ABSTRACT
Students hear a lot of performers who are self-indulgent. They’ll perform what they think students want to hear. There’s a danger in that because their audience is their client. A successful live music event is a collaboration between musicians, the music industry, and consumers of live music. The audience are not passive participants. The chapter considers students' audience. It explains about them in performance and discusses how to turn the public into audiences and audiences into fans. If students’re going to have a chance at dragging audiences away from their television sets, they’re going to have to do that as well. Students need to engage with their audience, make them feel connected, perform well, and always, always consider them. The physical and sonic environment students’re playing in affects their performance and affects the audience. Good venues are designed with great acoustics, and with great audience sightlines.
