One of the few good things to have come out of quarantine season is the opportunity to come together over social media with people from different parts of the world. This week, the battle of two legendary producers, Teddy Riley and Babyface united RnB music lovers from every continent over instagram live, as each producer played a selection of 20 songs from their considerable back catalogues.
The starting point here is that each man has achieved considerable success and has nothing to prove to anyone. The real winners were us – the audience of music lovers who tuned in. The third aspect of this exciting showdown were the audience comments which felt like having your favourite comedian perform during a concert with one of your favourite artists. The music brought back great memories and the comments provided constant levity.
As I enjoyed the performance, I was struck by the qualities that both Teddy Riley and Babyface demonstrated during their two attempts to have their musical battle. I was impressed by how Babyface showed up each time prepared, calm and not taking himself too seriously even though he had frankly earned the right to do so. Teddy Riley on the other hand, was able to laugh at himself, take feedback and try again when the first attempt did not work out. Here are some of the additional lessons that I took away from the battle;
Preparation
Babyface re-arranged his songs so that they included the bridges and hooks that were familiar to the audience. This would presumably have taken him some time to do prior to the battle. He did not have to do this. He could have just shown up and gotten by, but in the spirit of excellence he put in the preparation and thought ahead to what would be the most efficient way of sharing his music. Not only that, but he also prepared the environment before the show. He had candles, flowers, some of his Grammys, a guitar, some rose and I am guessing a phone, laptop and headphones. He ensured that he had given thought to everything he would need prior to the instagram live battle.
Keeping it simple
The first attempt at the music battle saw babyface show up alone and Teddy with a full backing band, a DJ and a hype man. All of the equipment corrupted his sound quality causing the first night’s show to be cancelled. Ironically, even though Babyface showed up alone, his sound quality was far superior than his opponents. To his credit Teddy Riley took the feedback and kept things simple the second time around.
Know your audience
The songs babyface chose were not necessarily the songs that had the most commercial appeal or had the most name recognition. Instead he picked songs that were filled with nostalgia, songs from the waiting to exhale movie soundtrack and boomerang. Songs that meant something to African American culture, and rather than try to impress us, he made us feel something. The comments were filled with people remembering times in their lives when they heard the song and at the end, when he played a medley of music by Cece Winans, Whitney Houston and Mariah Carey, the audience started expressing their gratitude to him. Days later, people were still commenting on how they felt that night and I believe it will be one of the lasting fun memories of this season.
Passion
Babyface and Teddy are both clearly passionate about their music and proud of their respective bodies of work. That was evident as they played track after track and it got me wondering how many of us would be able to showcase our body of work with that same level of passion?
Productivity
What was clear from the body of work of both Babyface and Teddy Riley, is that they have been extremely prolific in both of their careers. There were so many great songs that they could have played but chose not to. This really inspired me, how wonderful would it be to get to a stage in your career when you can pull out various aspects of your work portfolio with pride the way these two producers did?
Storytelling
I loved this aspect of Babyface’s performance. He set up most of his songs with great stories and sometimes with questions to Teddy Riley whose answers would provide the ideal set up for the next song. It was a fantastic way to humanise him and to make the experience more enjoyable. We got to experience more of his personality. One of the core tools in engaging an audience is through storytelling and some of the most successful people in the world have mastered the art of storytelling as a way to show who they are, what they do and market themselves.
Element of Surprise
Babyface pulling out his guitar to do a live rendition of “when will I see you again” was a fantastic ace up his sleeve. It caught his opponent of-guard and delighted the audience. The paired down acoustic version of the song added a different dimension to the slickly produced songs that each producer had played up to this point.
Dealing with setbacks
I have to say that both Teddy Riley and Babyface impressed me with their level headedness in front of half a million people. There were many (many) technical difficulties but they both pushed through. Could things have been a bit slicker? Yes of course. But in many ways, it made them more like us ordinary folks. Babyface to his credit was also very patient with Teddy’s technical issues and kept a good attitude through it all.
Being able to laugh at yourself
I commend Teddy Riley for reposting memes of himself about the first attempt of his Verzus battle with babyface. What could have stayed as a major public embarrassment for him quickly turned into people admiring his resilience.
Both Teddy Riley and Babyface gave us a wonderful celebration of music. It was clear that Babyface is a strategist and Teddy is an “in the moment” guy, but their differences have clearly worked for them.
Did you watch the battle? What were your take aways? For more tips on how to advance your current career or transition into the career or business that you love, sign up for my newsletter here and join my facebook group, “The Career Lounge” here.