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Professionalism


rodclement

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Hello again everyone! Doing my best to nurture this new baby forum!:)

 

My pet peeve with solo/duo acts is professionalism or the lack there off. Being that I sing in a duo and only a duo and not a full band (I do the occasional wedding as a hired gun); I tend to take it seriously from gear, to set, to practice, etc.

 

I spend a good amount of time working on sets, getting props to distribute to patrons, I work on our website, contact with venue owners and booking agent. I also stress on dress code, flexibility with the venue, timeliness, etc. I treat this as a job and not a hobby and I think it pays off.

 

My full time job is very demanding in terms of hours and my partner in the band has a similar situation so it works well for us. We both go over calendar for upcoming months together so it does not affect our day jobs; we commit to gigs and maintain them! The bad side is that we gig less than the demand since we are both so busy; the good side is that we understand each other so there is no difference in expectation.

 

Currently we gig once a week with most of the work being private parties and two bar/restaurant gigs a month so our friends can come and we can promote the band to new audience. Sometimes we play more; sometimes we play less like September, very busy for me!

 

Even being a part time, for fun band, we approach it as any other job and the rewards are better pay, great clients, and an agent that will book us every date we give him! I look at it like this, it is part time fun for me, but people paying us expect a professional duo and not some weekend warrior with crappy speakers and wearing cargo shorts ( I am sure it's different in Florida, etc)!:cop:

 

Another item that is critical in this approach is set selection, always changing and trying new things taking into consideration audience input as much as our own! Let

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Rod,

 

I agree with the professionalism aspect. Especially for a wedding! I'm still trying to decide if doing weddings would be a good move for me or not. I've done one, as a combination DJ/performer, for a relative, and it went OK. I think that once this forum gets enough members, wedding gigs would be a great thread. Pros and cons, do's and don'ts, stuff like that.

 

Love the props idea! Would you be willing to share what props and what songs?

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I only do weddings as a hired gun for my booking agent, not a big fan of wedding gigs, I sing in one of his bands as needed, pay is great! I don'tk know I woul dwant to do a wedding as a duo unless it was for the cocktail hour kinda thing, people start making requests not thinking what you can deliver with a guitar and a cajon! :)

 

I use a lot of glo sticks!!!! :) A grown adult woman will turn into a child with some margaritas and a glo stick!!! :) No particular song, once it gets dark and we go into dancing songs they come out.

 

Rod

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We have standards of professionalism that we established from the get go. Appearance/dress, presentation, songs, and equipment are all included in the standards. It seems to work, we play 8 or 9 times a month.

 

 

That's awesome. What style of music do you play, and where are you located? Just curious...

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Even though this is part time, I'm very big on professionalism. I'm in a professional business setting for my day job, and it carries over to my side job. From the very beginning I enlisted a graphic designer to put together a logo, business cards, flyers, etc. I also support an actual website, not just Facebook (I'm one of only a couple of solo/duo acts in the area that does this).

 

Always on time, always flexible, always respectful to staff. I typically try to be conscious of volume level as well. I'd much rather be asked to turn the volume up than have patrons complain that it's too loud. I generally try to work with the manager to make sure the volume is at an appropriate level. Also, if I have a waitress/bartender who is handling my drinks and food orders, I always tip them. Even if the food/drink is comped by the venue, I always tip. Upon leaving the venue, I always make sure I leave the area where I was playing clean. Pick up any junk, return glassware to the bar, etc.

 

The only place I differ is dress code. I do wear cargo shorts and flip flops :facepalm:. First off, I can get away with it, because (depending on the gig) my setlist is somewhat "beach oriented" Second, I live in the South, and it's often blazing hot at my outdoor gigs. I do wear long pants at most indoor shows. On the other hand, I always wear a shirt with buttons and a collar - and despite my setlist being beach oriented, I do NOT wear flower-print shirts.

 

This summer, I've averaged over 10 shows a month.

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I am with you on the website versus facebook thing, most of my private gigs are booked by people that check our site from work, where a lot of people can't see facebook. I do have a personal facebook account that I use to promote bar/restaurant gigs to family and friends so we get the best pf both worlds.

 

I also agree with you on the volume considerations, unless you are throwing a party yourself, it's all about the venue and it's patrons!

 

As for the cargo thing, well I wear cargos for outdoor bar gigs sometimes, like I touched in my post, there is a time and place for everything. Oh and I dig flower print shirts! :) JK!

 

Rod

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I am with you on the website versus facebook thing, most of my private gigs are booked by people that check our site from work, where a lot of people can't see facebook. I do have a personal facebook account that I use to promote bar/restaurant gigs to family and friends so we get the best pf both worlds.

 

 

Oh, yeah. I do Facebook, too. I maintain a separate "page" for my music stuff and update it constantly. The website is for promoting to potential clients, while the facebook page is for staying connected to fans.

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We have standards of professionalism that we established from the get go. Appearance/dress, presentation, songs, and equipment are all included in the standards. It seems to work, we play 8 or 9 times a month.

