Members Sgt. Rock Posted February 11, 2012 Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 I did 54 songs in 2 1/2 hours last week at one show. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members fancyfootwork Posted February 11, 2012 Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 How you had a voice left, is beyond comprehension. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BlueStrat Posted February 11, 2012 Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 About 75-80, on a solo gig I did for 4 hours and 20 minutes. No breaks, either. Yeah, I know..... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members daklander Posted February 11, 2012 Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 Somewhere the north side of 80. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Mike McLaughlin Posted February 11, 2012 Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Tomm Williams Posted February 11, 2012 Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 About 75-80, on a solo gig I did for 4 hours and 20 minutes. No breaks, either. Yeah, I know..... Holy Crap Batman!!!!!!!!!!!! I hope you were paid accordingly for that "music marathon" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators daddymack Posted February 11, 2012 Moderators Share Posted February 11, 2012 but in a sense, apropos...is it the number of songs, or the length of time that puts more strain on you as a performer? To my mind, I can play anywhere from twelve to twenty five songs in a set (depending if the sets are 40 minutes or an hour). Playing over 4 hours, like Bluestrat did, esepcially with no breaks, would likely be more that I would attempt (this from a guy who has done two 4+ hour shows at two separate venues, 40 miles apart on the same day with my band)...the breaks would be where I would draw the line... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BlueStrat Posted February 11, 2012 Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 It's too bad you seem to view everything as a contest. I don't see the point, but oh well. .the breaks would be where I would draw the line... Well, I try to take them, but in some venues (like an art walk where people are constantly passing trough) a break costs you money. Lots of people tip at those things- and tips range from a dollar to 20 dollars. A 15 minute break could cost me anywhere from 5 to 60 dollars on average. Since I'm sitting in a chair and not working all that hard, and I have a lot of stamina and a strong bladder, it doesn't bother me to play long shows. In band gigs I've done concert sets that ended up running 2-1/2 hours straight standing up. 4 hours in a chair is not bad after that! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Mike McLaughlin Posted February 11, 2012 Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 It's too bad you seem to view everything as a contest. I don't see the point, but oh well. I don't, there was irony in that pic. Sorry if you seem to take everything as being negative, but oh well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members BlueStrat Posted February 11, 2012 Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 I don't, there was irony in that pic. Sorry if you seem to take everything as being negative, but oh well. Guess I missed the irony. Wouldn't be the first time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Sgt. Rock Posted February 11, 2012 Author Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 I try to take a break at about halfway through the gig, but sometimes it's not possible. Three hour gigs are a killer without taking a break especially when you think you're near the end and you've only been playing for an hour. I keep thinking about the T-shirt I saw, "shut up and play". I like to cram as many good songs as I can in the shorter gigs, and I was just curious as to how many others can do. There must be a Guiness record for that no? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Mike McLaughlin Posted February 11, 2012 Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 I've never counted, but I would guess I might have done around 60+ on a four hour gig with breaks. It really matters more about the hours playing and singing solo. 3 is very comfortable, 4 is a pain for me at my age, but doable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Shaster Posted February 11, 2012 Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 Over the years I've been trying to decrease the amount of tunes I play in a night, by making the tunes longer. For instance... a few times a year I'm hired by a really good pianist to flesh out his solo act. He plays with and without his drum machine depending on the song. In a typical 40 minute set we might do six or seven tunes. Most of the rooms he hires me for are two or three day stints so being able to turn over your song list is important. Anyway, I mostly use sequences (bass/drums only) so that I can solo. Lately I've been going over every song to make sure it's at least five minutes long. That doesn't always work musically, but other songs can often be longer so it averages out. I do mostly Blues/Jazz/Soul listening stuff so that makes it easier. Things like Still Got The Blues For You, Antonio's Song, Just The Two Of Us, Breezin'.... so if I do a gig now with four x 40 minute sets I only need 32 tunes max. It seems to work better for me. Of course if I was still doing the Top 40 party rooms where everyone wants to hear the song as recorded, that could be a different story. Actually, even when I play with my Classic Pop party trio we stretch the songs out. Makes for less transitions on the dance floor. We also run a lot of the songs together for the same reason. No matter how you slice it, it essentially means I don't have to memorize too many lyrics Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members daklander Posted February 11, 2012 Members Share Posted February 11, 2012 Before I got too sick to do much gigging, and especially long gigs, I used a cheat book with the title and first line of the song for those days when the memory failed. Each page has 25 songs and, depending on the gig and expected time length, one page was one set. There were some all day and well into the night gigs that I don't include in this because they might include one set, then a long break while other performers did a set, & so on. Those could well entail 100 songs, sometimes repetitions of requests from an earlier set. Normally I tried to never play a song more than once during a gig unless there were requests to redo a tune. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Terry Allan Hall Posted February 12, 2012 Members Share Posted February 12, 2012 Depends on the venue...if it's a restaurant gig of 3 hours or less, I don't take a break, so figure up to 45 songs. If a 5 hour bar gig, maybe 60. