Below all the hubbub of the stage, the crowd below roared with anticipation. Would the next act be the amazing one it had been waiting for -- a future James Brown or Aretha Franklin -- or would it be booed back into the wings with no mercy?
It was all up to the audience. Such is the tradition at Harlem's Apollo Theater Amateur Night, which made its only N.C. stop in Chapel Hill on Friday.
Part of the Carolina Union Performing Arts Series, the show featured 13 previously auditioned local acts. The winner was chosen solely by the audience -- the crowd booed off what it thought were unworthy performers, and the act to garner the most positive noise at the end of the show won.
The history of the Apollo Theater was a key factor in choosing Amateur Night as part of the Carolina Union Performing Arts Series, said Jennifer Smith, marketing and design manager of the Carolina Union.
"One of the main goals of the Carolina Union Performing Arts Series is education," Smith said. "With a show like Apollo and the history of the Apollo Theater, that mission is definitely accomplished."
Touring to cities like Chapel Hill is part of the Apollo's aim toward that standard, said David Rodriguez, the theater's executive director. Recently, the Apollo has concentrated on community interaction, including outreach to areas outside New York that might have a lot of undiscovered talent -- like the Triangle.
Thanks to the Apollo's Chapel Hill stop, 25-year-old David Reese might be on the road to fame.
Reese,
Reese said keeping in mind past Amateur Night performers like the Jackson Five made his performing experience special and memorable.
"The history of the Apollo speaks for itself," said Reese. "It was just a big part of the whole entire vibe of the show."
The vibe started in 1934. At the Apollo Theater's first-ever Amateur Night, a young vocalist named Ella Fitzgerald stepped out before a crowd just as tough as the one that gathered Friday at UNC. Her performance of the song "Judy" made her the first Amateur Night winner and wrote her ticket to stardom.
It was in that year that the Apollo Theater was founded as one of the first racially integrated theaters in New York. It continued to provide an outlet for black artists who had previously struggled to find outlets for their talent.
Since then, the theater has maintained its place among the most important starting points for aspiring performers. Billie Holiday, Gladys Knight, Lauryn Hill and Prince are only a few prominent artists to have graced the Apollo stage, many of them at Amateur Night.
"All the major jazz performers you could think of came to the venue," said Jacqueline Dolly, a public relations representative for the Apollo.
She said that the theater maintained its status through the rock 'n' roll periods as well and that artists like Elvis and the Beatles used to watch the performances to learn how to improve their skills.
"The Apollo at that time was kind of a hot-house for cutting your teeth, for honing your skills as a performer," Dolly said. "It was kind of like a ground zero for skill development, for training as a performer."
The Apollo's legendary audiences paved the way for its position as a training ground. Since the theater was founded, the winners of Amateur Night have been chosen not by judges but by the boos and bravos of the crowd.
"(The audiences) have the reputation of being the toughest around to play before and for doing a good selection job," Dolly said. "It's one of the first shows where, as an audience, you don't have to suffer through a bad performance,"
Dolly said the artists who have been booed off and cheered on are evidence of the Apollo audiences' credibility as talent judges.
"They pick out people whose careers go on for decades, whose appeal is multigenerational, multiracial," she said.
To maintain such a rich history and esteemed reputation, the Apollo's staff and crew have a high standard to meet every day. Staff are encouraged to keep the theater's history in mind while looking for new talent and utilizing new technology, Rodriguez said.
"(The history) really set a standard, a bar that every day the staff looks toward," Rodriguez said. "That's the great thing about it -- that the bar is set so high that it's something everyone on the staff always aspires to."
The Apollo legacy is visible in popular culture today, Dolly said.
The theater fostered black contributions to performing art that continue to shape mainstream music.
"The Apollo was one of the pioneering places that helped to develop what we know as pop music and culture today," said Dolly. "This is the music, the feel and the style that the world identifies as American."
The Arts & Entertainment Editor can be reached at artsdesk@unc.edu.
