going—full throttle. I went on tour, opening for The Cheetah Girls’ The Party’s Just Begun tour in the fall of 2006. We were done shooting the first season of Hannah Montana , but only half of it had aired on TV. Before The Cheetah Girls concert, nobody knew if folks would care that I was opening for them. True, Hannah Montana had been an instant success, but that didn’t mean anybody wanted to see me in concert as Hannah . Hannah’s a fictional singer. Maybe all her fame was fictional too. So the concert creators kept it cheap. There was no dramatic curtain, parting slowly to reveal me onstage. Nor did I rise up on a platform like a real rocker. So how did I appear onstage? Two dancers stood holding a plain white bed sheet up to hide me, then dropped it. That’s right—a bed sheet. I had four dancers. (Now I'm up to twelve dancers.) I had a band track instead of an actual band. (Now I have a seven-person band.) Hannah’s costumes were all straight off the rack of Forever 21. (Now all Hannah's clothes are custom-sewn.) But I didn’t care if I was standing in front of a plain black wall. My dad always says that a real musician can make a great show out of anything, no matter how small. I was determined to be a great musician.
When you’re the opening act, you figure nobody’s there to see you . They come in with their friends; they’re talking, goofing around, and getting psyched for the main act, and they have zero reason to pay any attention to that random girl in a blond wig who thinks she’s a TV star. But this concert mattered a heck of a lot to me. It was my first and possibly only chance to show everyone what I could do as a performer, and I couldn’t afford to mess it up. I was supposed to get the crowd excited. If they weren’t pumped when The Cheetah Girls came onstage, I’d be to blame.
The shows all sold out, which was a surprise to everyone. I liked a big audience. At least with that many people, I didn’t have to worry that there’d be no applause, just crickets. I could handle the number of people—I hoped.
I’m never alone backstage. Before the show starts, my dancers and I have a little ritual. We gather in a circle with our hands together in the center and shout, “Pop off!” (It's my show and my ritual. You'd think I'd know why we say "pop off." But I don't.) Then my stage manager, Scottie Dog, a tattooed old-time rock ’n’ roller, shows me where to wait and stays with me until I go on.
As I stood backstage on opening night, my blond wig was already itchy, hot, and sweaty. And I had to pee. Badly. But it was too late. (Story of my life— having to pee when it’s too late to go is my body’s code for: you’re nervous and you might mess up!) Scottie Dog signaled me, and I walked out to the microphone. I looked through the sheet at the crowd at KeyArena in downtown Seattle. Over 16,000 people were staring back at me (or at my plain white bed sheet, anyway), waiting for me to perform. I felt really little up there onstage. I was really little! Why should I be up there? How could I ever win over that many people? But cheerleading had taught me to channel my fear into energy. I may have felt little, but I was ready to do everything bigger and better to compensate.
I took a deep breath, the sheet dropped, and I opened with “I Got Nerve.” I didn’t know if I could keep a crowd of 16,000 from throwing tomatoes at me (or maybe peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches—it was a young crowd). But I did know that I loved to sing, so I started by just focusing on that.
As soon as I started singing, I relaxed a little. After a while I felt calm enough to take a tiny peek at the audience. So I looked out . . . and I could not believe what I saw. It was a sea of Hannah Montana T-shirts! This audience wasn’t there just for The Cheetah Girls. They knew who I was! (Or they knew who my TV character was when she wasn’t herself. But let’s not be picky.) When I started singing “I’ve
When you’re the opening act, you figure nobody’s there to see you . They come in with their friends; they’re talking, goofing around, and getting psyched for the main act, and they have zero reason to pay any attention to that random girl in a blond wig who thinks she’s a TV star. But this concert mattered a heck of a lot to me. It was my first and possibly only chance to show everyone what I could do as a performer, and I couldn’t afford to mess it up. I was supposed to get the crowd excited. If they weren’t pumped when The Cheetah Girls came onstage, I’d be to blame.
The shows all sold out, which was a surprise to everyone. I liked a big audience. At least with that many people, I didn’t have to worry that there’d be no applause, just crickets. I could handle the number of people—I hoped.
I’m never alone backstage. Before the show starts, my dancers and I have a little ritual. We gather in a circle with our hands together in the center and shout, “Pop off!” (It's my show and my ritual. You'd think I'd know why we say "pop off." But I don't.) Then my stage manager, Scottie Dog, a tattooed old-time rock ’n’ roller, shows me where to wait and stays with me until I go on.
As I stood backstage on opening night, my blond wig was already itchy, hot, and sweaty. And I had to pee. Badly. But it was too late. (Story of my life— having to pee when it’s too late to go is my body’s code for: you’re nervous and you might mess up!) Scottie Dog signaled me, and I walked out to the microphone. I looked through the sheet at the crowd at KeyArena in downtown Seattle. Over 16,000 people were staring back at me (or at my plain white bed sheet, anyway), waiting for me to perform. I felt really little up there onstage. I was really little! Why should I be up there? How could I ever win over that many people? But cheerleading had taught me to channel my fear into energy. I may have felt little, but I was ready to do everything bigger and better to compensate.
I took a deep breath, the sheet dropped, and I opened with “I Got Nerve.” I didn’t know if I could keep a crowd of 16,000 from throwing tomatoes at me (or maybe peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwiches—it was a young crowd). But I did know that I loved to sing, so I started by just focusing on that.
As soon as I started singing, I relaxed a little. After a while I felt calm enough to take a tiny peek at the audience. So I looked out . . . and I could not believe what I saw. It was a sea of Hannah Montana T-shirts! This audience wasn’t there just for The Cheetah Girls. They knew who I was! (Or they knew who my TV character was when she wasn’t herself. But let’s not be picky.) When I started singing “I’ve
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