[RE: minstrel: Complaints of bordedom at feasts]

[John Ruble]

Vivien wrote:

Please pardon the question, but when do you feel it to be appropriate for 
the audience to quiet enough for the performers to be heard?  Only at 
bardic circles and arts and sciences competitions, perhaps?  What about 
those arts and sciences competitions at which the performing arts are 
scheduled *during* the feast?  Not everyone has a voice or instrument loud 
enough to be heard throughout a hall.  Should those individuals be 
relegated to performing only outside of feasts?  Should our larger group 
not perform lest we intrude on the conversation of the feast goers?


And I reply:
The successful performer sizes up their "canvas" (the audience) before they
begin to paint their picture of words and sounds.  If their audience is
boisterous, the performer needs to assess their own abilities.  If they cannot
overcome the audience, they get someone who can to give them an intro and set
the mood.  I no longer need this, but at one time I did.  I would find another
performer to make my entrance, or the majordomo-type of the feast could hook
me in to the audience.

I spend much time at events working.  When feast hits, I'm ready to relax with
my friends.  I will listen to other bards and performers, but too much forced
quiet is HARD on me.  And I'm not even a fighter!

Performances at a feast that require much silence from the feasters should be
advertised well in advance.  This give the boisterous a chance to calm down
before the feasting, and to come to the feast with a receptive frame of mind.

But I'm an Ansteorran.  Dinner Theater happens only rarely here.  When
instrumentalist show up, they want to, and get to, play during the majority of
feast.  But performance at the feast is usually an occasional song or poem by
an individual bard, or a song that breaks out at one table and moves to infect
half the hall.  There are at most four or five pieces done during a feast,
giving the feasters plenty of time to talk to friends and meet new people.

Ulf Gunnarsson


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