I’m not sure I understand ‘polished’ being negative? I see how it’s negative if it trades off against other things, like being a real community sing-along, but if somehow the community became better singers over the next year, holding everything else equal, that would be positive.
Is it that you think polish almost always trades off against important things in practice?
My own take is that in practice polish puts a new floor on who’s comfortable singing along, i.e. if there’s a vibe where everyone is singing really nicely, it makes someone who knows (or worries) that they’re not as good a singer feel awkward joining in. If hypothetically the entire community became better singers it’d maybe be fine, but then newcomers who weren’t as good would feel less likely to join in.
This isn’t strictly about quality, it’s also about style – certain types of singing sound more delicate and easy-to-screw-up-by-joining in (i.e. choir pieces, operatic solo pieces, etc).
(I’ve definitely gotten people telling me they felt they were supposed to sing in the middle of the 2016ish NYC Solstices because some of the Night Section songs sounded like they were supposed to be solo pieces. I’ve also gotten people who went to Bay Solstice, which often is generally fancier-feeling, and come away saying “I know Solstice is supposed to be like a big production thing, but I’d kinda like to have a small rougher solstice” and it broke my heart, cuz, like, that was the entire original point of Solstice)
in practice polish puts a new floor on who’s comfortable singing along, i.e. if there’s a vibe where everyone is singing really nicely...
That makes sense! I think Boston is far enough from where this would start happening that I don’t need to be worrying about it (and it would be positive to agree on the music more than a week in advance) but I see how it could be an issue in somewhere like the Bay where the level of polish is enough higher.
they felt they were supposed to sing in the middle of the 2016ish NYC Solstices because some of the Night Section songs sounded like they were supposed to be solo pieces
I’m not sure I understand ‘polished’ being negative? I see how it’s negative if it trades off against other things, like being a real community sing-along, but if somehow the community became better singers over the next year, holding everything else equal, that would be positive.
Is it that you think polish almost always trades off against important things in practice?
My own take is that in practice polish puts a new floor on who’s comfortable singing along, i.e. if there’s a vibe where everyone is singing really nicely, it makes someone who knows (or worries) that they’re not as good a singer feel awkward joining in. If hypothetically the entire community became better singers it’d maybe be fine, but then newcomers who weren’t as good would feel less likely to join in.
This isn’t strictly about quality, it’s also about style – certain types of singing sound more delicate and easy-to-screw-up-by-joining in (i.e. choir pieces, operatic solo pieces, etc).
(I’ve definitely gotten people telling me they felt they were supposed to sing in the middle of the 2016ish NYC Solstices because some of the Night Section songs sounded like they were supposed to be solo pieces. I’ve also gotten people who went to Bay Solstice, which often is generally fancier-feeling, and come away saying “I know Solstice is supposed to be like a big production thing, but I’d kinda like to have a small rougher solstice” and it broke my heart, cuz, like, that was the entire original point of Solstice)
That makes sense! I think Boston is far enough from where this would start happening that I don’t need to be worrying about it (and it would be positive to agree on the music more than a week in advance) but I see how it could be an issue in somewhere like the Bay where the level of polish is enough higher.
Oh yeah, agreed.
Missing negative?