Stranger jing-a-jings

 Oh.

 

I see.

 

You thought this was going to be a weekly, regular occurrence. Like I did 13 years ago.

 

No.

 

Sorry.

 

In fact, the only reason I decided to re-start this blog was after I made a promise to myself that I wouldn’t force out articles once a week, adding more pressure to my already depressing life.

 

Anyway…

 

Caution: This blog post contains spoilers for Stranger Things season 5. Read at your own risk.

 

I’m not going to focus so much on what actually happens in season 5. Instead, I’m going to focus on my biggest gripe with the show as a whole, and that’s the separate plotlines. 

 

Look, I get it. You have to break up characters so that each mini group can reveal a small piece of the puzzle, saving the big ultimate reveal for the last episode. But my favorite part of Stranger Things is really any part of the show where the characters actually come together and we can see everyone react to everyone else.

 

This similar problem is also the reason the MCU drives me nuts. But I’ll save that for another time…

 

However, as any opportune moment does, this made me think about a cappella. Can we learn something from Stranger Things?

 

Is it better to stay separate for a long time, and then come together only when everyone is ready?

 

Hear me out…because I argue there are positives to this way of rehearsing.

 

Yes, obviously the group needs to blend and the only way to blend is to sing together. But in a big group of singers, like a college or high school group, really the only way to achieve blend is to get each section to sound like one voice, then put all the voices together.

 

Spoilers coming….Watch out…

 

Only when the song achieves its perfect blend can the soloist really turn into the powerful Will The Wise. 

 

Next rehearsal, try this:

 

1)    Separate each section and place them in a different space, away from everyone else.

2)    Spend the entire portion of that “sectional” on achieving a one-voice blend. Record yourselves singing, listen back, fix, repeat.

3)    When you think you have it (or you’re close), join up with one other section and put those two voices together. Continue this pattern until you end up with two large groups coming together to form one giant mass of people.

 

My favorite scene in season 5 (spoilers) is the one and only scene where every single character (minus Vecna and Holly) convene at the radio station to formulate a plan. The best dialogue comes from these interactions. The funniest jokes come from these interactions. The most exciting build up comes from this interaction.

 

What your group is doing on a regular basis (probably) is skipping right to this scene by rehearsing all together. But this blunts the impact of the fact that everyone is in the same room at the same time. To really feel the power of this scene, you need to have gone through multiple perspectives, each following a small group of characters first. Why shouldn’t it be the same in a cappella?

 

Honestly, I even thought the finale was disappointing, only because Hopper wasn’t with the rest of the cast as they fought the (you-know-who). That blunted the impact of the battle, especially because Hopper was the lead “action hero.”

 

For the record (going waaaaaay off topic here), I loved the finale. I thought they nailed it. Powerful, emotional, and just ambiguous enough to crave more content. This finale goes in the “good pile,” where so few television shows lay.

 

Okay back to bending a cappella. Let’s address something else--a major character arc…Will. (Mega spoilers coming!)

 

Only when Will accepts who he truly is (he’s gay), does he unlock the power to tap into the hive mind and gain powers. It takes him five seasons, and a looooooong speech from Robin, but he eventually gets there, and in the final battle, he claims “We’re not afraid of you anymore.”

 

Here’s something else a cappella groups can learn from Stranger Things—the idea of identity.

 

Sit down for a moment. Comfortable? Great. Ask yourself this question:

 

What is your group’s identity?

 

I don’t mean you’re a singing group, you sing without instruments, you’re part of the a cappella hive mind, blah blah blah. I mean, what separates you from all the others? What makes you special? What makes you unique?

 

I’d wager you truly don’t know the answer to this question. You think you know it, but in reality, you don’t. 

 

If you want to survive in this rapidly expanding world, you need to figure it out. Because when you figure it out, “you’re free” as Robin would say. And then you can kill the Demogorgons.

 

Last thing (I swear). The idea of the “hive mind” I think rings especially true in a cappella. We are a single community made up of thousands of people who love to sing. But more than that, what someone does over here directly affects what someone does over there.

 

Say Ball in The House (hi guys!) puts on a great concert at Rando Calrissian high school. The audience loves it, they go online to listen to more. They spread the word that a cappella is awesome on social media, where it’s viewed by someone in San Francisco. It inspires a group there to put on a great concert, so they can be as cool as BITH.

 

It’s all connected. What you do affects all of us. When Pentatonix hit number 1 on the Billboard chart for the first time in 2016 (date?), it wasn’t just a victory for them. It was a victory for every a cappella singer in the world, because it legitimized our art form and proved that a cappella singing is marketable. Even now, when Pentatonix releases their latest holiday nightmare seasonal album, it brings a cappella into the public eye yet again.

 

Just remember that we are all connected. There’s no reason to hope a group fails, or hope a performance falls apart, because believe it or not, it hurts you too.

 

To wrap things up, let me just say this: Winona Ryder is the GOAT.

 

Marc Silverberg

Marcesilverberg.com

@docacappella on Instagram