| Author |
Topic: What's YOUR thinking on this? |
Ray Montee
From:
Portland, Oregon (deceased)
|
Posted 29 Jun 2014 9:09 am |
|
Over the years, I couldn't help but notice that the BIG SHOW performers with a song list of perhaps a dozen tunes played at each and every performance......
Always did a masterful job on each occasion.
I've also discovered that some of these folks, as professional as they are, are at somewhat of a loss when it comes to sitting in and playing with the regular musicians.
The same applies to many personalities that are really high up on their instrument in a classical orchestral setting but simply can't hack it in a working band. They seem not to know when to play and/or when not to with no idea whatsoever about how to back-up the vocalist.
WHAT SAY YOU? |
|
|
 |
Walter Stettner
From:
Vienna, Austria
|
Posted 29 Jun 2014 10:17 am
|
|
I remember having a classical trained piano player auditioning for a band I was in. Technically one of the best I have ever heard, but...unable to interact with a band and also unable to play w/o sheets (not speaking about simple lead sheets, he had to have full notes on every song. Interestingly, it was him who gave up and told us that he cannot do without notation. When we spoke about interacting with other musicians, he also said that he cannot play and watch others at the same time. Guess these are different musical worlds.
Kind Regards, Walter
_________________
www.lloydgreentribute.com |
|
|
|
Jack Aldrich
From:
Washington, USA
|
Posted 29 Jun 2014 10:36 am
|
|
| Walter Stettner wrote: |
I remember having a classical trained piano player auditioning for a band I was in. Technically one of the best I have ever heard, but...unable to interact with a band and also unable to play w/o sheets (not speaking about simple lead sheets, he had to have full notes on every song. Interestingly, it was him who gave up and told us that he cannot do without notation. When we spoke about interacting with other musicians, he also said that he cannot play and watch others at the same time. Guess these are different musical worlds.
Kind Regards, Walter |
According to recent research, people like that are not true musicians, but technicians. A true musician listens to what everyone else is playing.
_________________
Jack Aldrich
Carter & ShoBud D10's
D8 & T8 Stringmaster
Rickenbacher B6
3 Resonator guitars
Asher Alan Akaka Special SN 6
Canopus D8 |
|
|
|
Alan Brookes
From:
Brummy living in Southern California
|
Posted 29 Jun 2014 10:38 am
|
|
Ricky Nelson made a point of this in his composition "Garden Party". Everywhere he went, people expected him to sing his hit songs and no-one wanted anything new out of him, so he felt confined. As the words go, "If memories are all I sing, I'd rather drive a truck."
It's obvious with a lot of stars that they're fed up of singing the same songs over and over again. Some, like Bob Dylan, seem to show utter contempt for the process, slurring their way through the numbers and destroying the tune, even completely changing the tempo. |
|
|
|
Ken Campbell
From:
Ferndale, Montana
|
Posted 29 Jun 2014 10:51 am
|
|
| Well, for myself, and importantly here I claim nothing but my own feelings and no expertise, I'd rather play 4 sets of country music with people who's company I enjoy both personally and as musicians than have to slam through the same stale arraignments night after night. I played drums for a regional hit band back in the early 80's and we did one hour shows of the same material day after day, night after night. After a year of that I really didn't ever want to play again. The band I'm in now likes to change up arraignments, and provides us all with tons of room to improvise and to be, frankly, musicians. For me, at this point in a long and enjoyable musical life, it's perfect. |
|
|
|
Jerome Hawkes
From:
Fayetteville, North Carolina, USA
|
Posted 29 Jun 2014 12:58 pm
|
|
i sorta had this happen to me - i had been playing purely in 1 band for a number of years, never getting out and jamming much and when i did eventually get out to a jam, it was tuf - i would fumble all over the place.
you lose that improvisational thinking when you get in a set band and switch to autopilot because you have been playing the same songs/arrangements for 5 years.
_________________
'65 Sho-Bud D-10 Permanent β’ '54 Fender Dual-8 β’ Clinesmith T-8 β’ '38 Ric Bakelite β’ '92 Emmons D-10 Legrande II |
|
|
|
Alan Brookes
From:
Brummy living in Southern California
|
Posted 29 Jun 2014 3:35 pm
|
|
| Ken Campbell wrote: |
| ...same material day after day, night after night. After a year of that I really didn't ever want to play again... |
It could be worse. You could be drumming for a blues band. Brownie McGhee once said that he couldn't believe that he'd made a career singing the same tune with different words for forty years.  |
|
|
|
Bud Angelotti
From:
Larryville, NJ, USA
|
Posted 29 Jun 2014 6:39 pm
|
|
Some folks can't "do it" unless they have "practiced" it. They have to do it, whatever it is, the same way everytime.
Some of us just GO. 
