Wedding Ceremony Music

Mark Dannells and I are unveiling our new flute and guitar demo!  You can hear it on my website.

davidfreemanmusic.net

Video Roundup

Here are a few videos from the Variety Playhouse show a few Fridays ago:





Here are a few videos of me from last night:





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The Weekend That Was

I got so busy gigging and sleeping that I was unable to blog!

Early last week, I got the set lists for the weekend's gigs.  After enduring a few weeks where I felt totally directionless on stage, I decided that I was going to be very prepared.  I set out practicing everything--no surprises!

Thursday:  A really good night at the 10 High.  Nick picked a great set list, and we were on it.  We had a good mix of oldies and new stuff, and the crowd was more responsive than any other Thursday in January.

Right before we started, the little voice in my head threw me a curve ball--what if I was so prepared to play the gig, I couldn't focus on playing, and instead spaced out?  Hmm.  Fortunately, it never happened.  I felt really good about everything.  Greatest American Hero was the second song in, and I nailed the synth thing in the bridge!  Woo!

Friday:  We returned to 8 Traxx Disco (Andrews Upstairs).  Sold it out--six hundred forty people, I think?  They pre-sell five hundred and then offer a hundred  tickets at the door, and they went over that.  It was nuts.

I altered my set up a little bit--I got my laptop and my speaker on my left like I do for every other gig.  I liked this set up a lot more.  It felt a little more normal, and on a crappy stage like that where everything feels like I'm all alone, familiar is good.

Of course, the Andrews gig is (for me), a two set exam with Mark Bencuya as the proctor.  Normally we are on opposite sides of the stage, and if I flub a couple of notes, I might be able to get away with it.  At Andrews, he's sitting right next to me, and I know he can hear me really well--too well?  Anyway, it was the best I've ever played sitting next to him.  I'd give myself an A!  I can't think of anything I ruined, and lots of stuff where I came through--Greatest American Hero was good again, and I finally slayed the synth build up thing in Lido Shuffle!  Woo!

Since it's Buckhead, there was weirdness, though.  I packed all my stuff and stacked it at the front of the stage.  Upon returning from taking a load of gear out, I discovered that someone had stolen the base of my laptop table.  What the hell?  Some drunk idiot made off with a chrome tripod?  I don't get it.  Maybe it will turn up, but I am not optimistic.  The base of a folding music stand will do for now, but I'd really like to get that back.  So weird.

Saturday:  Yacht Rock went to the 40 Watt in Athens.  Probably the best sound we ever have on a gig.  The 40 Watt guys are on it!  I ran my sax separate from the rest of my rig so the sound guys could have a little more control (and I could have it coming out of the monitor in front of me).  When the sax is only in my little powered speaker, it's really hard to hear as I walk away from it.  This solution is way better.  Hopefully the front line guys will put a little sax in the monitor.

Great crowd in Athens.  They were nuts from the beginning.  It was really fun to play.  We did two encores!

Our old second keyboardist Brandon Still was at the gig.  I'm glad I didn't know ahead of time.  It probably would've messed me up to know he was listening.

While setting up my stuff, I noticed that my EWI had something rattling around in it!  Not good!  It turns out that one of the octave key rollers had come loose.  I taped it into place so it wouldn't touch the roller below it (or fall out completely).  The thought occurred to me that I might be able to take the thing completely apart and fix it backstage, and then I had thoughts of NOT being able to get it back together. Taping the roller in position worked fine as a band aid.

Sunday:  We got back to Atlanta at 4:15 AM.  I was in bed at 5, and probably asleep twenty minutes after that.  I was then back up again at 7 AM so I could leave at 7:30 for my church gig.  Ouch!  I slept in my clothes--including my jacket and shoes.  Basically, I stood up, drank a cup of coffee, and left for the next gig!

Church gig number one was normal.  I tried wearing headphones like the rest of the band, but the mix was really bad (and super loud), so I decided to just without.  I can hear everything fine, anyway.  I could use more bass (I'm only hearing the house), but the headphones sound horrible, so I'm going to deal with it.

I was asleep again by 11:30 AM!

I got up at 4:30 PM, took a shower, ate, and left for church gig number two.

The sound was back to normal--the old spot on the main fader was the right one again, after two weeks of it sounding like we were outside the church.  What the hell?  It sounded pretty good.  I messed around with the EQ on the piano to try and get a little more clarity out of the left hand.  That was about it.

