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Storytelling follows the 80:20 rule. The first 80% of telling a great story takes 20% of the effort, and the last 20% takes 80% of the effort. You can tell a really good tale by simply avoiding any glaring errors. This article summarizes a few of the essential basics to get over the 80% hump. A parallel article called Storytelling 201 goes into some observations on some of the subtleties.
1. Remember your goal. This is #1 for a reason! You can forget everything else, but don't forget this! Remember your goal. And your goal is: TO ENTERTAIN YOUR AUDIENCE a/k/a TO HELP YOUR AUDIENCE HAVE FUN a/k/a TO GIVE YOUR AUDIENCE ALL YOU'VE GOT TO GIVE a/k/a . . . You get the idea.
Call it "stage fright," call it "fear of public speaking," call it anything you want; the fact is, there's something about standing in front of a group that makes us want to curl up and hide. Simply getting up in the first place conquers the conscious part of that fear. Most of what I discuss below has to do with the unconscious parts, the various ways that we try to hide behind invisible objects (having notes as a safety blanket, memorizing, sitting, and so forth), tense up physically (looking away, squeaking, fidgeting, etc.), and commit self-sabotage (apologizing, explaining, moralizing, and the like).
All of those things are bad because they interfere with your goal; they get in the way of your audience's ability to enjoy the show. Yes, saying "This is the first time I've told this piece, so be kind" will give you cover for your mistakes; but it also makes your audience look for those mistakes and limits their ability to really get lost in the tale. After all, if you get "lost" in an unfinished piece then you're obviously really easy, right? And who wants to be "easy"?
Your performance is meant as a gift to the audience, right? If you get in the way of the story, you're withholding a part of that gift. It's unnecessary, ungenerous, unworthy and undesirable, so don't do it. This is one of the few rules for which I've never found an exception. Remember that your trying to entertain, and don't do anything that gets in the way. That's the goal; everything else is the "how."
Which reminds me of a story:
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Once there was a little town that was blessed with a wise and knowing Rabbi and burdened with a terrible trickster named Barbush. He wasn't a wicked man, but he had a wicked wit and he delighted in puncturing what he called "airs." 'Pride goeth before a fall' they say; Barbush liked to stick out his foot. The problem was that he'd as happily trip the innocent as the guilty, and that was a pride of his own that he never saw.
Barbush had dreamed for years of finding a way to trip up the Rabbi. 'Everybody thinks he's so wise and kind, so good and fair. He's just a man like any other. All that time with his nose in some book; how does that make him any better than the rest of us?' Barbush longed to teach him a lesson, but the Rabbi was nothing if he wasn't clever and the opportunity never appeared.
Then one morning he woke up knowing what he had to do. At last he had The Plan! He gathered his friends and explained it, and they too agreed that it was perfect. "Then come along and see how it works," crowed Barbush. "I'm off to see the Rabbi."
When they arrived at the Rabbi's house Barbush waved his friends off to hide around the corner and then composed his face to a mask of piteous yearning. He knocked on the door and when the Rabbi appeared he began to plead. "Oh Rabbi, I have seen the error of my ways. Please, I need you to teach me all the wisdom of the Torah! And the Talmud too!"
"Teaching is what I do," said the Rabbi. "I have some time this evening. Come back then and we'll make a start."
"Oh no Rabbi, you don't understand! This is an emergency. I must learn it all here, and now." Barbush went on before the Rabbi could answer. "And I have to learn it standing on one foot, like a bird." He raised up one foot, stuck his arms out like wings and waggled his fingers.
His friends began to snigger around the corner, but the Rabbi's answer stopped them short. "Well if it's an emergency that's different. Are you ready?"
Barbush dropped to the ground. "You must be joking. The Talmud's got to be half a mile thick. How can you teach all the wisdom of the Talmud while I'm standing on one foot?"
"Go ahead and get ready," said the Rabbi, motioning for Barbush to raise his foot and his arms. "All set? Go and treat everybody else in the way that you would like them to treat you."
"That's all?" said Barbush.
"That's all," said the Rabbi. "The rest of the Talmud just teaches you how. When you're ready to learn that come back and see me again." |
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2. Don't memorize or rely on notes. This is telling, not reciting or reading. Memorizing puts an invisible piece of paper between you and your audience, a barrier that may feel protective but really just gets in the way.
- BUT: repetitive phrases are good, especially for kids, and so is the occasional set-piece.
- ANOTHER BUT: If you tell the same story often enough and it will tend to fall into a pattern. Other people may differ, but by the time I get to the 500th telling it's coming out pretty much the same every time. There's nothing particularly wrong with that so long as the pattern doesn't become a cage. You have to be able to adjust the story to the needs of the moment.
- In the case of poems, songs and plays, make sure to learn the piece SO well and focus on interpretation SO much that you remove the invisible script from between you and your audience.
- Consider: from the acting perspective, most stories would be impossibly long as monologues.
- If you must rely on notes, use some tricks from the politician's speech making book.
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- Hide the notes on a podium, if possible. We've been trained to ignore them.
- Refer to the notes, but don't read from them. You want to look up to reestablish eye contact before you speak.
- Don't lose your place because it wastes time and ruins flow, but use something besides your finger to mark your place and free your hands. A slider can work, and if worse comes to worst you can slide your foot slowly back in a way that will help you to keep track of where you are on the page.
- Spend some time to figure out how to turn the lemons to lemonade. Okay, your stuck with a paper in front of you, and your ability to move has been cut down. What techniques and approaches will take advantage of those factors?
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3. Uhh-ming and Errrr-ing. Uhh-ming, Errrr-ing, "Like-ing" and so forth all come from the same problem: mouth and mind are moving at different speeds. This is not an insult because as often as not it's the mind that wanders ahead of the mouth. Either way, it's the catching up that causes the interjection.
- Learn to interject silence instead.
- Work on pacing.
- Practice more and learn the story better. Once you stop trying to remember what to do and how it's supposed to go, things will automatically begin to fall in place.
4. Look at your audience while you tell.
- Yes, it tends to make them pay more attention. But more importantly, we speak and act differently when we communicate with another person as opposed to the ceiling. It brings out body language, vocal nuances, better pacing, etc., etc. [Note: stage lights can really disrupt you because of this. Same with microphones.]
- Watching your audience gives you the best possible feedback, both for the immediate tale ("I'd better cut this short" or "They're really into [blank] stories today") and for improving your performance skills.
- A lot of times this is the best part of telling! Teller:Audience interaction is just plain cool.
5. Nervous Habits. Everyone has certain nervous habits. The most common include speaking higher and faster, hunching shoulders, playing with hands, apologizing, and losing eye contact. Identify your habits and just don't do them. Focus, e.g., on keeping good posture, controlling your voice and making eye contact. Acting confident will help to make you confident, and will give you reason to be.
- Personally, I take comfort from knowing I can hide behind technique. If I just do A, B, C, and D correctly, the performance will never be worse than O.K.
6. Voice Generation and Projection. All the rules for voice generation that have been developed for the world of singing apply to storytelling as well. Talk to a singing coach for specifics. I am not a singer. I tell stories because I don't want to be that embarrassed. In fact, my normal response to requests for a song is, "I sing for my children at bed time and my wife in circumstances I'd rather not discuss. If you're not one or the other, don't ask."
That being said, there are a few, simple basics of voice generation that will stand you in good stead.
7. How to Seize the Room. Most top storytellers do something to grab the room before they start to tell (usually a quiet thing that "erases the board"). |
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