It's a simple fact that if you play for a living as a sideman you will have to do gigs with no rehearsal...you have no choice in the matter other than to blow off the paycheck. Getting your **** together to get through these situations that you have no control over and even shine in them is not being an "egomaniac". It's paying the rent.
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Gigging without rehearsals
- Thread starter Depth_Charge
- Start date
It's a simple fact that if you play for a living as a sideman you will have to do gigs with no rehearsal...you have no choice in the matter other than to blow off the paycheck. Getting your **** together to get through these situations that you have no control over and even shine in them is not being an "egomaniac". It's paying the rent.
Well...that may be.
However, it never, ever hurts to do things to prepare one's self for situations in which you must transpose on the fly, etc. Simple scale exercises, and getting out to a jam regularly, go a long way towards making a musician ready for, well, just about anything. Everyone encounters such a situation eventually. When it comes, ya wanna be ready for it!
I used to be in a band with a guy who not only would throw down covers we had never, ever played, but would write original songs on the spot, and we'd play them. (Good songs, too! I miss him...he moved to Cali.)
That taught me a lot about how to transpose, how to adapt to different musical situations. It wasn't always good...LOL!...but we all learned an awful lot.
Cherie
that may be true,but if it's challenging music,with some left turns,stops,starts etc....a rehearsal or three is in order.....
being able to wing it will get you through some gigs...but you would have to be dangerously good to be able to walk in cold on some of the acts i've seen
I'm not arguing that for a second. As I said in a previous post often times rehearsal is absolutely essential.
As I also said in that post no rehearsal works best when you:
a) know a all of the more commonly played tunes in the genre
b) know the stock endings and intros common to the genre
c) have big enough ears that even if you don't know the tune by the second time through you've learned it well enough to avoid clams
and
d) have conquered your fear of playing bad notes and deal with it relaxed and musically when you do.
Without these things going on you will flail and you might wanna rehearse or say no to the gig. On the other hand if you got the confidence jumping in cold and going for it is something everyone who has the above skills has done more than once. Nobody wants to fail but occasionally it can teach you things you'd never learn playing it safe. Embarrassment has driven me to the woodshed more than once.
I'm not saying this situation doesn't arise, and I'm not denying that being on your toes and doing some general preparatory practice work is good advice.
I'm just saying, it's not the ideal, it shouldn't be a substitute, and if you can rehearse, by all means, please take advantage of the opportunity.
Knowledge of theory, scales, and even the song itself does not prevent train wrecks when you get a bunch of musicians on a stage who each has their own idea about structure, tuning, key, modulations, etc.
EDIT: It is probably good to distinguish between different players and situations. One, like nic_salsus, either knows the music or the other musicians well, and has a lot of experience in these situations. He gets the call and has to come through at the drop of a hat. Clams, imperfections, etc., are quickly recovered upon and hidden from the ears of all but the most discriminating listeners. The other situation is people who are not "fill-ins" necessarily, but a more cohesive band. Maybe they lack the experience to play songs well on the fly, maybe the material is too complex or arrangements too detailed. Bands should rehearse if possible.
Blues and jazz guys, you should know what's up and be able to play on the fly if needed.
Cover bands doing "Carry On Wayward Son" or "Radar Love," I wouldn't try those without at least one rehearsal. I would bet my bass collection there is at least one person in the band who hears it different from you, and that needs to be worked out before you get up in front of a room full of people and put your reputation on the line.
Agreed. Way too often, when dealing with people who insist on rehearsals it's "We don't need to rehearse, you need to practice". Way too often people treat rehearsal as a place to learn material. I had a guy who insisted on rehearsing and we went over songs like My Girl and Brick House. Played like the recording.
If you come to the gig prepared and I do and everyone else does, everything usually turns out fine... or better.
One of the bonuses of playing a five or six is that it makes transposing that much easier. I never detune... I just play wherever I need to play. Sure, it might require more effort fretting than playing an open Eb... so what?
We played "Carry On... " on the fly on a bar gig with a stream of consciousness bandleader a while back... and it sounded great. It depends on who you're playing with. Better musicians tend to remember songs correctly. IME IMO
Some of the best live performances I've played on have been on stuff like that... most likely because the musicians are really paying attention since they haven't played it together before vs. phoning in a standard.
True. Our non-rehearsing cover band shies away from anything tooooo complicated, unless its something we've all heard forever. And even then, its not always correct.
I heard a recording of Led Zep trying to cover "Shakin' All Over", live. They had very obviously not ever played it before. It was, um, not especially good. Not everyone knew where the stops were, or the length of time they must be held. So they evidently decided to be wrong together for the rest of the song. LOL!