I got home, ate again, and took my EWI apart.  It turns out the top and bottom rollers were BOTH loose.  Not good.  Two nuts rolling around inside there.  I turned the thing around like a piggy bank until both came out.  Reinstalling them was pretty painless.  It's all back together.

Easy week ahead.

davidfreemanmusic.net

Big Weekend!

Friday:  The big XTC/Sgt. Peppers/Dark Side show at the Variety Playhouse!  It was very cool to play a gig without a wig.

We were all pleasantly surprised to see a pretty full (700+) room on Friday night.  All the work that had gone into learning that music deserved a good audience, and we got it.  Very cool!

The efforts of Cobb, Bencuya, and Nick were amazing--the three of them played a TON of music.  Not one of their heads exploded.  Dannells carried a ton of (musical) weight in The Dark Side of the Moon, and was brilliant throughout (even if he's still pissed about the solo in Time).  Every solo on that album is a classic (and David Gilmour's stuff is always so melodic that it sticks in your ear!), and Dannells' tone and technique were spot on.  My hero!

For my part, I was mostly just reading charts and trying to stay in tune.  I don't know if the charts are the problem or what, but for me the gig felt more like a sideman than a part of the band, and I couldn't get that into it.  I think I played well and I was more than happy to help, but I felt that my contribution was miniscule, and that's really all I was doing--helping.  This project like it was mine--I was just along for the ride.

Peter Stroud played in the XTC band Nigels With Attitude.  What a neat guy!  He plays great, he's super nice, he looks like a rock star.  He's royalty around us.  When Peter speaks, everybody listens to what he has to say.  After the show, I he spent a couple of minutes praising my playing--really cool of him.

Saturday:  Back to Yacht Rock.

We played a private party at the Westin Buckhead.  It was a pretty bland event, and twenty-four hours after the Variety Playhouse, were came crashing back to earth--ignored by a couple of hundred people more interested in two minutes in the money cube.

I played well on this gig, though I had a lot of trouble finding the right volume level.  Everything felt too quiet or two loud.  At one point I turned my amp all the way down and tried to play off the room sound.  Weird.  I mentioned how I could hear my sound slapping off the opposite wall, and he said he couldn't hear me at all.

It was a super easy gig, though--three sets of the usual stuff.  No equipment catastrophes, no drunk idiots, no cigarette smoke.

We had a lot of down time in between soundcheck and the gig.

Sunday:  church gigs.

My first church gig of the day was strangely cohesive, considering how seat-of-the-pants it was.  I think the band is getting better about reading the leader.

Where as last week I think I played almost exclusively soprano sax, this week was all flute and tenor.  This week also had the children's choirs singing along to tracks and standing WAAAAAAY to close to my horns.  With this I can never be happy.

The band played one of the leader's originals--some kind of frenetic samba--that I had to chart out because he didn't have any sort of lead sheet on it.  The leader asked the organist to play on it as well (because church organ sounds really good on a samba), but the organist didn't have a chart, so he made a photocopy of the chart, so suddenly my chart has been donated to the church?  Why'd I just let that happen?

In between church gigs we went to Cobb's house to celebrate Nick's birthday.  That was really fun!

My second church gig was ok.  Since the sound has been weird the past few weeks, I tried running mono instead of stereo.  There's a mono out on the board, so we used that.  First song was full of static.  What the hell?  I moved it to the "left" channel of the stereo out, and it sounded better in the room (cathedral) than it has in weeks.  I cranked it up--it makes me think someone's messing with the amplifier settings.  Anyway, I went out in the house to check the sound, and when I walked by, the drummer was playing with four fingers (two on each hand)--like drumming with your palms on a table.  Check the technique!  More what the hell!

Drummer tells the band leader to tell me (since he's wearing headphones of the main mix) that the overall mix is louder (duh--we went from 12 on the main volume fader to 5!), and the drum mic is too hot.  I turned down the headphone output and cut the gain on the drum mic by twenty-five percent.  It seemed like he was pouting after that.  I don't know what to do with him.  Perhaps he should do some reading.

davidfreemanmusic.net

My Mojo Returneth

I'm finally all the way back from the funk that has plagued me for the past few weeks!  I felt good and confident about everything I played last night.  It's about time.

We had a great gig last night at the 10 High.  The crowd was pretty good--better than last week, but not overly enthusiastic about what we were doing.  Maybe it was the number of people out there, but I thought the onstage sound was much better, and that made a difference for me--who wants to do anything but go home when it sounds like crap.

