Frankly speaking, I had no idea what to expect. Tiffany Alvord‘s music lives inside YouTube. The production quality of her music videos is professional. I don’t YouTube often. But I enjoy celebrity artists like Tiffany who push out good stuffs regularly. Close to 1.3 million subscribers is quite a milestone. Bear in mind that she does not seem to have the backing of the traditional music industry. So, viewers stay onto her – I would suppose – because her cover music interpretation is good, and she has a personality to back it up.
But what about a Tiffany Alvord concert?
After I bought a pair of tickets, my brother-in-law Eric who is also into YouTube music artists asked a very valid question, “Can she sing live?”
I had no idea. Unlike another YouTube artist Bri or Kina Grannis whom I have heard them recorded live, I don’t recall Tiffany demonstrating her vocal ability without all the fancy processing tools. Also, I was thinking. Just how many of us in a tiny country like Singapore have heard of Tiffany Alvord, willing to fork out some money and time and watch her concert?
Turns out she has amassed quite a sizable fan base here. Amazing.
I took a picture of the stage before the show started.
The venue was Singapore Conference Hall. Quite an unusual place for a pop concert. More like an auditorium and it is located in the heart of central business district. By my calculation, there is a seating capacity of 1,000. Mostly filled. Mostly teenagers. The sound system is okay. A young girl named Natalie Hiong opened the show. Previously worked as an investment banker in UK, she is now pursuing her music career in Singapore. She has the look, not too sure about the voice. Or perhaps the monitor speakers setup was not right and she couldn’t hear herself. In any case, it is hard to stand in between the audience and the main artist. I lost focus after her first song.
When Tiffany emerged from the backstage, the crowd was somewhat lukewarm. There was no live band. She sang using a prerecorded music track, which was like a karaoke. Very strange. She sang OK, a bit of pitch problem here and there. As the crowd got warmer, she got more relaxed. The concert came alive when finally, a band arrived at the stage. By the look of it, these were young local session artists. The band was OK, certainly much better than having the soundtrack played in the beginning. It is quite obvious that the 20 years old Tiffany is new to performance. The band is new to her music too. Together, they played a mix of her original music and her cover ones. I didn’t see much connection between Tiffany and the band though. Maybe the band was added in the last minute. No idea.
At one point of her concert, Tiffany has invited someone called Marcus onto the stage for one song. Apparently, he flew in from Europe, has helped in the design of her tour T-shirts. That was neat. The things she does to her fans with her singing and him sitting at a stool. After Marcus returned to his seat, Tiffany realized that she has lost her guitar pick and she did not carry any extra. So she asked the guitarist behind for a spare one. One guy at the front row offered her a guitar pick and she has decided to use the one from her fan instead. That was sweet.
And there was an intermission! Amazing. An intermission for a pop concert is definitely a first for Cynthia and I. According to Tiffany, last evening was the longest performance for her. Almost a two-hour show, that is pretty respectable. Quite a few Western International stars only perform a one-hour long concert. Then more singing using a prerecorded soundtrack. One time, the sound engineer played the wrong track that came with the vocal. Oops. She stopped and restarted. Still the wrong one. Uh oh. Awkward. She asked the crowd if it was OK for her to sing acoustic with her playing the guitar. Of course that was OK. Take 3 here we went. Tiffany is not a guitar player. But personally, I enjoy her singing with her acoustic guitar (not exactly hers as she has left her guitar in California, strangely so). Much livelier that way. Her song “Possibility” could have been a disaster, with the stop’s-and-go’s due to technical problems. She managed to turn that around. That impromptu acoustic version could easily be my favorite performance of the evening.
Then the band came out. And then midway Tiffany switched back to karaoke mode with the band still on stage. That was odd. After a few more songs, she has finally dropped the karaoke for the remaining show. The entire concert was filled with a lot of I-love-you’s from the audience. A lot of I-love-you-too’s from Tiffany. Her cover version of Taylor Swift’s We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together is probably the highlight of the concert. Glad You Came was the last song of the set. Or so she said.
But you know how concerts are like. The audience are supposed to scream for encore. And then the artist would return to the stage and perform another number or two. When Tiffany and the band dived into the backstage, the venue was still dimmed signalling a high possibility that there was more. All of a sudden, the few feeble scream of encore was drown by a series of loud stomping sound from left to right, towards the exit. Singaporean audience was storming out of the venue like packs of zebras in Africa sensing a tiger nearby. These people were in such an urgency as though they were running for their lives! What’s up?!
Cynthia caught the band peeping from the backstage to see if they should make a return. By then, more than three-quarter of the crowd has gone or were making a hasty exit. The organizer has then decided to turn up the light and announce the end of the concert. That was really odd, especially when you are new to Singapore.
Here in Singapore, we are known for two things. Impatience and queue loving. The whole crowd has migrated from the concert hall to the main lobby within minutes, queuing up and waiting for – I suppose – meet the artist session. That got me thinking. Do the majority care about the music? Or more about meeting the person behind YouTube? Now, I would never know if my favorite Tiffany’s cover of Payphone – the video that got me subscribed to her – was indeed on the encore list.
Very uniquely Singapore, people rather queue up to meet Tiffany after the show than to wait for an encore.
An interesting experience no doubt. I am hoping that artists promoting their works without the music industry support can make it in this business. Clearly, the music industry plays a role in promoting the music and making the live performance more polished and professional. As I was watching Tiffany Alvord on stage, I could not help but to think of all the cover bands in the region that play in local pubs and even Hard Rock Cafe. They can do cover songs so much better. If only they have entered into the game of YouTube as well.
Maybe that was why I was wishing for a glass of beer as I watched Tiffany Alvord on stage.