Certainly nothing wrong with practice, but I don't "practice" driving or walking & talking at the same time. Although maybe I should.
_________________
Just 'cause I look stupid, don't mean I'm not. |
|
|
|
Bill L. Wilson
From:
Oklahoma, USA
|
Posted 29 Jun 2014 10:26 pm Never a Problem.
|
|
| I can play with or without number charts, jam, and usually pull something out of the hat, on about any song that's thrown at me. The band that I play in, we practice by playin' gigs, and takin' requests. If you didn't recognize the song you requested, it's because we didn't know it, but we played it anyway. |
|
|
|
Willis Vanderberg
From:
Petoskey Mi
|
Posted 3 Jul 2014 6:32 am
|
|
Yep Bill,been there and done that too...
Then there was the guy who requested Proud Mary. I said we just did that and he said that must be why I though of it...Duh ! |
|
|
|
b0b
From:
Cloverdale, CA, USA
|
Posted 3 Jul 2014 7:21 am Re: What's YOUR thinking on this?
|
|
| Ray Montee wrote: |
Over the years, I couldn't help but notice that the BIG SHOW performers with a song list of perhaps a dozen tunes played at each and every performance......
Always did a masterful job on each occasion.
I've also discovered that some of these folks, as professional as they are, are at somewhat of a loss when it comes to sitting in and playing with the regular musicians.
The same applies to many personalities that are really high up on their instrument in a classical orchestral setting but simply can't hack it in a working band. They seem not to know when to play and/or when not to with no idea whatsoever about how to back-up the vocalist.
WHAT SAY YOU? |
I have never found that to be the case. Amateurs are amateurs and professionals are professionals. While there are some amateurs who can mimic pros, they typically aren't "BIG SHOW" performers or first chair in the orchestra.
Top classical musicians who can't improvise country or rock often simply haven't bothered to learn the idiom because they don't like it. Good classical musicians know their scales, modes and chords. Given free reign, not tied to an unfamiliar style, they can improvise as well as or better than pop musicians. Some of my favorite records are "crossovers" by classical greats like Yoyo Ma, Richard Stoltzman, John Williams and the like.
I used a classical musician, my friend Ed Wray, on this recording. Ed rarely plays electric guitar and almost never plays rock with distortion. All I had to do was play the track for him once and tell him the chords. His part is mostly rhythm, but he easily played as well as anyone I've shared the bandstand with over the years. No problem at all.
_________________
-πππ- (admin) - Robert P. Lee - Recordings - Breathe - D6th - Video |
|
|
|
Ray Harrison
From:
Tucson, Arizona, USA (deceased)
|
Posted 3 Jul 2014 7:41 am
|
|
I went to a Ray Price show many years ago and George Strait was his opening act. George had to cancel due to a death in the family and Ray's band struggled through the time frame set aside for the opener. Once Price hit the stage, they were the consummately rehearsed band that you expected to hear behind the star.
Surprises will upset any apple cart. Some more than others.
_________________
Ray Harrison
Bass/sing/Love PSG
77 Stingray/Kiesel 5 string bass
Telonics , Fender Rumble500, Polytone Amps
D-16 Martin, 1970 Ovation guitars |
|
|
|
chris ivey
From:
california (deceased)
|
Posted 3 Jul 2014 7:45 am Re: Never a Problem.
|
|
| Bill L. Wilson wrote: |
| I can play with or without number charts, jam, and usually pull something out of the hat, on about any song that's thrown at me. The band that I play in, we practice by playin' gigs, and takin' requests. If you didn't recognize the song you requested, it's because we didn't know it, but we played it anyway. |
i'm with you, bill! |
|
|
|
Lane Gray
From:
Topeka, KS
|
Posted 3 Jul 2014 1:38 pm
|
|
| Alan Brookes wrote: |
Ricky Nelson made a point of this in his composition "Garden Party". Everywhere he went, people expected him to sing his hit songs and no-one wanted anything new out of him, so he felt confined. As the words go, "If memories are all I sing, I'd rather drive a truck."
|
Actually, I think most of HIS shows were well received
"Garden Party" was a response to a large "package show" or similar at Madison Square Garden. It included him, Johnny Cash, Carl Perkins and a mess of other acts from the late 50s through the 60s. In my personal opinion, he should have known his expected role there and either played his rΓ΄le or refused the gig. But he showed up and tried to play his current (at the time) stuff and got booed off the stage.
But he got a monster hit out of a bad experience. When life gives you lemons, retire to the porch with a whisky sour.
PS: apropos of the blues thing, a friend of mine back in the early 80s played bass for Thorogood for 1 tour. Said it was the most boring way to make a living in music.
_________________
2 pedal steels, a lapStrat, and an 8-string Dobro (and 3 ukes)
More amps than guitars, and not many effects |
|
|
|
