBILITIES have been hijacked!

Slavery, certainly, is the blackest of all betrayals as it extinguishes our corporal, natural, inherited, learned and earned humanity. Common slavery is easily identified. However, how do we know when our very “personal intellect” itself has been misappropriated or conscripted into service? This idea of “personal intellect” lives at the core of Galileo’s wonderful gift, which unfortunately existed during an unenlightened time in a place where the keepers of “lost voices” held court.

Galileo Galilei knows betrayal. Under the jurisdiction of the Catholic Church Inquisition Court, Galileo, one of the greatest minds ever produced by humanity, was sentenced to life in prison for THINKING. Actually, he was way past just thinking. His thoughts were not idle musings. They were scientifically PROVEN, yet a small-minded institution stripped him of his intellectual voice and every other expression of freedom.

In the show, Aristotle’s Prayer, Galileo’s grief is presented in the song, “How Do I Go On from Here?”, and was written from this intellectual giant’s very public perspective of his own betrayal. It immediately follows the song of his trial, “The Boys in Red”. It’s not a dead, historical betrayal with no meaning or feeling. It is a betrayal which we each may share with Galileo, but have yet to feel the knife.

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Galileo Betrayed by Inquisition

“How Do I Go On from Here?” from Aristotle’s Prayer“