#also sweden lets make an experiment. send a very bad song and let's see if the jury still vote for you or not

[this-is-a-name-dont-worry]

i think jury votes should only be used if the public votes for top are close enough. otherwise when there's a 100 points difference I don't think it's necessary there's an obvious preference

[nashvillesingersblog]

Jean-Baptiste Craipeau

Todd Wilson explores a cappella music in France with Youtube multitracking pioneer, singer, and musician Jean-Baptiste Craipeau

Todd Wilson had a chance to interview Jean-Baptiste Craipeau for our email newsletter. Todd is one of our founders and serves the Nashville Singers as Executive Director and Artistic Director.    

You can subscribe to our newsletter by texting the word SINGERS to 42828

Published December 11, 2017

TW: When did you know you wanted to be a singer?

JBC: I've been fascinated by and exposed to vocal music since I was a kid. My dad has always been a choir director so all sort of vocal music was played in the house and I got the chance to sing solos as well which reinforced my love for vocals.

TW: Your arrangements sound like they were influenced by the work of some of my favorite a cappella groups, like Take 6, the Singers Unlimited, and the Hi-Los. Are there other a cappella arrangers or groups that have inspired you along the way?

JBC: These are my 3 favorite vocal groups but I may want to add The Real Group, The Kings Singers and Bobby McFerrin

TW: Outside of a cappella, what soloists or other bands/groups seem to find there way most often to your personal playlist?

JBC: I've had some intense periods of listening to several bands for the last 10 years including Jaco Pastorius, Queen, Earth Wind & Fire, Bill Evans and Snarky Puppy.

TW: You have a plethora of multi-track a cappella videos on your Youtube channel. That's how I learned about you. Many of these videos have been featured in our newsletter over the years. As far as I can see, eight of them have over 100,00 views and THAT'S AMAZING! What about your Daft Punk cover of "Get Lucky" do you think caused it to attract so much attention - over a million views (so far)?

JBC: I had a pretty active period on YouTube some years ago where I built an audience. I tried different things and some of them worked better than others ! I can't explain why...

TW: Can you describe the popularity of a cappella music in France?

JBC: There is a scene in choral and classical singing in general, but the jazz or contemporary a cappella is not so popular. People barely know groups like PTX for example. They seem to always love a cappella music when they hear it though.

TW: In your response to my request for this interview, you mentioned being a fan of ACOUSTIX. I'm flattered. How did you discover barbershop harmony, and what about barbershop captured your interest in this American art form?

JBC: I started doing multitracks around 2005 and when I decided to put some clips online I found some guys doing split screen videos on YouTube ! I was amazed by the concept of showing each parts in squares. These guys were doing barbershop tags. I kinda fell in love with the sound of well balanced and tuned chords. I had never heard barbershop before, so I searched for quartets doing this and of course I quickly found Acoustix, which remains one of my favorites. The thing that I love the most about barbershop is the tuning challenge : the goal is to have all chords ring, which is the best school for a cappella lovers/singers. When a fifth rings and you hear overtones, it's a very exciting experience. Also some arrangements are pretty advanced for only 4 parts so I soon started transcribing songs to understand more this style which is very unique!

TW: Your a cappella group Accent is described as an online collaboration of musicians from several countries looking to bring you the best in a cappella and jazz.  But I've also seen lots of videos of live performances, tags, promos, and jingles recorded all over the place. My three-part question about Accent is this: 1) What brought you together? 2) What are some of your aspirations as an ensemble? and 3) What can you tell us about Accent's new recording project "In This Together?"

JBC: As I said before I was doing multitracks videos, and most of the other guys were doing the same. We all met on YouTube sharing our passion for a cappella/jazz/barbershop music by sending arrangements, transcriptions, rare recordings etc. Very geeky stuff haha! I first "met" Simon Åkesson from Sweden on a forum about The Hi-Lo's. I discovered this group through Take 6 when they mentioned their influences. Simon amazed me by his knowledge and very refined vocal work! I'm talking about 2006 or something, he already had arranged a ton of stuff, composed a mass etc. So we get along pretty quickly having the same background in music (classical, jazz, rock lovers). He's the most talented person I know! It took a while til we decide to record a song together ! It actually started as a quartet with Andrew (Canada) Evan (USA) and my brother, then Danny joined (Canada) and then we thought it would be great to cover Gold Mine by Take 6 ! So I contacted Simon again and the London Based James ! Funny thing is I met James some years before at a Take 6 concert in London. He reached out to me and from that day we kept chatting and sharing stuff together.

