This is karaoke, isn't it?

[GeorgesEric]

I much rather see a singer shred and chainsaw lyrics looking at the audience…

…than a singer with correct and proper words looking at a device while singing.

 

[LBS-bass]

I find no equivalence between the local band singer with the iPad and the big-time singer with a prompter at his feet.
The latter has someone cueing the prompter for him. The occasional glance down to refresh the memory is unobtrusive and doesn't break the connection with the audience.
In my opinion, the local guy reaching over, swiping, hitting buttons, and looking for a long time at a device at hip or chest level is far more distracting, and makes him appear poorly rehearsed.
Just one man's opinion.

Most iPad apps will scroll at tempo. There's no person cueing the prompter, either, it's automated in a similar way, though there might be someone in charge of stopping, starting, and making sure it doesn't get ahead or behind the talent.

 

[Lowandfat]

Gee whiz, how did people ever perform live without them?

Nothing says part timer like a tablet clipped to a stand. If that's what you are aiming for, enjoy. I will continue to learn the songs I perform before performing them. I guess I'm crazy like that. Sure I have had a music stand on stage here and there for big shows with complex charts, but there is just no equivalence between hobby band warrior reading off a tablet all night, and a seasoned veteran pro in their 70s, with a lexicon of a literal hundred charting songs, needing a little visual cue hidden behind a monitor. Even suggesting this as a comparison smells like justifying poor work ethic to me. Sing the set for a year? Lose the book. And while you're at it, get off my lawn!

Excellence in music requires hard work. Tablets on stage are, and will always be, crutches. If not, I ask again, how did people over the previous thousand years ever manage to put on a show before their existence?

 

[Lowandfat]

Try covering up your fret markers. You think you don't look at them, but you do.

Or, you teach yourself to play on a full black out stage where if you miss a note/downbeat you're fired. Also, there are no fret markers on my upright. I will keep repeating this: Excellence at music is hard.

I also stand by this: A musician practices until they get it right. A pro practices until they never get it wrong.

 

[retslock]

Not really. His timing is off, probably because he's too focused on his eyes instead of his ears. But I was referring to how it looks on stage. Shouldn't singers be at least partially focused on the audience?

I saw Bobby Womack years ago at the Sydney Opera house and he used a large tele-prompter monitor. I’ve heard that it’s common now with big concert acts. You can’t tell from in front because it looks look a monitor speaker from the audience. The only reason I could see it was because I was beside the stage looking across.

 

[Michedelic]

I saw Bobby Womack years ago at the Sydney Opera house and he used a large tele-prompter monitor. I’ve heard that it’s common now with big concert acts. You can’t tell from in front because it looks look a monitor speaker from the audience. The only reason I could see it was because I was beside the stage looking across.

Just click on the link in my post(#3), you’ll get the full story, and as I pointed out, this has been going on for many, many years. I first started noticing them in the 80’s.

 

[GreyBeard]

Pretty hard to communicate with and entertain the crowd with your head stuck in a tablet. I use a binder on a stand for new stuff but I get rid of it as soon as possible.

 

[5StringBlues]

Not karaoke but pretty weak.

 

[Mastermold]

That's Tom Petty playing the Moda Center (~20k capacity) in Portland, Ore., August 12, 2014. I think he had three floor wedges, one in front and one on each side. Lots of old pros still playing arenas without IEMs, because that's how they've always done it.

I don’t use them if I can avoid it.

 

[Zoffy]

I spent the better part of '85-'92 going to Dead shows. Jerry and Bobby routinely forgot lyrics to songs they had been playing weekly for 30 years; c'mon Bob, "Truckin'" aint that hard... with Jerry I figured it was the drugs, with Bobby I'm thinking it was the high-cut jean shorts...

 

[pepj]

Whats worse, forgetting the lyrics or using a prompt.
But no one should stare at it all night, but if they do, yep, its pretty poor and karaoke imv.

 

[Lowandfat]

Someone please tell me, when exactly did musicians become so musically lazy/half-butted?

