Tag Archives: auditorium

a microphone in a spotlight in front of a red curtain

Quick tips for your dance studio recital introduction speech

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It’s important to start off your recital with a solid introduction speech for several reasons:

  • The audience expects to be welcomed
  • A great introduction reinforces your studio’s excellence
  • You should convey your theater rules
  • It’s a great chance to mention upcoming summer camps, next season’s registration, and any lobby concessions you might have
  • Congratulating graduating seniors can help retention
  • It’s an opportunity to thank your teachers, staff, and your dance parents

A great dance studio recital introduction should cover these bases. The duration should be however long it takes to get across this important welcoming information, but it should also be as short as possible. If it’s too long or boring, your audience will get antsy waiting for the real stars of the show… their kids.

Many dance studio owners would rather not give a recital opening speech themselves. That’s one reason why so many SOs are having me create a Welcome Soundtrack for their recitals. A Squirrel Trench Welcome Soundtrack is the fun, creative, and professional way to set the stage for your studio’s theme and performances. I even can tailor the Welcome Soundtrack to go seamlessly into your opening number.

And best of all, you don’t have to deliver the message on-stage yourself. Your audience will be delighted when you open your recital, show, or showcase with a Squirrel Trench Welcome Soundtrack.

Here are just a few of the many fun and creative themed Welcome Soundtracks I’ve created:

Airline Welcome Soundtrack (pilot/flight attendant)

Jukebox Welcome Soundtrack (Radio DJ)

Circus Welcome Soundtrack (carnival barker)

Television Welcome Soundtrack (Late Night Talk Show host)

Mary Poppins Welcome Soundtrack

Santa/Holiday Welcome Soundtrack

Email me at morriss@squirreltrenchaudio.com if you’d like a unique Welcome Soundtrack for your dance studio’s recital!

The reason you don’t want audio from YouTube videos

youtube logo (6)There are many reasons why it’s a bad idea to extract audio from YouTube.

1) It’s illegal.

2) Even pristine audio is somewhat degraded since YouTube uses mp3 encoding of any audio submitted. In many cases, it’s an mp3 of an mp3 of an mp3….. and the audio gets worse every time it’s re-encoded in this manner.

3) But if the above reasons are not enough to convince you it’s a bad idea to extract audio from a YouTube clip, then realize this:  In many cases, what you are listening to on a YouTube clip is the room in which the audio was played. Even if the clip doesn’t have audience noises, like coughing, moving around in seats, and other assorted venue noise, the audio is playing back over a sound system, and being picked up by a microphone, along with all of the reverb, reflections, and echoes of the room in which the music is being played. All of these things combined downgrade the audio, sometimes a little bit, and sometimes to the point of pure garbage. But it’s never as clear as it could be. And once degraded in this way, there is no practical way to restore it, except to go back to the original source. That is why, when creating music edits and remixes for dance teachers, Squirrel Trench Audio always goes back to source audio whenever possible.

If you want GOOD, CLEAN audio, DON’T get it from YouTube!

That’s someone’s little girl

She stands in the wings, her heart pounding fast
Her first dance on stage to begin, at last

Mom and Dad cannot help her, she stands proud and bold
Six million hours of rehearsal, she knows this dance cold

She strides to center stage into bright shining lights
Choking down nervousness and ignoring stage fright

Starting pose is assumed, she anxiously waits
Straining her ears for that first count of eight

“Excuse me! Pardon me!” a thoughtless parent cries
Making other patrons stand up in front of Mom and Dad’s eyes

Oh no! Sit down! We can’t see our princess!
We’ve waited eight years, can’t you wait two more minutes?

So the next time you stand in the midst of a routine
Know you’ve blocked us from seeing our young dancing queen.

—Morriss M. Partee, June 21, 2012

(On the DanceMom.com site, a parent wished for a dance version of the poem titled “He’s Just A Little Boy.” I felt I could deliver just the thing, and the result is above.)