RICH'S TEN POINT PERFORMANCE TUNE-UP

1. Make eye contact, you are engaging in a conversation with your audience.

2. Use body language for punctuation, but don't overdo it. Be aware of what your body is saying when you are on stage. Avoid affections and inappropriate clothing. You may think wearing a funny hat is cool, but is that where you want the audience to focus its attention?

3. Keep the topic of your patter of interest to your audience. They don't care about the great party you went to last night, who you are sleeping with, or the mundane activities of your daily life. (Unless you are a competent comedian and can weave it into a humorous monolog.)

4. Your conversation is with the audience, not the sound technician. Get the sound right during the sound chack and live with it. I will shoot the next performer who stops mid-set and asks for more guitar in the monitor. If you are a solo artist you should learn to perform without a monitor.

5. If a song needs a long introduction in order for the audience to appreciate it, maybe you need to rewrite the song. There's nothing wrong with setting up a song, but a three-minute song should never need a four-minute introduction.

6. Performing means never having to say you're sorry. Don't apologize, it just calls attention to your mistake(s). If you forget the words: hum, improvise, repeat the chorus or find a logical end point. Many in the audience won't know all the words and won't realize you've forgotten them.

7. Deliver a coherent train of thought or quit blowing your whistle. If you can't think of anything intelligent or amusing to say between songs, then shut up. Be careful of ahs, ums, and other fillers that become distracting.

8. Practice tuning as much as you practice playing. If you don't have perfect pitch, invest in an electronic tuner and use it. If you play in more than one tuning, and travel by car, bring two guitars on stage with you. Always be ready for a broken string, and practice quickly changing strings at home. If you can think of a routine that keeps the audience engaged while you change a string, all the better. If trying to talk greatly increases the time it requires to change the string, politely put the show on hold and quickly change the string. Invest frequently in new strings to minimize broken strings on stage.

9. Attend performances by artists you admire and analyze their technique. My short list of outstanding stage performers includes Pete Seeger, Tommy Makem, Tom Paxton, John McCutcheon and Christine Lavin.

10. Always remember who you are, what you are doing, and why you are doing it. Never ever complain about anything on stage. If you find performing a chore, just remember the phrase "do you want fries with that?"