The Ugly Duckling Turned Into A … Rockstar

by Cari Cole

Not everybody who sets out to be an artist reaches their destination. It’s for a ton of reasons, some outside of your control, but most probably because of tolerance. Tolerance for sucking until you don’t suck anymore. It takes a lot of hours (some say 10,000) before the ugly duckling turns into a .. rockstar. It’s going to challenge every fear you’ve ever had. And it’s going to take more than talent – try ingenuity and stroke of brilliance from the song gods. And it’s not even for those who are the most driven either – because drive is not all you need.

But most of all, because you will be the ugly duckling for a while ~ for a long while… until one day, you’re not. I’ve seen this transformation occur hundreds upon thousands of times over the past 3 decades of working with artists and being one myself. And it’s always such a transformation when it happens. In the story of the ugly duckling the homely little bird born in a barnyard suffers abuse from the others around him until, much to his delight (and to the surprise of others), he matures into a beautiful swan, the most beautiful bird of all.

The most precious and precarious moments in an artist’s life are before they ever release their music – in those hours, months and years of development. This phase is precious because the artist is honing their craft, finding their stage legs, trying to not sound awful, writing songs and hoping they don’t suck and trying to discover who they are. It’s also precarious because it’s not proven yet, most of all to them. The single hardest thing about being an artist is being able to withstand the period of time when you sound nothing like you hope, long enough to start liking what you’re hearing back. Basically it takes that long to get good – for everyone. Alicia Keys and John Mayer were known to study and practice 6-8 hours a day in their developing years as musicians.

Because it’s never perfect starting out. You could naturally have a good songwriting talent but your voice sucks. Or you have a good voice, but you sound like everyone else and have trouble sounding unique. Or you love to perform and love the stage but your voice craps out on you and you are scared to pursue a career. You end up frequenting the voice doc’s office looking for a cure. The result of all this usually falls under one of three categories:

1. Panic. You go into super drive and practice every single day out of sheer panic (even though your cats howl every time you sing). But slowly (oh so slowly) you do actually get better.
2. Compensation. You compensate for your lack of uniqueness with your creative quirkiness or humor. Like wearing Lady Gaga-like outfits on stage and hiring dancers to entertain your audience or playing the kazoo (and it kind of works even though you’re only at a local club and some people think you’re weird).
3. Avoidance. You do nothing but white-knuckle it through your performances hoping one day you’ll get better (or you’ll find that magic elixir that Jason Mraz and Beyonce drink) and then you will tour the world. For now you stick to local gigs.

So it’s true that this period of development exists for every artist (until they’ve been on tour for 6 months it doesn’t really get much better) – but it doesn’t have to be excruciating when you have some tools and know-how at your fingertips. Wouldn’t it be freakin’ nice to know exactly what exercises to do so your voice doesn’t crap out on you? (I mean really!) Or to know exactly what your sound and style is and how to put your music together in a way that brings out your unique strengths and attractive quirks? Why reinvent the wheel when there is a path and system to it? A system that understands all of your weird artist insecurities, meets you where you are, addresses the pitfalls, helps you build confidence, savvy and know-how, and helps you develop a craft that is noticeable and music that comes from your soul? Well there is. And for those of you that want to know more about this system ~ click here.

For the first time ever, because we believe artist development is the cornerstone to great music, we are offering early enrollment in our signature program: Step Up to the Spotlight, It opens today. And shhh… this is the first time ever in 4 years of running this program that we’re offering this low rate with a payment plan to boot (savings!!) — but it’s only up for a short few weeks so click here to find out more.

©2014 Cari Cole, Vocal Mag, Inc. All Rights Reserved.