Notes_Norton

We rehearse at least 3 day per week. We have gigs booked for the 2021/2022 winter tourist season. It's the light at the end of the tunnel.

Notes

We're getting bookings for the 2021/2022 winter season here in Florida. So there is a dim light at the end of the tunnel

Notes ♫

The vaccines are coming. As tired as most of us are about it, it's not time to let our guard down.

A friend of mine (a fine guitarist) plays in a band that pitches themselves to a much younger market than we do. They did some gigs, 3 out of the 4 members got COVID. One of them died (he had a previous heart condition). My friend had a fever for a couple of weeks, didn't get tested, so I don't know if he had the flu or survived COVID.

Without your health, you have nothing. All the money in the world will just buy you a better headstone.

Insights and incites by Notes

It's sad to see a once lively forum slowly fade away.

We are a duo, and our last gig was March 17.

We're learning new songs, re-arranging and polishing some older ones, and gigging in our living room twice a week to the birds and squirrels in our back yard.

We are not in a hurry to get back to gigging. There is no Ctrl+Z or Cmd+Z if we catch COVID, and since 1/3 of the people who recover have long lasting, perhaps permanent damage to lungs, brain, kidneys, heart and/or other organs, we're happy to be safer at home until a vaccine or some other solution comes around.

As impatient as we are to get back to 'normal' life, in the great scheme of things and in a lifespan, one year is not that long.

Insights and incites by Notes

Are we past the golden age of specialized forums and have most of us gone to the voluntary spyware fields of anti-social media?

(Rhetorical question)

1 hour ago, Outkaster said:

Facebook is horrible for bands and music and hasn't improved much.  Even doing things for bands on the page app is terrible.  I actually think the forum is fine now and am trying to get the guys over on KC to come back.

Facebook is just horrible. Period.

Being different is a time honored way to either be noticed or ignored. It's great when it works.

Notes

I'm not here - I'm hiding - look over there -->

(I don't do FB)

IMO the DJ shares this with a live musician. We both have to pace the audience, give them what they want, when they want it, whether they know when they want it or not. We both have to put on a show, because many people listen to music with their eyes. But the DJ doesn't get to perform the music.

I have respect for a DJ who can play the crowd well.

I have respect for musicians who can do the same thing.

As a pop musician, I also play other people's music, but I get to play the music myself, and that brings me great joy and is my bliss.

I have additional respect for musicians who can play the crowd well and play their instrument well (including the human voice instrument).

Me? I know being a DJ wouldn't provide me with the bliss I get playing music - I wouldn't get into that place were there is no space, no time, no me, just the music that seems like it is flowing through me instead of from me.

But that's just me. Of course, there is more than one way to make a living doing music.

Insights and incites by Notes

But being a DJ isn't as much fun as playing music.

You just need the right people to work with.

Leilani and I have been a duo since 1985 and up until COVID the only time we were out of work was when we blocked out time to take a vacation and turned down work for that period.

But we do this full time, so the needs of the audience guides all our decisions.

Insights and incites by Notes

9 hours ago, Outkaster said:

I do disagree sorry.  

I'm not the arbiter of what's art and what's not, so I respect your opinion.

Notes

1 hour ago, Outkaster said:

I kind of disagree.  I have opened for a lot of people also.  More people will know Bob Marley around the world than Dvorak hands down because of accessibility and what Bob did politically though music.

Popularity and are are not mutually inclusive.

McDonalds is the most popular restaurant in the US - does that make it's cuisine fine art?

One in twenty American homes owns a Thomas Kinkade painting or print - but you won't find him hanging in any fine art gallery hanging next to a Rembrandt, Singer-Sargent, Dali, or any of the others.

I don't think either McDonalds or KinKade could be considered fine art. They are perhaps the most popular in their field.

There's art, craft, and kitsch. I think what we pop music folks do is more fine craft than either art or kitsch. It's somewhere in the middle.

To equate what we pop and jazz players/composers do to what composers of great symphonies do sounds a bit pretentious to me.

I'm a damn good sax and wind synth player, a decent singer, bass player and drummer, an adequate guitar and flute player, and a hack keyboard player. Every year I was in school I sat first char all-state which is rare for a tenor player, it goes to an alto by default. I write excellent aftermarket styles for Band-in-a-Box judging by the comments and repeat business I get. I practice my craft and was given a gift of talent (Thanks Dad!). Do I consider myself an artist? Nope. I'm just a pop musician lucky enough to make a living on my own terms doing music and nothing but music.

You may disagree as there is no definitive answer.

Notes

On 11/12/2019 at 2:27 PM, Outkaster said:

That's a loaded post.  Not sure really if it's that simple. There is tons of art in other music.