 

That is as it should be albeit scarce in my neck of the woods. Good on you! :thu:

 

BTW, another thing that I do not do (and I catch some comments on this) is to consume alcoholic beverages before or during the job. To me it is just like any other job in the private sector. No booze during working hours. If someone sends a drink up I just set it aside and thank them at the break and telling them my personal rules.

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I always dress for stage, arrive early for setup/soundcheck, hit the stage exactly at starting time, and keep the dead-time and chatter to a minimum. I figure people want to hear music, not me yacking on about things they don't care about.

 

I also listen to suggestions from the audience, and watch their reactions to the material, and adjust accordingly.

 

I too am a non-drinker on stage.

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That is as it should be albeit scarce in my neck of the woods. Good on you!
:thu:

BTW, another thing that I do not do (and I catch some comments on this) is to consume alcoholic beverages before or during the job. To me it is just like any other job in the private sector. No booze during working hours. If someone sends a drink up I just set it aside and thank them at the break and telling them my personal rules.

 

Yeah, I'm with you on that one. I don't have anything against people who drink while playing - some of my fave all time musicians have done that. But I don't want to do it.

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I am with you on the website versus facebook thing, most of my private gigs are booked by people that check our site from work, where a lot of people can't see facebook. I do have a personal facebook account that I use to promote bar/restaurant gigs to family and friends so we get the best pf both worlds.


I also agree with you on the volume considerations, unless you are throwing a party yourself, it's all about the venue and it's patrons!


As for the cargo thing, well I wear cargos for outdoor bar gigs sometimes, like I touched in my post, there is a time and place for everything. Oh and I dig flower print shirts!
:)
JK!


Rod

 

Rod, I was wondering if you could clarify something on the dress code- I checked the link on your sig and, while I do like the music, I feel that you're dress code may be somewhat lacking or maybe I misinterpreted your original post about stressing it. I'm not trying to be rude but you say that you stress dress code with the no cargo shorts rule, but the clothes you're wearing don't seem that different in terms of "cargo-short-casual-wear". But that's just my opinion - I did enjoy the video's and it seems your crowds do too.

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Well it's mostly button shirts, full leg kakhis or jeans and my choice of hat for the day, not baseball hats but fedora type hats since I love them a lot! As you quoted from my post, the attire needs to be appropriate for the gig, I don't dress like a rockstar since we are not a rock band but if you are in an outdoor bar wearing flip flops and a tshirt and I am wearing long pants and a button down shirt, you can tell that I am there working and not a part of the crowd.

 

I am also sure that I can use some style tips since I wear a shirt and tie to work every day so for me to figure out a happy medium between to casual and not enough can be tought! Open to ideas!

 

Thanks for the coments about the site, we need better videos but I never have time to edit some! I even bought a hero HD camera so we can get better quality video but I never seem to get around to editing the videos! This is were I wish my partner was more active and would help a little!

 

Rod

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I use a lot of glo sticks!!!!
:)
A grown adult woman will turn into a child with some margaritas and a glo stick!!!
:)
No particular song, once it gets dark and we go into dancing songs they come out.


Rod

 

Great idea, I will most likely 'borrow' that. We make shakers out of plastic easter eggs and aquarium gravel, glue 'em shut and put on a label with the duo name. Works out to be about a dime apiece. We hand them out to people who at least appear to have been clapping or tapping in time with the music. We play some arrangements with syncopation and carefully timed off beat rhythms. Its pretty cool when some of our regulars hit the rhythms right on time. Another thing we do is bring along an extra guitar, we often have musician friends come by and we will invite them up for a song or two. Some of these folks have their own following so they often bring a few folks along to our gig. Every additional customer makes the venue owner a little happier.

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You are so right! We have a lot of musician friends that come out as well and we always invite them up for a few songs so they keep coming back anb bringing friends!

 

For the glo sticks I use Windy City Novelties, cheapest I could find that was any good, much better than Oriental Trading, these actually glow and already come with the necklace attachement so no added work. They are 29 cents a piece.

 

http://www.windycitynovelties.com/10768p/22-inch-red-supreme-glow-necklaces.html

 

Rod

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Glow sticks are a great idea. We do the shaker thing, too. We just buy the little plastic egg shakers or mini maracas from MF or whatever. They wind up being less than $2/each, and most get returned by the end of the night. We occasionally lose a few, but that's okay.

 

I occasionally will have a friend up to play, but that's a slippery slope. Every guy in the place will then want you to let them play a song, or every chick will want to come up and belt out something awful.

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I occasionally will have a friend up to play, but that's a slippery slope. Every guy in the place will then want you to let them play a song, or every chick will want to come up and belt out something awful.

 

 

Yeah, I understand the risk. We try to be very clear that we are inviting them up, we introduce them and will name the group they play with, all to make it clear these are pros and it's not an open mic deal. We did have the problem a couple of times when we first started having people up, but since we started to make it clear (nicely) that we know everyone we invite up and know what they can do it hasn't been an issue.

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