Neko
Dear Diary . . .
Well, I am home again from Yuma, and I don't have good news. Unfortunately, I got skunked...I didn't take any of the top three places. Now, of course, I'm not happy with that outcome, but actually, it's OK in the end. Here's what happened.
I went, and I did my very, very best on both songs. I was relaxed, confident, and I had no jitters at all! There were 4 judges, and on my first song, "When You're Good to Mama", three of the judges gave me top marks, I believe it was something like 47, 48, and 49 out of 50. Great, right? The problem was the fourth judge, who gave me (as I recall) a 42 or 43.
As an aside, we are allowed to see our scores, but they don't let you sit there and study them because they don't want you looking at the other people's scores, so I am trying to remember them off the top of my head from seeing them for about a minute and a half, just paging through.
So that was bad enough, but then I did "Le Jazz Hot", and I got marks from three of the judges that were like 46, 47, and 48. The fourth judge? I remember this clearly...she marked me as a 35. Exsqueeze me? WTF? How is it that 3 out of 4 judges marked me very similarly, and one judge was so far off? Obviously, she had an agenda, and making sure I wasn't a finalist was on that agenda...and she succeeded.
Now, I will say here and now that the girl who took first is very, very good, she has a great voice, just ask Beanie and the Rattus. She won the first night of the contest, and I always knew she was my chief rival. She and I were talking at the break, and she said that she felt it would be between the two of us for first place...and so it should have been, because if the 4th judge had even scored me at the lowest of what the other judges did, I WOULD have taken 2nd.
I had people coming up afterward in disbelief that I hadn't even gotten third place, the comment "You were robbed" was spoken more than once! One of the judges came up afterward and hugged me and told me how much she enjoyed my performances, and she said that I was obviously the crowd's favorite female singer, considering that I had gotten two standing O's. (The top male singer? OMFG!!! You had to have been there! I can't begin to do him justice!)
I thanked her, and then I said that I wished that ALL of the judges had felt that way, but that ONE judge didn't care for me. She stopped short, then got a look on her face, and she said that she could guess who that was. I believe that I know who it is too, and again, there was an agenda. Oh well.
So where does that leave me? Well, I had 4 and a half hours of driving time to think about what I would do. I am still going to go to Laughlin. I believe that in an arena where those gals and I are all "strangers", we will have a much more balanced result. Yes, it means figuring out where the fuck I'm going to roust up about $1000, but dammit, I am bound and determined to score higher than those other girls, simply to prove that in a fair contest I am the better singer/performer.
Y'all, they done pissed me off!
But before you think that I wasted $300 in gas, not to mention wear and tear on my car, and on me, I am so grateful for the experience...and I'm actually glad that it turned out the way it did, because it just made me more determined to perfect my performances before Laughlin. I now understand something very, very important...I can leave nothing to chance, or opinion when dealing with judges.
I MUST make EVERY performance as much of a slam dunk as Mama is...in fact, I have to improve Mama too! I am accustomed to being able to work the crowd, which I can't do in these contests. So I have to go back to square one, and work out my choreography for every song, based on my having to stay on stage with a mic in my hand.
To be honest, I didn't do "All That Jazz" simply because it isn't a slam-dunk yet. I believe that I would have only gotten a 40 or so from the "good" judges, so that song MUST be improved drastically. I also have to have a really, really good ballad type song, one that I can sing softly and sweetly, using my upper range.
Here's the funny thing, when I was younger, I would have been a sodden mess from the unfairness of it all and the disappointment. But I haven't even gotten verklempt! I don't know how to describe it, but I feel as if it's all working out as it should, so I learn my lessons at a lower level, before I go to the big shizzle.
Believe me, I needed that prize money, but it will all be OK. I do want to thank everyone for your support, but most especially Poolie, Beanie, my Rattus, my friend Russ and Curiouoso for your financial, moral, and immoral support! Without the help of those people, I would have had no costuming, and even more, I would not have been able to keep life and limb together as I pursued this.
Edited to add...here's one other thing. Had ALL of the judges given me lower scores, I might hang up my hat. But I got damned good scores, which actually reinforces my belief in myself. Once stupid person with an agenda is not going to destroy my belief in my abilities!
Believe me, I WILL survive this, they can't rain on my parade and get away with it! And I WILL prove that I should have been their choice when I score higher than the other two gals at the Nationals! I may not make it to the Finals there, but by all that's holy, I WILL do better than those two!
|
Virtual Kitteh, Swapping, and Bird Bits - 2009-09-16
The Happy Police - 2009-09-11
The Name Game and the Pain Game - 2009-09-09
BIG NEWS FLASH! - 2009-09-03
