Hi All,

Following to this post and your answers, I'm back to the forum.

I'd like to thank you again for providing so useful information that helped me a lot!

Here is my feedback.

I finally had three gigs during the past months.

During the first one, in May in a small American restaurant in Paris (!), I only song two songs (one with a pianist, another one myself playing the piano), it was BIG stress but the overall result was rather good for a first time (no lyrics forgotten, no real piano mistakes). There were a big feedback during one of my performances but I kept in beat and it was okay!

The second one was held at a great venue in Paris. Wonderful room with a real stage, with sound engineer, lights, return, wireless mic...70 people were there. I also song two songs, again one with a pianist, another one with me playing the piano. Big stress on the first one, I wasn't sure to remember the lyrics and didn't start on time at the beginning... But I did me job correctly.
For the second one, I was playing the piano so it was different (not facing the people). Still some stress but I was very focused on my job and there wasn't any real problem. The audience acclaimed me at the end, it was really strong and I was so surprised!

The last one was this summer during a friend's birthday party (around 40 people). This time, it was completely different because I had the opportunity to do a "real full show" alone on the "stage". I brought my keyboard and the required stuff.
It begun bad because I didn't have the opportunity to sing at all during the week before the show and of course, my voice wasn't trained enough to sing without problems the songs I prepared...

I practiced anyway my voice in the afternoon, before a rehearsal and balance, but wasn't really confident.

At 10PM, my "show" begun. I again did 15 minutes vocal practices and, this time, it was going really better...

I started playing and singing some quiet ballads, the audience was half-listening (while eating . After some songs, some people came to sing with my (I brought a second mic with a stand): it was become more hot and interesting.

After a small break, I started singing more "dance" tunes and it worked fine. People requested songs to sing on, I had 5 floppies of MIDI files so it was great!

Near the end, the whole audience was singing with me in chorus on a song, it was fantastic...

I finally song during about two hours / two hours and half (really don't know after a so long night)...

So, in conclusion, I'm very satisfied my these experiences and I'm waiting to go back to the stage asap!!

On a technical point a view, here is the gear I bought and setup I defined):
- Mic: I now have a SM58, Beta58 and EV 767. The later is now my favourite (thanks to Scott). Good "sound" and output signal. The beta 58 is also not too bad. I use the SM58 for guest singers singing with me.
- I bought a small Yamaha mixer, very convenient for travelling.
- For the PA, I bought an Altec Lansing 622 (?) multimedia system but hadn't the opportunity to use it. I use PSR speakers for my own monitoring.
- For the case, I bought a keyboard bag at Thomann. Great and not too expensive.

Finally, I'm rather happy with my setup. I've got the project to buy a PSR3K, a wireless Beta 87 mic and a real PA and it will be perfect for me!!

Bye
Earl.