Song and Show Basics

Let’s identify what we’re working with. A few of these will require some research — which is itself part of knowing your material.

Let’s start with the basics. Fill in what you know — some of this you may need to look up, and that’s a great first step in knowing your material.

Type your entire set of song lyrics as a monologue. One big paragraph with punctuation even if the sheet music doesn’t have it. 

Songs hide their secrets in specific words. Your job is to find them. Think of this as a treasure hunt through the lyric — every unusual word, every repetition, every ‘but’ and ‘still’ is a clue about what this character really means.

Now that you have been inside the words, pull back and look at the whole picture. What is this song actually about? Where does it go? Great performers know the story so well they can tell it without singing a note.