Our influences as a group are quite obvious. We love The Hi-Lo's, The Singers Unlimited, Take 6, The Real Group. These groups are the main reason why we are together! We recorded a first CD in our own places but this second CD is special for us cause we recorded together in the same room, all standing in circle. The songs are all originals from group members or legends like Mervyn Warren or Siedah Garrett which we feel so lucky to have around us!

TW: You guys recently spent some time with Jacob Collier in the UK. Is there a new vocal or arranging collaboration in the works?

JBC: This was probably the most exciting moment in Accent so far! This guy is a genius, probably the most unbelievable musician of his generation ! The funny thing is that he contacted me when he started doing his one man band thing on YouTube. So I really saw him grow very fast and big ! Very inspiring. We don't have any collaboration in mind at the moment, but it's a great idea...Let's work on this !

TW: When did complete your first vocal arrangement. Do you remember the name of the song?

JBC: I think it was Fly Me To The Moon that I wrote for 5 parts, later on I adapted it for 6 and now we sing it in Accent as part of our show.

TW: Can you describe the arranging process or what basic elements you feel every good arrangement should include?

JBC: I think it's important to have a unity in the song and to decide what do you want to keep from the original and what do you want to change...could be the tempo, the groove, the style, the chord progressions etc. There's so much you can do! You just have to take some decisions. Also the more I arrange the more I try to build a song. Starting somewhere and going to another place. Rather than harmonizing chord by chord or phrase by phrase. It's about creating some moments-tension/release.

TW: Do you arrange for your own multi-tracks or for Accent exclusively or do other groups ever commission you to create a custom chart?

JBC: Most of my work so far has been for my multitracks or for the groups I'm part of. But I'd love to work for some choirs or groups at some point.

TW: Do you ever encounter writer's block, times when your creative juices are not flowing adequately enough to get an arrangement started? If yes, how do you usually overcome that situation?

JBC: Oh yeah, it happens all the time haha! I think what helps me is to try to "zoom out" a bit. I try to sing the melody again and again, find a way to make it more simple and effective. It's okay to write complex chords but they have to work together too. A good tool for that is to check both vertical and horizontal approach to an arrangement. Adding some rests here and there, make sure singers have time to breathe etc. Simple tips but always good to keep that in mind!

TW: What is some advice you could share with aspiring arrangers?

JBC: Go transcribe all your favorite songs/arrangements! That's the best school! Start with easy pieces maybe only 3 parts, then SATB pieces then more closed voicings. I had the bad idea of starting to transcribe vocal music by Take 6! My ears weren't ready yet...so it was a bit frustrating. I don't want this to happen to anyone else !

TW: You've had a chance to work with some amazing performers over the years. What is some of the best advice you have been given by another singer/arranger/performer?

JBC: The best advice would be to listen closely, pay attention to details and do your homework so you are ready when you need to!

TW: What are your thoughts on the evolution of the music industry and songwriting over the course of your lifetime? Are you happy with this evolution?

JBC: I think the music industry evolved a lot with the digital music and internet in general. I personally love how it turns out : everyone can record their music with almost anything and it's easy to share it to the world. But it's somehow difficult to sell this music aside from touring! So the best is to build an audience that go to your show!

I kinda miss the old recordings that sounds very natural and live though. That's why I rarely listen to the radio because of these really compressed mix, that sound unnatural and unmusical in a way (No dynamics). My albums collection consists mostly of old CDs haha!

TW: Do you have a day job like so many of us, or do you make your living as a professional musician?

JBC: I'm lucky enough to live from music. I play in many bands of any kind, from classical vocal ensemble to acoustic folk trios, even some rock bands. I'm excited by any kind of music and I really think any opportunity helps me to become a better musician.

TW: What personal accomplishment are you most proud of outside of music?

JBC: Being the father of 2 kids! Alicia (2,5 yo) and Gabriel (1 month). It's just amazing!

TW: Do you have any hobbies outside of music?

JBC: I like sports in general, traveling and going to the beach during summer! Just wish I had more time for these things!

TW: What new and exciting projects do you have on the horizon?

JBC: Accent always come up with cool ideas to help us working with new people, new challenges etc. We really love collaborating with big bands or lead singers, so maybe we will go in that direction!

TW: How can our subscribers find out more about YOU and Accent while you're at it?

JBC: We are active on social media, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc. You can follow us @AccentVocal! Feel free to drop a message!