Depends on your definition of art vs craft.

I have a very high definition of art, perhaps too high. There are some great pop songs in many genres out there and I enjoy many different types of music from 3 chord blues to symphonies and a lot of genres in between. But when compared to what some composers do with great symphonies, the gap is way too large.

Example:

I played Dvorak's 9th symphony in school. I love the piece, owned 3 different copies of it (wore out an LP), bought a CD, heard a better version on the radio and bought it. I've heard it live a half dozen or more times, the best version being from the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra. After hearing it thousands of times I can still hear something new.

A couple of years ago I was listening, and in the fourth movement Dvorak took half a main theme from the fourth movement, spliced half a main theme from the second movement on it to make a new melody. He took the part of a theme from the first movement, made a bass line out of it and a snipped of a main theme from the third movement as accompaniment. And it sounds so natural that after hearing the symphony hundreds of times and being able to sing along with that part, I never actually realized what he did.

Now IMHO that takes great art and even the great cuts from The Moody Blues, King Crimson, ELP, ELO, Yes, Beatles, and others can't come close to that level of art. I may love the music, think it is artistically crafted, the playing is phenomenal, and everything else can be superb. But to me it's still craft. It can't compare to what Dvorak, Tchaikovsky, DeFalla, Saint-Seans, Prokofiev, Amirov, Shostakovitch, Mahler, Janacek, and so many others created.

I play sax, flute, wind synth, guitar, bass, drums, keys, and vocals and have had the good luck to have played with or warmed the stage up for some of the biggest rock artists in the history of the genre and a few top jazz men too. When I think of those symphonies, calling myself an artist just seems like I'm inflating my ego. I'm a damn good musician.

Like I said, perhaps my standards are too high, and I am not the supreme arbiter of art and taste so feel free to disagree.

Insights and incites by Notes

Artist schmartist. I'm an entertainer.

I'm a damn good sax player, wind synth player, and backing track maker. I'm a decent singer and an adequate but limited guitar player. I also play bass, drums, and keyboards. The composing I do is improvisations on sax, guitar and wind synth and I'm very good at that. But of course, there are others much better than myself, and others not as good. That's life.

I'm in a duo that has worked steadily since 1985. Before that many other bands. At one time I was in a band that was the opening act for headliners when their hits were top 10 on Billboard. I was in a house band that hosted jam sessions where heavyweights, real jazz stars, used to come to sit in (the guitarist taught jazz at the University of Miami and was in Ira Sullivan's band for a while).

I play rock, disco, jazz, country, blues, Musica Latina, Afro-Cuban, and many other styles. I've even played in classical bands and won "best" sax player in the state when I was in school. I'm not a rock musician. I'm not a jazz musician. I'm not a reggae musician. I'm not a country musician. I'm just a musician. I'll play whatever people want to hear and in whatever style they want (with the exception of rap and EDM, I don't think I could pull that off)

Artist???? I don't think so. If others think so, that's ok. I'm just a damn good entertainer, making a living doing music and nothing but music, playing whatever puts food on the table, having fun playing it, and doing it to the best of my ability.

I'm having a great life because playing music is better than any day job I can think of. I just have fun, entertain the folks, and bring home the bacon. To make things better, my wife, best friend, and lover is my duo-mate. We met when we were in different bands and when our bands both broke up, we decided to join forces. It's a match made in heaven.

I don't know what it takes to be an artist, and I know that term is sometimes abused for commercial purposes, and whether it's Taylor Swift or Buddy Guy or me, we aren't artists, we're just singing musicians, and some of us have better gigs than others.

When I was opening for major stars, most of them were pretty down to earth regular musicians. A few had the big ego, they forgot they were just musicians and singers and thought they were on that pedestal that the public can put you on.

Right now in our area, nobody wants to pay musicians so the quality goes down. That's good and bad for us. Good in that we are desired more because we are better, bad because they undercut us so badly we can't charge what we want and haven't increased our rates in a long time.

There are open mic nights around here, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Sometimes Tuesday too. What kind of quality can you expect there? It's variable, some are good, most are poor, some are terrible, but don't expect art there either.

It's really easy. Practice your craft, be professional, play what the audience in front of you wants to hear, entertain them, do a good job, have fun, and don't worry about art. Life is short. Have fun.

Some write run of the mill rock, jazz, folk, or country songs. Art? Not as far as I'm concerned. Some can be very, very good and well crafted, but not a thousandth of what goes into a great symphony. To me it's craft, perhaps fine craft, but craft non the less.

