Why do some guitar players for cover bands struggle to play original sound

[RockViolin]

The classical player is only interested in their playing. There`s nothing wrong with this. If you want a plumber, don`t call an electrician sort of thing.

 

Interestingly, some of the best musicians I have played with don`t write music. The ones that in my opinion are the most "well rounded", tend to do everything with passing grades but they`re not A players. I put myself into that list. We`re the ones that play multiple instruments, write, program, record, etc... the jack of all trades, master of none...

 

The best classical musicians are very busy being just that. Some do find a cruising altitude, but those at the top or those who are making their way there and want to stay there have an edge to maintain and their time is likely better spent with scales and arpeggios than it is getting ready for the unlikely event that someone might ask them to improvise.

 

And I'd agree as far as well rounded goes. I quit chasing Ithzak Perlman and Joshua Bell the instant I started chasing Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck. I managed to land a good orchestra gig though, and I can probably go 500 miles in any direction from here and not find a soul who plays an electric violin like me. Sorry that sounds ego-ish. It's probably true though.

 

Perlman can improvise by the way. I'll duck as I say that I didn't care for what I've heard of it it much. There was something odd and off kilter about it to me.

 

[RockViolin]

 

As far as improvisation is concerned, not everybody can.

 

I recall seeing a documentary. Andre Previn and Itzhak Perlman were in in a segment. Itzhak, who at the time was the most in-demand classical soloist in the classical world wanted to know how to improvise. Andre was then conducting the London Symphony but had a long career as a jazz pianist. Itzhak wanted to play jazz but couldn't get the concept of improvising, so for the next best thing, Andre wrote an 'improvised' style part for Itzhak to play. There isn't a person in the musical world who can honestly say that Itzhak is not one of the best living virtuoso violinists. But Itzhak can't improvise.

 

Different skills in his toolbox.

 

 

 

Insights, incites and perhaps TMI by Notes

 

I made my post above before I saw yours. Well, that 'slpains it. He was faking it! The part where he's actually supposed to be making it up as he goes, anyway.

 

I'll have to admit, when I had to improvise over "Giant Steps" for my jazz jury in grad school, um, it wasn't all just off the top of my head. The prof could tell I think, and may have he cut me a little slack.

 

 

[RockViolin]

Wives can be amazingly astute, yet somehow quite hard to hear thoroughly. Happens to me all the time, I mean often, no wait...once in a while.

 

You're welcome! Good luck! :-)

[RockViolin]

But then there are exceptions to the rule. People who are multidimensional and are heads and tails above everybody in at least a some of them. Prince comes to mind. A jack of a trades and master of quite a few, as it were.

[Ernest Buckley]

Great conversation my friends:

 

Here is a more detail explanation of my problem.

 

I have a song I am currently recording, this song is going to be the greatest song I ever wrote and record, and when I die, this is going to be what people will remember me by (those who know me).

 

It has lots of space, extremely ethereal and a mixture between very sweet and emotional turmoil. I love this song as if it was one of my children and so I treat it as a person.

 

With that said, the original idea requires a guitar solo at the beginning and the end and some riffs here and there. To accomplish this I contacted a Guitar player, he's been playing for 3 decades, cover songs mostly.

 

The first day was to hear the song and just get familiar, not really a recording session. However, we start to play around and the guy can't play anything, his timing is just way out of whack, the progression and cords are all over the place.However, this guy will play ACDC to a T.

 

Long story short, how do I get a guitarist? I am looking to hire one but what a person charges is not indicative of good playing.

 

Right now I am thinking about removing the guitar idea completely and just use all synth.

 

So assuming you do not know a guitar player personally, how do you go about getting one who will just come in, you push play and they blown your mind?

 

Finding the "right" player is always a bit strange. I have used some amazing players both here in NY and Nashville but they don`t all bring what I`m looking for for a particular song. I have hired players only to delete their tracks...

 

So I`m reluctant to even suggest them. However, they are fantastic players. PM me if you would like their contact.

[Ernest Buckley]

Perlman can improvise by the way. I'll duck as I say that I didn't care for what I've heard of it it much. There was something odd and off kilter about it to me.

 

Yeah, I know what you`re talking about... to me it doesn`t sound like he`s improvising, it sounds more like he thought it out already and is trying to figure out how to play what he already composed in his head with what is currently going on around him. It`s like FAKE IMPROVISING!

