The McVie Show Season 4

Some people asked me why I don’t like “Seasons Of Love”. I suppose they haven’t read the comments page of that particular episode (“Pet Sound Peeve”) so for their sake I’m posting a portion of it here. And I’ll add some stuff that I forgot to mention earlier just for clarity’s sake.

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NELZ: I understand what you mean. Some people I know can be so O.A. when they sing this piece! Nakakainis at ang sarap sabunutan lalo na pag feel na feel niya yung song. Nakakakilabot ever.

Just a piece of info: I sang this song for three seasons in choir, and according to the choral music piece that we used, it's supposed to be sung “hushed but strong.” I guess for some singers, the “hushed but strong” sounded like earnestness. ;-)

On our last performance of the song, we had to “pull back” from singing it earnestly [meaning not yodelling out the word “love” in the high registers] and let it just let it flow. It sounded great, in my opinion.



And yes, I abhor the dance version. ;-)

McVIE: That’s precisely it! “Hushed but strong” should be the appropriate approach to the song.



My friend and theater director Ricky A. and I had this discussion about art, specifically on acting. He doesn’t like how some actors have misunderstood the idea of Method Acting and of Eric Morris. Some actors think that an unbridled show of anger or fear or sadness, as long as it’s truthful, is already considered “good acting.” Ricky disagrees with that.

For him, emotion has to be filtered through a rational and conscious choice by the actor on how to release and express said emotion. Meaning, it’s not enough that you are angry when the scene calls for your character to be angry; that’s not art. Art is when there’s creative control over that anger, an acting choice that the actor picks to add layer to that anger: Is it anger with fear? Anger with disillusionment? Or anger masking a deeper emotion of, say, lust? For Ricky, that kind is the more skillful kind of acting, instead of straightforward, full-tilt, one-layer of emotion.
Because in reality, except for babies, people often do not show just one pure emotion—people’s reactions are a mixture of different emotions.

So going back to the song: singing it earnestly renders it OA because it’s just adding a same layer. Whereas there’s an interesting counter-point to the simple earnest lyrics if the song was sung hushed (but strong).

So going back to the song: singing it earnestly renders it OA because it’s just adding a same layer. Whereas there’s an interesting counter-point to the simple earnest lyrics if the song was sung hushed (but strong).

It was a great choice for your choir to “pull back” and just let the song flow. That way the words will speak for themselves; if sung earnestly, it would be like the words were underlined, italicized and printed in bold all at once! With matching exclamation point! Hindi ba OA? Hindi ba nakaka-irita?