[ismael37olson]

There's a Road We Must Travel

I recently came across a surprising article called, "Should There Be All-White Productions of Hairspray?"  Talk about click-bait! I was dying to read this and see what the hell it was about. Of course there shouldn't be all-white productions of this show about race in America, so who's asking this question...? Then I read the article. and to my astonishment, the show's writers and their licensing agent Music Theatre International are both okay with this. In fact, for all-white productions of the show, MTI provides this letter to put in the program:

Dear Audience Members, When we, the creators of HAIRSPRAY, first started licensing the show to high-schools and community theatres, we were asked by some about using make-up in order for non-African Americans to portray the black characters in the show. Although we comprehend that not every community around the globe has the perfectly balanced make-up (pardon the pun) of ethnicity to cast HAIRSPRAY as written, we had to, of course, forbid any use of the coloring of anyone’s face (even if done respectfully and subtly) for it is still, at the end of the day, a form of blackface, which is a chapter in the story of race in America that our show is obviously against. Yet, we also realized, to deny an actor the chance to play a role due to the color of his or her skin would be its own form of racism, albeit a “politically correct” one. And so, if the production of HAIRSPRAY you are about to see tonight features folks whose skin color doesn’t match the characters (not unlike how Edna has been traditionally played by a man), we ask that you use the timeless theatrical concept of “suspension of disbelief” and allow yourself to witness the story and not the racial background (or gender) of the actors. Our show is, after all, about not judging books by their covers! If the direction and the actors are good (and they had better be!) you will still get the message loud and clear. And hopefully, have a great time receiving it! Thank You, Marc, Scott, Mark, Tom & John

As in Marc Shaiman, Scott Wittman, Mark O'Donnell, and Tom Meehan, the creators of the show. Wow... so... um... what do we do with that? And John Waters also signed the letter, the guy who wrote and directed the original film, who actually lived through the cultural moment Hairspray describes. Even if we can dismiss Shaiman, Wittman, O'Donnell, and Meehan, can we dismiss Waters, who's writing from his own experience...? Then again, once you really starting thinking about all this, it just gets more complicated. After all, as progressive as Hairspray feels, it's still true that the black folks in the story can't get their Happily Ever After until the "white savior" steps in on their behalf... So I did what I often do with complex theatre issues and questions -- I posted the article, both on New Line's Facebook page and in our St. Louis Metro Area Theatre group, and asked folks what they thought. That's when an even bigger surprise hit me... In the Metro group, everyone was adamantly against the idea of a white actor playing a black character, and the actors of color who commented felt understandably hurt by this; but no one seemed  to know how to grapple with the fact the writers disagree with them. That's what's hard for me. These four white guys write an insightful piece of theatre about race, but they also make this decision that suggests that they don't understand the issues around race after all, a decision that really upsets black theatre artists.

On the New Line Facebook page, people started posting angry, abusive, insulting, condescending comments about what a stupid question it is (even if the show's own creators don't think so), and how bad New Line looks for bringing it up -- even though we didn't endorse the decision, just shared the article. The writer of the article and I both agree that we don't like the idea at all, but we can't just dismiss entirely the creators' opinions, can we? Honestly, I could tell from the comments on New Line's page that most of the people commenting had not read the article, so they probably didn't know that the article (and I) agreed with them. I could also tell that most of them were white and most of them hadn't really thought much about race or the incredibly complex set of issues surrounding race. They just had a knee-jerk reaction and, like too many people on Facebook, commented on an article without actually reading it first. Best way to look like a fool. The big takeaway from the article for me is that this shit is complicated. And one sentence posted on Facebook does not resolve or explain it. My big takeaway from the reaction to the article is that most white people don't really think much about race and they/we/I don't understand the issues nearly as well as they/we/I think. One local black woman, Jasmine French, wrote very insightfully about this in the metro St. Louis group:

And yes, [black actors] can say with a straight face that we understand the show better than the writers... When it comes to the black characters, the writers were coming from a place of observation... They and their loved ones weren't in the shoes of those black characters... My grandmother always talks about when the schools integrated. When family would travel to visit her and how everyone would wait up for them, scared that the police or KKK caught them... My grandfather barely speaks on what he saw (he's from Alabama so we can all just picture how peachy that was). I sang "I know Where I've Been" for my grandparents, for the civil rights movement, for the black lives matter movement. The writers wrote it for ticket sales. Its a wonderful song, don't get me wrong, but just because they wrote about black characters doesn't mean they understand a black person's experience, and them attaching that letter co-signing and allowing this is proof that they don't.