How is "should the singer learn the songs" even a question? That's a real question.

If you don't respect the gig/process/music enough to bother to learn the material, I don't even know what to say.
I understand a hobby band playing in a random club to their friends does not require setting the bar very high, but good grief. We can do better than laying it on the floor, can't we? George Thorogood got signed while playing an empty hotel bar. They were delivering like they were in front of thousands, and I'd bet nobody had a music stand with the words.

My regular gig draws from a list of about 150 songs, with very few things from your standard roots bar band repertoire. The only time you'll see lyrics on anything near us during a show is if we had to learn something short notice for a wedding.

We're not doing anything special, we're not geniuses, we just give enough of a crap about our jobs to not present as a bunch of schlumpfs. It's called SHOW business, not "That'll Do" business, for a reason.

"Why can't we get booked in any of the better rooms in town? We have a decent draw and we play well!" - Guy wearing khaki shorts a tucked in golf shirt and sandals on stage

Have some respeck fo yo awt.

 

[5StringBlues]

bunch of schlumpfs

Agree. And quoted for the overheard band name thread.

 

[bbao]

My band and I use tablets to different extents.
I commit my parts to memory and only leave the tablet on the side to know the set list (there's always last minute changes to the set list due to weddings running behind etc).

my lead singer uses hers a lot but mainly because her memory hasnt been terrific ever since her stroke. She is however still lively even when she is using the tablet so I'm not too irked by it.

upon seeing the other wedding bands in my local area using tablets too, I'm not as against it anymore.
Don't get me wrong, I would love to play with a band that doesn't need anything infront of them - but we should all remember that most musicians have day jobs.

 

[Durham52]

Technology is ever changing, it's just a matter of how you use it, isn't it? I might not be a fan of every technological development, but none of it is going to go away on my acount.

The singer relying on an ipad for songs that have been on the set list for a year? Maybe it's a confidence issue, or a real problem? Anyone talked to them about it? Some help, or positive re enforcement may be in order. (if it turns out to just be laziness, then that needs to be dealt with in some way too)

The odd aid, or prompt, no big deal, a set list on an ipad, or a sheet of paper taped to the back of you guitar, or bass, what's the dif? But yeah, reading every word of a song without looking at the audience, that's a problem.

 

[micguy]

A human voice grabs people’s attention - tgere is a primal connection that happens there. But that connection gets lost quickly if there isn’t eye contact to cement it in place.

An occasional glance is OK, but if your singer’s eyes are glued to a tablet, that’s a problem.

 

[ThinCrappyTone2]

A pro practices until they never get it wrong.

A friend uses a modified version of that. “You have to practice it until you hate it.”

 

[friskinator]

If you think the iPad for lyrics is bad, the singer in my previous wedding band kept one onstage to continually check on his dogs at home via webcam. Every time there was a break in the lyrics for him (guitar solo, etc.), he'd go over to the iPad to look at it. It made me furious, and I have to believe the audience wondered what the hell he was doing.

 

[el murdoque]

Singer reads lyrics on a computer tablet for ALL their songs. They've been performing those songs for over a year. Am I the only one who thinks this looks tacky on stage?

Depends.
When the band has a 400+ songs catalog and plays 4+ hours per show, it's okay to use crutches - everyone will have a music stand and/or tablet on stage.

When we're talking about a rehearsed show of two hours or less, with a fixed set list, I could tolerate cheat sheets for one or two songs. Reading everything means, in my book, that you either have a massive deficiency remembering text and not enough initiative to work on the problem or that you cannot be bothered to learn them - or that you subbed for that gig in a last minute

 

[Acoop]

I play with a very attractive female singer that still reads some songs off her ipad but it's jazz and I really don't care. ... Thirty years ago I played with a great RNB singer who read the lyrics, of some songs, off of a note pad and I thought that strange and sometimes it sounded like his head wasn't in the right place, so I know where you're coming from. ... But, remember this, if you're talking about someone else, someone else is talking about you. ... Maybe it's time to find something else to focus on.