Remember how I was working on picking up the bass part on Steal Away?  I listened to it this week--the piano/synth guy (my role on this song) doesn't do that at all!  Instead, the piano kind of doubles what the synth does.  Way easier.  Stupid me.

Earlier in the day we had a final rehearsal for the big show tonight at the Variety Playhouse.  This rehearsal concentrated on Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band.  We're adding a trombonist (Jill Freeman) to make the horn section bigger and brassier (and more french hornier, but french hornists are hard to come by, so we're using a trombonist).  All my charts were good except for one--she's doubling the alto part, and I forgot to transpose it from Eb to C:

Oops.  It sounded super bad when she was playing a minor third away from the rest of us.

We also ran The Dark Side of the Moon one more time.  Bencuya's got the synth solo in Any Colour You Like really happening.

It should be a great show tonight.

davidfreemanmusic.net

Rehearsal and the Radio

We (Yacht Rock) had a Tuesday morning rehearsal for this Friday's big gig at the Variety Playhouse.  For this one, we focused on Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon.  It sounded great.  I don't remember what it sounded like the first time we played this album, but with the second guitar (Greg) and Nick playing more second keyboard, it's really happening.

Speaking of guitar--Mark Dannells was totally unprepared for rehearsal, and still pulled the entire album out of his butt.  You can do that when you're awesome.

I got most of my stuff right.  I screwed up a little on Money.

Wednesday morning we played on The Regular Guys show (Rock 100.5 FM).  We did Time (off The Dark Side of the Moon).  It sounded pretty good.  Dannells was beyond awesome.  Cobb's electronic drum pad took a shit in the corner.  I played the three measures the female vocalist contributed.  Here's my chart:

Pretty easy!

davidfreemanmusic.net

Sunday Sunday

Yesterday was Sunday, a day for performances in houses of worship.

The first gig was pretty cohesive.  It's finally coming together--no big disasters or anything.  They're limping towards everybody on in-ears, which would be cool.  Right now it's one monitor mix and a six channel headphone amp!  Not quite cool.  Somehow they've not been able to find a headphone extension long enough to reach the eight feet over to my position, so I get nothing, which really hasn't been that bad.  I'm playing acoustically against the piano and drums.  I'm told that eventually they'll start using an Aviom system, which would be sweet.

Speaking of sound, I don't know what the hell's going on with the sound at church gig number two.  The sound coming out of the board (listening with headphones) does not equal the sound coming out of the main speakers.  They've changed something between the jacks on the floor where I plug in and the PA.  My best guess is that the right channel has been turned off and it's mono, and I'm still trying to run stereo.  After the mass, I took my mic and tried panning it hard left and then hard right, and I couldn't tell the difference.  I'm not saying I'm a good sound man, but stacking everything in the band on a mono send (as opposed to spreading it out in a stereo mix) is not going to give better results.  We'll see.

davidfreemanmusic.net

Zydeco-Birmingham

I played last night/this morning with Yacht Rock Schooner at Zydeco in Birmingham.  It's the first time we've played there.

The room itself was pretty crappy.  Low ceiling, hollow stage, plywood floor.  The sound was vastly different depending on where you were on stage--where I was (downstage left) was pretty good, but the drums and the opposite of the stage were evidently PAINFULLY loud and washy.  The hollow stage made for some weird low end harmonics.  It was just flat hard to hear for most of the guys in the band.  Actually, the dressing room behind the stage was probably the best place!  I hung out there on the tunes I wasn't playing, and I could hear everybody well.

The total number of people was around one hundred fifty.  I guess that's good for the first time--if they all tell two people, next time…they were pretty enthusiastic, though, which made up for it.  A big burly guy in the audience passed Mike Bielenberg a note that said "I love you."  The same guy later encouraged Mike to take his shirt off.  Not a normal Yacht Rock audience!  As soon as we finished, a couple of party girls burst into the dressing room and invited to a "party."  No thanks.

I played pretty well--the usual batch of Schooner tunes, so I was comfortable.  I probably could have used more monitor, but I could hear the main PA well enough that I just worked off that.  The saxophone must've been louder in the middle of the stage, because I got some positive feedback  from the main vocalists, though I couldn't hear myself that well at my position.  Overall, the band sounded good in spite of the stage sound.

I used my hard cases and key clamps for this trip.  Lately I've been concerned about the cold dry air, and coupling that with a bouncy ride to Alabama, I thought it best to try and stabilize my horns as best as I could.  Plus, I've been kind of clumsy dealing with my horns when I'm wearing gloves.  Hard cases protect me against my own stupidity!

