Members msmooth Posted August 14, 2017 Members Share Posted August 14, 2017 Any one here ever taken an extended break from gigging? Currently the duo/trio has 2 gigs per month until the end of December after which my wife and I want to take a break from gigging. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members senorblues Posted August 14, 2017 Members Share Posted August 14, 2017 Try four decades. Not counting 20th and 25th HS reunion. . . . I know you aren't considering anything near that long, but even after just a couple of years, you may see a change in the music and/or a change in the gigging landscape. In my case, of course, it was dramatic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members ski219 Posted August 14, 2017 Members Share Posted August 14, 2017 took a dozen years off and started gigging again about 10 years ago. I pretty much stopped playing guitar during that period and it took a good bit of jamming and practicing to get back to where I was. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators daddymack Posted August 14, 2017 Moderators Share Posted August 14, 2017 I took close to ten years off from gigging while I worked on my degree at night school. I still played at home, but strictly for fun, and certainly not daily. I was also doing sound on weekends in Hollywood, Chinatown, Santa Monica....so I was able to keep up with the 'scene'.My first public 'return' gig was at my graduation party where a number of my old band mates showed up, set up, handed me a guitar and said 'play, dammit!'...that was 1986... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Vito Corleone Posted August 15, 2017 Members Share Posted August 15, 2017 I didn't gig at all from 1993-1996 and again from 1997-2000. Keyboard & computer technology changed a lot during those years, so that was an adjustment getting back into it. Gigged pretty much nonstop with bands from 1977-1993 (5-6 nights a week for most of the 80s), did a duo for 5-6 nights a week for that 96/97 year and then it's been the corp/wedding band thing a couple times a month from 2001 to now. As much as I love gigging it was weird how much I DIDN'T miss it during those two breaks. Just where my head was at at the time, I suppose. I certainly could have gigged if I really wanted to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members pogo97 Posted August 15, 2017 Members Share Posted August 15, 2017 As much as I love gigging it was weird how much I DIDN'T miss it during those two breaks. Just where my head was at at the time, I suppose. I certainly could have gigged if I really wanted to. Yep, if you're fully into what you're doing at the time, you don't miss what you're not doing. Doesn't help the "music career" much, though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Vito Corleone Posted August 15, 2017 Members Share Posted August 15, 2017 Yep, if you're fully into what you're doing at the time, you don't miss what you're not doing. Doesn't help the "music career" much, though. Very true. Had I not stopped playing in 1993 and stayed in Las Vegas where I was living at the time (the city was just starting to REALLY boom just then) I very likely could have had a completely different music career. OTHO, I might have been dead by 2000 had I stayed there so.......sometimes things work out for the best. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators daddymack Posted August 15, 2017 Moderators Share Posted August 15, 2017 I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness-Alan Ginsberg I was knee deep [actually neck deep, to be more accurate...] in the madness of the punk/new wave era in LA, up to the 'rock resurgence', doing sound. After 1986, I was back gigging. In '91, I stopped the band thing, got offers for small time session/demo work, and wrote and recorded in my home studio until '95, then had the itch to front my own band [something I'd not done since I went back to college at night].And bingo, in under three years we were opening for national acts...playing big stages...gave up club work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members steve mac Posted August 15, 2017 Members Share Posted August 15, 2017 Hurt my index finger 4 months ago and have hardly picked up a guitar since, where I work is seasonal so I have had to write off the year basically and cancel contracted gigs. Frustration isn't the word. I am considering doing a bit of stand up just to get back in the game. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members MrHarryReems Posted August 15, 2017 Members Share Posted August 15, 2017 Hurt my index finger 4 months ago and have hardly picked up a guitar since, where I work is seasonal so I have had to write off the year basically and cancel contracted gigs. Frustration isn't the word. I am considering doing a bit of stand up just to get back in the game. I hear ya on the seasonal thing. Our gigs are most definitely that. I guess that could count as a break, but I usually use the downtime to develop new music and work on EP's. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Bob Dey Posted August 16, 2017 Members Share Posted August 16, 2017 Oh my 2 gigs per month? You definitely need a break! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators daddymack Posted August 16, 2017 Moderators Share Posted August 16, 2017 be nice Bob...not everyone is a glutton for punishment or makes their living playing. That schedule likely makes it difficult for them to take a long vacation...something I haven't been able to do in over a year.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators daddymack Posted August 16, 2017 Moderators Share Posted August 16, 2017 Hurt my index finger 4 months ago and have hardly picked up a guitar since, where I work is seasonal so I have had to write off the year basically and cancel contracted gigs. Frustration isn't the word. I am considering doing a bit of stand up just to get back in the game. Sorry to hear that your finger injury is still an issue, Steve. Pain hurts... When I dislocated my left forefinger, I had 10 days before I had to get back to gigging weekly...maybe it is time to work on some open tunings and some bottleneck... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members msmooth Posted August 16, 2017 Author Members Share Posted August 16, 2017 I also have a full time job as a prosecuting attorney and a wife/musical partner who does not want to play out that much. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Notes_Norton Posted August 17, 2017 Members Share Posted August 17, 2017 I've never taken more than a month off from gigging. I call that vacation. And I've had weeks in the slow season when there wasn't any gigs to be had. But gigging is like intercourse, I never get tired of it. (Is that word OK in this forum?) Notes Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Bob Dey Posted August 20, 2017 Members Share Posted August 20, 2017 Sorry about my reply. I'm old school - back when gigging meant playing at least two nights a week. All I can say is if the break is too long you might start to forget words or chords to songs. I do best when I have two gigs in one day. By the time I get to the second gig I'm really warmed up! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members sventvkg Posted August 21, 2017 Members Share Posted August 21, 2017 I took a break from full Time gigging Jan 2010-Dec. 2014. Almost 5 years. Now, I did some gigs in Alaska a couple of summers and a 34 day cruise ship run in Europe Summer 2013. So about 50 gigs in 5 years. I had done an average of maybe 200 a year the previous 20 years. I was TOAST by the time I took a break and I never once missed playing covers. Did the Nashville writing/writers rounds thing for 4 years with my own material and scratched that itch. Moved to FL and began gigging again Dec 2014. Averaging 140 gigs a year and on pace for the same this year. Working for a lot more $$ less number of gigs which Is great and so hope to keep that trend going! Ultimate goal in 4 1/2 years when I'm 50 would be playing 1-2 gigs a week just playing in the Tributes I want to, with my bands playing 5 gigs a week on average. Hoping to be retired from solo acoustic gigs after 2018. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Voltan Posted August 21, 2017 Members Share Posted August 21, 2017 what was it john lennon wrote about making plans? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members FloridaFrailer Posted August 23, 2017 Members Share Posted August 23, 2017 Lennon... or Steinbeck? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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