[RockViolin]

 

Yeah, I know what you`re talking about... to me it doesn`t sound like he`s improvising, it sounds more like he thought it out already and is trying to figure out how to play what he already composed in his head with what is currently going on around him. It`s like FAKE IMPROVISING!

 

I think part of it is a matter of manner, for me. It's been a while, but I remember that fairly often dead ringer classical mannerisms show with Perlman. The vibrato can go on automatic just a bit, and it might be the same vibrato that is right on for a Brahms sonata or an improvised cadenza to a Mozart concerto, but is out of place somehow when he's trying to swing. Grapelli, on the other hand, has a sweetened and a little extra wide vibrato that's perfect for what he did, but would be out of place in Brahms and Mozart, etc. I straddled the fence for a long time, and I got used to not allowing what's right for one genre to bleed over into the other except in rare instances, and then it's a conscious choice-not by accident or automatically. A classical vibrato when I rock would be wrong, and pretty much everything I do when I rock would be oh soooo wrong at a classical gig.

 

I had this party shortly after I started working for an orchestra. Most of the violin section was there. It was funny. They all had to try my electric violin. The concertmaster went first and he wasn't too bad. But then everybody wanted a shot. They were like headhunters who'd laid their hands on their first gun. One of them would get their chance while another would be looking on a bit in disgust, waiting for their chance to steal it away and show them how it's done. One guy finally did things that were so onerous that it was me that yanked it away. Strange... he and I wound up being the best of enemies for the rest of my time there. 13 years, no peace, though I tried.

 

 

[RockViolin]

Having maybe made a point or 2 at Mr. Perlman's expense, I'd just like to add that there were many more times when he was an inspiration of the best kind, and I never had a better jury/exam in school than the one I had the day after I saw his mighty performance of 3 major violin concertos in 1 show on tv. Mendelssohn, Brahms, Tchaikowsky in 1 show. Even my teacher at the time noticed that changes she couldn't account for had happened overnight. I think I was watching, listening with my entire being. Totally engrossed. It was an act of power as Castaneda might put it, and I was all there for it... albeit through the television. Thankyou Itzhak Perlman!

[WRGKMC]

Being able to write and improvise takes a well developed inner ear, not the ear itself, but the ability to hear music within your own mind.

I started playing as a very young child and was playing violin in an orchestra by 5th grade. I came from a family that was musical too so I always had music going on. Even when I got older and worked I spend half my day driving so I's always had music play plus I invested allot of monet into music collections to were I could listen to a song once and play darn near the whole song after hearing it once.

 

I think once a person has developed that inner ear and can play music back in their minds much like an actor can memorize a script, the ability to reverse gears and generate musical compositions becomes much easier. its like the glass becomes full from all the music you know, and then you start to generate your own.

 

It does take work however. Too many think that its an easy task to write and create. Like any work of art you have many more failures then you do successes. If I add up the numbers of songs I've written in the past 50 years it would easily add up to 5~7 thousand songs written and recorded. Out of those songs there may be several different versions and parts of songs stitched together to create new ones. I could easily narrow those numbers down to a couple of hundred that are truly well done, maybe more if I wasn't such a perfectionist.

 

I've also worked with many musicians who know how to improvise well and can like myself write music as they play it, coming straight from the minds eye into the hands and into the instrument. The one band I played in we used to play out and write music as we played it, 100% improve the entire night. We even wrote the lyrics and melody as we played and never knew how it would wind up beginning or ending.

 

We did that kind of stuff for 20 years together and its as close to reading other peoples minds as you're likely to get. I had so many single take recordings that were so well done I couldn't keep up with the task of mixing them half the time. Just takes creative people with inventive ideas who like playing music and having fun.

 

I do play covers with bands occasionally too but its so frigging boring playing other peoples music any more. I do it to please an audience but its so old any more and there simply aren't any challenges there any more. Its a whole lot of work and what do you wind up with when you're done. you're nothing but a clone and you're never going to be the person who played that music. You have to decide something in your life is you're going to spend the rest of your life being an imitation or an original thinker. The choice was easy for me but its a very small club unfortunately.

[Makzimia]

Best post on this so far . I feel the same way. After so many years of playing covers, I'm so F that.. I do some still, but mostly I do originals, or I do songs people didn't think of ever doing so I am not just a bloody copycat jukebox. Thing is, people like well made songs that are original, they just don't know it, until they hear some LOL.