We got back to Atlanta around 6 AM.  I slept most of the way back in the van.  Dozed?  Probably more like it.  I can sleep anywhere, but I woke up a lot trying to get comfortable.  I was in bed at 7 AM.

I'm checking out the new album by Bob Reynolds called Live in New York.  It's really good--sounds like much more accessible Chris Potter.  Kenyon Carter better get busy transcribing!

davidfreemanmusic.net

Of Ice and Gloves

I started Thursday with a trip downtown for a rehearsal.  Around fifteen minutes out, I got a call that it had been cancelled due to the icy conditions that still remain in parts of the city.

I took some pictures while I was sitting in traffic on I 75.

On the way home I stopped at Sam Ash and bought some reeds.  I grabbed a box of tenor reeds as well as some synthetic Legere reeds.  It seems silly, doesn't it?  All the technology that goes into building a modern horn--tone hole placement, metal alloys, corks vs felts, not to mention the insanity over mouthpieces--all the thousandths of an inch and the baffle shapes and tip rail thickness, and yet the sound all starts with a fickle piece of cane!  Why?

There was NOBODY in Sam Ash.  They didn't even have canned music playing in the store.  It was like I was a private shopper.

I made it all the way back home (approximately 40 miles round trip), only to get stuck trying to get back in my driveway!  Madness!  A neighbor and I spent two hours trying to chip through the ice in the street and my driveway so I could get my truck in the garage.  Beating a shovel into concrete is NOT good for the hands and wrists.

So…the synthetic reeds.  These are Legere Studio Cut reeds.  I got the same strengths that I normally use.  I really wanted these to work--most of the Yacht Rock gigs (which are most of the gigs I do these days), I'm picking up my horn two or three times in a seventy-five minute set, so the moisture on the reed has faded by the time I come back to it.  On a typical gig, I set up my stuff (including my horns), and soundcheck is over by 9:30 PM.  I may not play a note again until 11 PM, and then they might sit there through a thirty minute break, and then I might pick it up again midway through the second set, sometime after midnight.  If the reeds could feel the same as they do at 9:15, that'd be great!

I tried them.  I tried living with them for the break in period of thirty minutes.  I tried running them under warm water to loosen them up.  I tried them on alto, tried them on tenor, tried them on bari.  I didn't like any of them.  The sound is very cold and bland.  I like big, bright, fat, greasy sounds, and I couldn't get that from these reeds.  I gave up.  They don't work for me.  I opened the box of Javas that I'd also bought, put the first reed on my tenor, and it played GREAT right out of the box.  That sealed the deal.

The trip down to my gig took longer than expected.  There must have been some wrecks downtown--traffic was at a standstill--so I wandered off on 10th Street and made my way to the 10 High via flat streets and parking lots.

Yacht Rock did a silly promotion (strictly for our own enjoyment)--Glove Night--where we replaced the word LOVE with GLOVE in every song.  Mark Cobb even made break music where he "fixed" it!

Here's the set list (which included some non-Yacht Rock material for the sake of handwear, and a few "greatest hits" to quell any potential riots).  Some might not be so obvious:  I Keep Forgettin' (We're not in Glove Anymore), Caribbean Queen (No More Glove on the Run), I Just Wanna Stop (For Your Glove), and of course, a little Michael Jackson.

I played WAAAAAAAAAY better than last week.  Call off the suicide watch--I'm on the road to recovery.  I had a few hiccups--I left my chart for The (G)Love Boat Theme in Mexico last year, and every time we play I forget six more notes.  I've gotten to the point now where I only remember half the string part.  Maybe sixty percent.

My synth thing on Lido Shuffle is coming along.  There's a two handed stacking synth part that I have never played--I only play one hand of it--and I've always thought that eventually I'd get it happening.  I wasn't quite ready last night, but I usually need four or five gigs to get used to the pace of playing it live, and there were only about seventy-five people there last night, so let the sucking begin!  And I did.  First pass, good;  add left hand for second pass, a little wobbly!  third pass, disaster!  fourth pass, wobbly!  It needs some more work--at 120 BPM I'm good, but the tune's at 140 BPM, so…not happening yet.

I Just Wanna Stop hasn't been on the set list in a while--probably since I died on the string part last year at Andrews or a few weeks later at the 10 High.  I'm finally getting the hang of it!  Last night I did well on it.  I knew where I was the whole time (amazing!), and I tried my best to play the Ernie Watts I-can't-play-in-time-with-the-rest-of-the-band solo.