You want real art in music? It's there, by the likes of Shostakovitch, Beethoven, Dvorak, Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Suk, Mozart, Saint-Seans, Prokofiev, Grieg, Smetana, Janacek, Borodin, de Falla, and some of their modern contemporaries. Where to draw the line under that to separate art from craft and eventually from kitsch? I don't worry about that, I just play music. And I remember they call it PLAYing music for a reason.

Insights, incites and perhaps a minor rant by Notes

I'm still here, but don't have much to say, except gigging is the most fun I can have with my clothes on!

I didn't know about your wife's accident. I do hope she heals quickly and completely.

Notes

I too miss the action here.

 

Congrats, that in my opinion is success, even if you don't have platnium records on your wall or do you ? <...snip...>

 

I wake up in the morning, go to bed at night and in between do what I want to do. I'm a success.

I've made my living doing music and nothing but music most of my life. Got close to that record deal and spent a year or two being the opening act for headliners in concert. The deal fell through because the label didn't want to pay, but that's OK.

I'm in a duo with my wife. She is a great singer and plays guitar and synth. I play sax, wind synth, guitar, bass, drums, keys and make our own backing tracks. We have a great time playing music for our audiences, and at the end of the night they give us money. (How cool is that!!!)

I started my own business making aftermarket styles for Band-in-a-Box and sell them to musicians in over 100 different countries. A few times here and overseas I've walked into music stores and when they asked my name and I responded they asked if I was THE Bob Norton. That's a nice ego boost.

I'm not a wage slave to some faceless corporation, I have no boss telling me what to do either. I profit by my good decisions and hopefully learn from the bad ones. I'm living my life on my own terms.

The mortgage is paid, I take vacations every year and have been to every continent but Antarctica, I'm healthy, happy and gigging with my wife/best-friend/lover.

AJ6, it sounds like you are successful too.

Fantasy is reality when you are in the entertainment business, Voltan

In fact, to escape from fantasy, we read non-fiction books.

Notes

I'm still here. I check in almost every day.

I don't understand it but this is the first I've seen of this thread - 7 days later. I clean my cache, clear my cookies, and put the computer to bed every night so I don't think the trouble is on my end.

I won't do Facebook. I know a lot of people that do, but I will not participate or let a company profit by my posts that uses the information the gleaned from user's likes and by reading their posts to spread fraudulent news (I don't call fraud fake news) to throw a US presidential or congressional election. Whether it is for the candidate I like or dislike these are not my personal values, and I cannot in clear conscience aid and abet that behavior.

Thanks to FB, this is not the only forum that has turned into a ghost town.

Insights and incites by Notes

Through the years I got so frustrated with singer problems, that I learned to sing myself.

It was harder than learning the saxophone or guitar, because you can't press the right keys or fret and have the right note come out. It's physical, you need conditioning, proper breathing, proper breath support, and countless hours of practice. But it's worth it.

I'll never be a great singer, I don't have the physical equipment for that, but I've learned to become a decent singer. Add that I can play sax, wind synth, guitar, bass, drums, flute, and some keys, and it makes it easier for me to be wanted in a band.

But back in them late 1970s I was seeing a fantastic singer who was playing in another band. She also played a rhythm guitar. Pardon the cliche but it was love at first sight, we didn't know it then, it was just lust and fun. But it was both relaxing and exciting from day one.

Our bands broke up within weeks of each other. We decided to try something together. Got a piano player, a drum machine and played trio gigs. Later we added a drummer and bass player. That band broke up so we went to the "Musician's Exchange" and found new musicians and was gigging in another 5 piece band. Bass player quit for personal reasons, and we replaced him, drummer quit and we replaced her. Total out of work was 3 months to break the new musicians in.

Then when we got our first gig, the room was packed, so they opened the accordion pleat wall and set us in the bar. The new drummer said that God wouldn't forgive her if she played in a bar. I said God would have to forgive me for homicide if you don't play tonight.

Talk about delusional -- where did she think we were going to play?

The next day Leilani and I quit the band. I bought a Teac 4 channel reel-to-reel and I would record backing tracks. 16 hours a day, 7 days a week and when we had enough tracks for a gig, we went out as a duo. That was in 1985 Eventually digital came along and we ditched the tape for various digital formats. I ended up marrying her and we haven't been out of work since our second year as a duo. Once we established a reputation, we get repeat bookings and we're still doing it.

We are both stable, hard-working, professional, and we haven't had personnel problems since.

Notes

"Forever And Ever Amen" - Randy Travis

for a triple word score

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sgJXbIP83A8

Notes

Peanut Butter - The Marathons

[video=youtube;-V9ikQn58NY]

"I Get Ideas" - this version by Louis Armstrong although I think it is associated with Tony Martin.

double word score