Like I said, this is complicated stuff. We just announced New Line's next season, which will include the classic satire Anything Goes, but that show's "Chinese converts" pose some tough questions as well. Their portrayal in the script is borderline racist, and there's a long creepy history of white actors playing these two Chinese guys, which I knew we could not do. We're still figuring out a way to get the plot point across without being unintentionally racist. I think we may have a decent solution, still thinking about it... Bottom line, we'll never fully understand or solve the issues around race in America unless we can have a conversation about them. But clearly this article was too provocative..

So I finally deleted the post and the link to the article on the New Line page. The conversation was shut down by people who weren't interested in thinking these complicated questions through. In contrast, in our Metro St. Louis group, everybody was against the idea, but they had a conversation. Yes it got emotional (as would be expected), but not nasty. Personally, I would not go see an all-white production of Hairspray. I hate the idea, on both a practical and an artistic level. But I don't know what to do with the creators' position. These guys obviously have thought through these issues, while writing the show, so I can't just dismiss them. Not every issue is clear. Most aren't. And those are the ones most worth thinking and talking about... No answers here... Maybe we should let one of the show's writers have the last word. Marc Shaiman wrote this to The Huffington Post about an all-white production of Hairspray in Texas in 2012:

A recent article out of Plano Texas reported of a children’s theatre production of HAIRSPRAY that featured not a single black actor. Many years ago, when MTI started preparing for the release of HAIRSPRAY for licensing to regional, community and children’s theatre, the subject of 'color-blind casting' was hotly debated. Starting the discussion with 'absolutely no production can exist without actors who are the race of the characters,' I was asked by a rep of MTI 'Ok...what about in Japan?.' 'Oh...' I replied. 'How about South America? Scotland? Sweden?' they said. 'Oh...' I replied. I then remembered when Scott & I went to his summer stock alma mater when they performed HAIRSPRAY. Up to Vermont we drove only to see two Asian actors in Velma Von Tussle’s 'Nicest Kids In Town.' This was a company of young actors put together to put on a bunch of shows that summer. Were we to stop the production because it was unrealistic that Velma would allow Asian teenagers to be on The Corny Collins Show? Would that not be a form of racism? I thought back of when I musical directed a community theatre production of WEST SIDE STORY in Plainfield NJ in the early 70’s. 'Anita' was played by a African American (a beautiful woman named Audrey) who was probably in her 40s. And she was, probably, the only non-white in the cast. Should we not have been allowed to tell this story of the consequence of bigotry. Should Audrey not have been allowed to play Anita because she was black? Or 40? By the way, the kid who played Tony was REALLY cute. I have grown to realize that when you write a show — particularly one you are lucky enough to see have a long life — you are, in effect, giving birth to a child. And you try your hardest to teach that child what’s right, instill good values — and a sense of humor — and then, when the time comes, send it out into the world. My mother and father raised me right, but would they be proud of every single choice I have made in my life since leaving home? Probably not. But they did their best, I do my best and we authors of HAIRSPRAY do ours. A few years ago, we were horrified when pictures appeared online of a one weekend only bootleg production of our show in Italy that had people in full blackface. Really terrible images. By the time we saw the photos, the production had come and gone but we were put on red alert to what some people out there might do. So, we authors wrote a program letter that acknowledges that not every community on earth has the correct racial make-up to portray the characters in HAIRSPRAY as written. But that we did not feel it was correct to tell an actor they are incapable of portraying a character and hopefully moving an audience by inhabiting that character, regardless of their skin color. Which, ironically, is a huge part of the message of HAIRSPRAY. But that blackface was forbidden. Who knew we would even have to say that? We also stress to every group that licenses it that the best solution is to look outside their community until every avenue is exhausted. There are literally (and lucky for us) thousands of productions out there. It is simply impossible to police every single one but MTI does a remarkable job. As do the folks who license it throughout the world. I would ask for everyone to consider what I am saying here before assuming that greed and only greed has led to the decision to allow HAIRSPRAY to be performed to the best of the ability of each troupe that takes it on. This is an ongoing learning process, and we authors are doing our best to spread the right message and learn the lessons each production and each year brings us. Marc Shaiman

Is it okay or is it racist to let a black woman play Anita in West Side Story? Is it okay or is it racist to allow a white woman to play Motormouth in Hairspray? Two very different questions, I think. In a cultural vacuum maybe the two are the same. But we don't live in a cultural vacuum... I'll leave it there for now. But I won't stop thinking about this... and neither should you. Long Live the Musical! Scott from The Bad Boy of Musical Theatre http://newlinetheatre.blogspot.com/2017/07/theres-road-we-must-travel.html