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I like the idea of the whiteboard, and currently use a similar system (without the whiteboard) I absolutely despise slips of paper, for this reason: Busy night, large crowd of people handing you slips of paper at the same time...first thought is who handed the slip in first, secondly, a hour later some guy walks up, "Where is my song I handed the slip in an hour ago..." Now whether it was you who lost it in the shuffle, or it was him who never gave it to you in the first place, makes you look bad in someones eyes... So, most people know at my shows that they come up to me and tell me the song they want to sing...I keep a strict rotation based on when they gave me their first song, First person to give me a song for the night, is first right after me. On slower nights, as I see regulars walk in, I will add their name on the list, many of which I will choose a song for unless they tell me otherwise. I know the regulars well enough to pick a song from their repretoir (sp?) and they will often sing it, I will also have one ot two others picked our for them in case of the occasional "That song is too high/low/fast/slow/etc... for me to sing tonight." I have a few singers who will never pick out a sing all night, yet will end up singing 3 or 4 and have a good time, they just tell me put me up for whatever... Often at the end of the night they will come up to me and say "I haven't sang that song in years, I forgot about that one, Thanks." I use a chart-like page with three boxes across the page and 10 boxes down each singer gets a box starting with the first singer in the upper left, second in upper middle, forth in the second row left box...this is my rotation for the night...I will not deviate from this rotation, even at the owners request, or a request from President Jackson, President Grant or Ben Franklin himself (happened once and I almost took that one) People know this system and know who they follow in the rotation, they know so-and-so is singing, I better pick a song quick, I'm next. They also know the rotation does not change halfway through the night. The only exception I will make is if I call up Dave and someone yells out "He's in the bathroom" I will switch him with the next singer then come back to him next song...if he's not out by next song, I'll announce "Going once, twice, maybe later" and If I see him return or he comes up to me he'll be up on his next turn around. Only a couple of times have I taken the cordless mic into the bathroom looking for someone... and only on the real steady regulars, great as a joke. One thing that really blows people away is a good memory, or the appearance of one... Simple trick I've learned... I have a spot on the top of my chart for the date, all my sheets at the end of the night go into a folder arrainged by date... I can see the door as people walk in, a singer comes in who hasn't been there in about 6 months, I know he sang before, but I can't remember his name...open up my folder go back to 6 months ago and flip through a few pages, find his name and songs he's sung...when he walks up to me I say "Hey John, how's it goin, been awhile since you've been here, blah blah blah, whatcha singing tonight?" He says "Blah-blah-blah by so-and-so" then say "Oh, no Iron Maiden tonight?" This technique works really well with the ladies too. Or make a joke about the last time they were in and got rip-roaring drunk, "Hey John, let's try not to swing the mic around tonight and dance on the tables OK?" Make a joke about it in a way that he will know it's not accepted ettiquite, and you look more like a "concerned friend" instead of a pain in the a$$. Do this a few times and not only will they come back for the "personal touch" but you also actually do learn their name and songs. Most often they will come back again and again. It works well since I only host one show a week, my partner does the other one. If you do multiple shows have a folder for Bar A, one for Bar B etc... only occasionaly will you find "Hey that person came in to the other bar a few weeks ago..." and have to pull the other folder. Well, Thats about all I have for now...hope you can understand it all, I know it was a bit long...
Peace...
Mike
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