I also have a live recording of the Foos trying to cover "Stairway To Heaven", and the audience singing along because they couldn't remember the words.
Cherie
Having big ears and good feel is key.
"Stream of consciousness bandleader..." -- I like that! You sure you're not playing with my kewl ol' bandleader from Cali?
Cherie
I think it's safe to say your experience is the exception. Four or five players who never rehearsed "Carry On" nailing it, or even "sounding great?" Gotta be a relatively rare occurance in most areas.
Been there, done that and agree completely. But I think that now "classic rock" is getting to be much like jazz and blues in that there are "standards" and stylistic touchstones. This makes it easier to pull it toghether for a "pick up" gig.
When I've been given songlists I focus mostly on chord progression and hooks or signature phrases rather than concerning myself with note-for-note perfection especially if time is short.
Practicing and being proficient on ones instrument can't be overstated. Not only does this make one better able to handle low/no rehearsal situations but it allows bands to be much more productive when they do rehearse.
All this is not to say that I don't prefer a band that rehearses, but any more when it comes to straight ahead cover bands, I don't stay in ones that rehearse more than they gig.
Cheers!
a BIG +1
Rehearsals are for ensuring you're all on the same page, not for learning the song. That's what home practice is for.
Stops and starts can be telegraphed by a good drummer. I used to fill in with some guys, rarely rehearsed, and never went over starts/stops/breaks. When Milton whacked the snare drum extra hard, sounded like a gun went off, and everyone instantly gets quiet or stops for a break.
It was amazing. Couldn't help but follow, it was so damn loud you'd be startled into stopping.... lol
Randy
Having big ears and good feel is key.
"Stream of consciousness bandleader..." -- I like that! You sure you're not playing with my kewl ol' bandleader from Cali?
Cherie
My first gig with him, no rehearsals, consisted of at least one half original tunes. He quickly got very comfortable with the fact that I didn't freak out. Bring it on.
I go into gigs knowing we might play a reasonable percentage of song that we've done before. Of course that doesn't mean we'll do them the same way we did before. I actually enjoy that aspect of live performance. Trainwrecks? Sure, they can happen... but the rewards when you really get it going far outweigh the risks.
I think bottom line we both realize the very limited possibility of anyone actually dying from a musical meltdown. Or maybe we've just been lucky so far.
That's what loving music can do for ya.
I honestly don't understand how this works for me... mention a song, play a lick, hum something and my brain goes into playback mode. I hear the full arrangement in my head. In color
. Everything. In the case of a song like Carry On, I've heard it a million times. So have many of the people I gig with. Dealing with folks who don't have this gift, I realize how lucky I am. I like being the exception.It doesn't take four or five people on that level, some could have less of a remembrance of the song... they just need to follow the people who do. aka LISTEN. One of the biggest keys is paying attention and using your ears if you're not the one on top of the song and a key for me is to help lead the song. Once you get used to it it's not hard to telegraph where you're going. On that gig we had four people who knew the song inside out; guitar, keys, bass and drum. All of us have been gigging for more than 25 years. We all listen to all sorts of music. I think we followed that song with some jazz standard. Definitely not a "Let's all fit into this box!" gig.
One of my pet peeves is dealing with idiots on live gigs who jump to a change with no warning, as if they'll look like they know what they're doing while the rest of the band doesn't., IMO they simply look like an ass. Like a doofus you're supposed to follow in your car who zips in and out of traffic.
Or by other members of the band. As long as you have a band mentality vs. it's all about me, it's usually surprisingly easy.
I do a ton of pickup gigs and have been involved in some very cool endings on the fly. I've done rehearsed gigs where brain farts abounded.
All it took was listening.
my band rehearses rarely except at soundchecks, although we have an acoustic show coming up that we'll probably have two rehearsals for. but we all have lives and do our best to confine rehearsing to soundchecks. and as for doing other gigs, i can't tell you how many times i've done gigs cold without so much as even knowing what songs we were going to do until 5 seconds before we do them. wasn't always perfect but it still sounded like good music because we're all pros. name the song, call the key. if i don't know it i'll watch the guitarist or pianist. i work all the time...except for this month which is unusually slow, and i just don't have time to rehearse when i could be making money. for originals, obviously you have to rehearse more unless the writer has full demos done already, but for covers, forget it. how many times do you need to run through freakin' brick house?
a guy i know who does cover band pickup gigs came up with what he calls the inverse rule of cover bands: the amount of gigs you play is inverse to the amount of time you spend rehearsing. in every single case in my life, it has been thus.
a guy i know who does cover band pickup gigs came up with what he calls the inverse rule of cover bands: the amount of gigs you play is inverse to the amount of time you spend rehearsing. in every single case in my life, it has been thus.