I'm kind of embarrassed to admit that I finally fixed the little flute part in the second verse of Africa that I've been playing wrong for years.  Oops.  I saw a transcription of it--not what I was hearing!  After seeing it written out, I also realized I could do more with the solo (some spots where it's almost totally in fourths)--since I'm playing the solo on EWI, I was able to set up my sounds to make that happen.  I fixed that a few weeks ago, but last night was the best it has sounded to me.

I love playing (G)Love is Alive--I think it works well for us.  You got Mark Cobb playin' the hell out of it, Mark Bencuya rockin' the synth bass (and a crazy solo!), Nick singin' the shit out of it.  I wish we did that one every week.

We ended the night with Zeppelin's Whole Lotta (G)Love.  Nothing for me to do on that but watch.  Mark Dannells played great on that--a true rock star!  Best thing he played all night.

note the splash cymbal placement

I packed up, avoided the homeless guy in the parking lot, and made it back into my driveway without incident!

davidfreemanmusic.net

Sundaze

I did my two church gigs yesterday.

First church gig was not what I thought it would be.  Since the leader is kind of a wuss, I kind of thought he would say something to me to try and smooth over the issue about the money, and I kind of thought I would bite his head off.  Neither happened.  I guess that's good…I mean, I still have a gig.  Afterwards the leader hung around a little bit, like he was looking for a moment to speak to one of us in the band, but I was talking to the sound man right up til the point when I walked out the door, so it must not have been me for whom he was waiting.

Chris Wilkes got into some Steve Gadd/Stuff kind of sounding thing on one tune that was pretty fun.

The second church gig was a kind of lame.  I'm not sure if the church changed the amplifier settings or what, but the sound was really weak.  The singers started complaining right from the get go.  I checked all my connections, checked to see that the sound was coming out of both speakers, and checked the channel strips.  I didn't see anything amiss, so I just turned the whole thing up.  "Way to troubleshoot it!" said the band leader.  "You fixed it!"  said the singers.  Umm…yes!  Yes I did!

P.S. Steve Gadd is God.

davidfreemanmusic.net

Church Business

I'd like to give an update regarding one of my church gigs.

As you may recall from an earlier post, I found out that the musicians in the band are all making different amounts.  Let's say I've been making $A.  Someone else in the band is making 1.5 x $A.  Someone else in the band is making 2 x $A.  Not cool.  All three of us were surprised (and, of course, I was pissed!).

I sent the band leader an email Sunday afternoon in an attempt to get his side of the story:

Hey Xxxxx-

What's up with the money?  I heard that different members of the band are making different amounts, and I'm confused as to why we would not be paid equally.  

I would like to paid the same as everyone else.

DBF

I was hoping he'd have some sort of reason that could justify the fact that the guy next to me is making twice as much as I am.  Maybe:

1.  The other guys have been here longer
2.  They began at a higher rate
3.  They have hair

Something…anything!

I had just asked for a raise in December, so I began making 1.5 x $A last Sunday.  The middle guy (who had been making 1.5 x $A) asked for a raise last week, and the band leader whispered to him that they had just bumped me up to his amount (and what business does he having sharing this information?)!  Now middle guy wants to go up to 2 x $A like the third guy (and I can't blame him), so I'll still end up making less than anyone else in the band, and for no apparent reason.  Another scenario would be that two us make two thirds of what the third guy makes.

I sent the email to the band leader Sunday afternoon.  Friday afternoon, I finally received the following response:

You will be paid $x starting this Sunday…thanks           Xxxxx

Nice.  No explanation at all, and for some reason he is informing me about the new rate (1.5 x $A), even though it began January 2.

My point of this blog:  remember when dealing with a paid church gig that the church is a business, and playing gigs is a business.  My biggest misstep was in not asking for more money from the outset.  I wanted the gig, and I gave them a safe number instead of an appropriate price.  Now that I am on the gig, I know much more about the time commitment:  an seventy-five minute rehearsal plus a church service (plus having to wake up WAAAY too early for me).  I wish I had factored that in.

Obviously on the other side of it, I am disappointed that a church would be so indifferent about paying the musicians different rates--I guess church ethics don't extend that far!  Also, it never ceases to amaze me that a fellow musician (and band leader) would do something like this, knowing that we are all doing our best to cobble together a career.

I wonder what the vibe will be like tomorrow morning!

davidfreemanmusic.net