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members rodclement Posted February 12, 2012 Members Share Posted February 12, 2012 This past Thursday I sang from 6:45pm to 11:00pm with no breaks other than running to the bathroom once. Have no idea how many songs we did but the bar was full and i had a lot of guest musicians there that kept on rotating on stage to play with us and I was the only singer so....from Elvis to Skid Row and all in good fun and having a blast! Rod Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members richardmac Posted February 13, 2012 Members Share Posted February 13, 2012 My record is 48 songs - that was 4 hours, with a 10 - 15 minute break every hour. I thought the contest picture was kinda funny... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members RupertB Posted February 24, 2012 Members Share Posted February 24, 2012 5 hours, w/one 15 minute break. Didn't count the songs but the number was easily past 60 and maybe past 70. This was playing solo. I had an agreement with the place for 3 hours with an option for a fourth hour for additional pay. They always bought the fourth hour but it was a good safety-valve for them should the night be slow. So that night, I got to the end of four hours and the manager/owner walks up and tells me that Ron Francis & Brent Hedican (Carolina Hurricanes at the time) and their wives were just seated for an after-game dinner and said "that guy is pretty good, how much longer is he playing?" Of course, he told them "another hour." The pay & tips were great that night but MAN, my voice and hands were shot by the end of the night. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members jmullen45 Posted February 24, 2012 Members Share Posted February 24, 2012 Good stuff...I've played for almost 6 hours in a night...was scheduled to play the usual 9-1 but bar owner's friends showed up late and I played until almost 2:30. Probably played about 70-80 songs as I usually average around 50-60 a night. Also, did a double gig one day...played before the Buckeye game on a Saturday morning for 3 hours and then played that night at a pub for 3 more hours. In both cases, my fingers on my left hand felt like they were going to fall off. I'm always somewhat horse for a couple days after a show so that was normal. The worst was this past fall. Columbus has a marathon and one thing they do that's really cool is have live music all along the course. I was set up at mile 11. Long and short, I was scheduled to play once the first runners started coming up (about an hour after the start) and at that point we are to keep playing until the limo drives by (symbolic of the end of the race). Anyway, I was having issues with my supplied generator powering all my equipment so I didn't get started until right when the first runners were coming. Because of this, the bathroom break I counted on before I started didn't happen. I ended up playing for like 3 and a half hours straight wishing I was wearing depends....was actually a really cool gig but I started to wonder if some of the runners were going for round two as they just kept coming and coming.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Goominim Posted February 24, 2012 Members Share Posted February 24, 2012 I can barely work up enough nerves to do 1 song. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Notes_Norton Posted February 25, 2012 Members Share Posted February 25, 2012 I have no idea, but we once played 6 hours straight without a break. At about 4 minutes a song, that would be 90 give or take some. We were hired to play a birthday party for someone who saw us at a yacht club. He was from Germany and had invited a few friends from Germany to fly over for his party. All total there were probably a dozen people there. We played in the kitchen and they partied in the living room. We hardly saw them. We played 4 hours straight (nothing to do but play, so why be bored and break?) and at the end the guy came up and said this is great, threw a couple of hundred dollar bills on the keyboard an asked us if we could do another hour. We said "Be glad to" At the end of the 5th hour he put a few more hundreds on the keyboard and asked if we could play another one. Being greedier than we are sane we agreed. At the end of the 6th hour we were secretly hoping he wouldn't do it again, because we are needier than we are sane and we would have played more. But instead he came in, told us it was great, gave us a tip and offered to help us carry the gear out. We were tired, but it's a good kind of tired. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Notes_Norton Posted February 25, 2012 Members Share Posted February 25, 2012 Speaking of breaks. We learned to play without them on the cruise ships. We did 3 years back in the late 80s. The problem was that the first set of the night you would build up a big crowd in your lounge. Then when you took your first break, the people would leave to catch another act (6 or 7 musical acts on the ship including the DJ and he didn't take breaks). So you started the second set with nobody in the room. People would stick their heads in and see an empty room and move on thinking "It's not happening here." It's much more fun to play for a full house than an empty room so we started playing straight through, holding the audience, and having more fun. Then on passenger talent night, when everybody went to the main theater to hear their fellow passengers, we sat around drinking cappuccino in the 'bistro' for a few hours waiting for the theater to clear out (one loooooong break) and then started as soon as people started appearing in the promenade. What did it get us? More fun playing. Better tips. Better receipts in the bar (that's how the home office evaluates the bands, if they drink in your lounge, they must like you). And since we had better receipts we got a passenger sized cabin with a porthole, and they ignored us while we discreetly sold cassette tapes (which was officially against the rules but granted to people who the ship didn't want to lose). Tiring at first, but you build your stamina. We still rarely take a break but actually prefer to play straight through. We love making music. We have fun making music. We get high playing music. We'd rather play music than do anything else (at least that we can do in public ), so why stop the music? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members dparr Posted February 25, 2012 Members Share Posted February 25, 2012 I did 5-1/2 hours of 3 to 4 minute songs a while back. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members John Bartus Posted February 25, 2012 Members Share Posted February 25, 2012 Last weekend I had two three-hour gigs on both Friday and Saturday, both solo acoustic. I have no idea how many songs there were on both days, but it was a lot. Luckily, the voice held out just fine... but the fingertips were sure tender! Not bad for a 50-year-old geezer... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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