Sing-alongs ain’t embarrassing. Talking without tone: now that’s embarrassing. Next time you need to tell someone you love them, try doing it in song, in a public space, with all of your comrades singing along in perfect lunchroom harmony.

This one’s my favorite. Drag over the black stemmed noteheads.

“Asshole” is a minor third interval, meaning there are three steps between the B-flat “Ass” and the G “Hole”. The singing of minor third intervals in mocking fashion, such as Na na na na Poo Poo or Farted On, can ultimately be traced back to the 18th century children’s song “Ring Around the Rosie”.

Another mocking minor third is found in the basketball chant “Defense”.
Drag over them noteheads…

Defense is usually followed by a three beat “cha cha cha”. This feel and tempo is also found in the 4/4 beat of the Bay City Roller’s song “Saturday“.

Another popular stomp and clap rhythm is Queen’s “We Will Rock You”. It has a classic 4/4 “boom boom plah” beat.

Baseball features this little call and answer song, arranged for hammond organ and a thousand screamoes.

The basketball analogue of “charge” is found in the “suck” melody below.

Now, Scotty Pippen in no way sucks. He’s made so many clutch shots and buzzer-beaters that the above widget should be ashamed.

Finally, we have the Wave.
The Audience Wave involves thousands of people emulating an oscillating sine wave traveling through a thick fleshy medium, while singing sweet sine waves gliding up and down an octave, known as portamento.

               I like Sports.

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The above example is taken from a live version of Harvest Moon by Neil Young. As you can hear, the sustain and decay of the final D major chord is completely drowned out by the cacophony of dissonant woo’s and arhythmic applause.

Audiences get lazy when they don’t have any licks. They have nothing to practice. They don’t get to have any participatory fun in the music created. It doesn’t have to be like this. There are things that an audience member can do to hone her awareness so that even at a suck-rock show, she can have a kick-ass time.

If the two aforementioned techniques of applause—claps and woo’s—were made to be musical, rather than noisy, then communication between performer and listener could be heightened, and live shows could be more engaging.

Check out figure 2—the tonal woo. For “Harvest Moon”, an audience member can woo the keynote D, to show her appreciation of tonality.

Henceforth, a crowd of people can woo the key chord of a song; in this case—D Major.

Now the above examples are not musically glorious, but that’s the whole point. Most audiences are flat anyway, because the alpha males sing louder than the herd. Regardless, the gesture of tonal wooing will be felt by the performers; just like how sing-alongs are more about the “along” than the “sing”.

As for hand clapping: might the audience clap to the tempo of the song they’re applauding? Try it out in the example below. And for the adventurous concert goer, she can perform polyrhythms on top of the crowd beat. Just use the natural membranophones found on your own body!

Try it at the next show you attend. Clapping in time and wooing in key. Fun shit.

Oh, and here’s a much better live version of Harvest Moon from SNL. It’s just Neil solo, without all the lame harmonies.

The need for clapping on the One is born out of fear and distrust of Rests; those unplayed spaces between the notes, collectively known as black noise.

Here are the four basic colors of noise. White noise is the shit on your TV. Pink noise is in vogue for neurophonic meditatiors. Brown noise makes any sentient being with an asshole immediately shit upon hearing the slightest decibel.

It’s impossible for most people to allow a rest to sound without fulfilling the urge to color that space with noise. A socially acceptable kick drum would help to standardize crowd rhythms in the right direction. May I recommend the Floor Stomp?

Clapping on the Ones is unacceptable. Why do white people do this? Haven’t they heard “We Will Rock You” before, or been to a B-ball game where “We Will Rock You” is correctly stomped and clapped out before their white eyes?

Here’s a most pitiful display of Clapping on the One. Of course, it’s the Eagles.

For Jupiter’s sake!
Clapping on the One certainly has its place, like say in a Hoedown. Although in this case, each clap is often accompanied by a floorstomp. Plus, in a hoedown, the feel is down all the way, with empahsis on every beat, so Clapping on the One makes more sense. Check out this song from the movie “Willow”.

NEXT BLOG POST: The Abolishment of Applause!