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"How do you find a keyboardist who wants to play?"


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OT, but how do I turn on notifications for threads I post or reply to?

 

I should know this, but I don't see it.

 

Thanks.

aka âmisterdregsâ

 

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The level you need to be at to be decent to play out on keyboards is so much higher than the "average guitar gunslinger".

 

True, but the level an average keyboard player needs to be "decent" is nothing to brag about either.

I've been in too many bands where the keyboardist either did not solo at all or only soloed when they had a specific little piece that they could play by rote.

Extend the song because the dance floor is full and it's almost break time? Uh-oh, uncharted territory - "Mommy!!!!" :laugh:

 

That's not how it works when you get a request that the band doesn't "know" - you don't get a chart and you shouldn't need one.

 

The best keyboardist I've played with up here can take anything you throw at her and throw down without hesitation. She is awesome, that's how it's done.

There are others. Plenty of "guitarists" but not that many gigging steady. Marketing 101, supply exceeds demand.

 

I know a couple more keyboardists that I'd love to play with but they've got their band firing on all 8 cylinders so it probably won't happen any time soon.

 

There will always be plenty of aspiring "average" everybody out there, how "difficult" an instrument is to play depends on how far you want to take it and how your brain works.

Singling out "average guitar gunslingers" is a pretty easy target, it's kind of like the whole "Karen" thing.

 

Sorry that's not really the same thing. I am with The Real MC on this one. The guitar bullshit is all over NYS.

"Danny, ci manchi a tutti. La E-Street Band non e' la stessa senza di te. Riposa in pace, fratello"

 

 

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Sorry that's not really the same thing. I am with The Real MC on this one. The guitar bullshit is all over NYS.

 

I don't understand your "Sorry that's not really the same thing" comment?

Nothing is ever "the same thing" is it?

I didn't offer my perspecive as an echo chamber. We've all heard players who are way too loud, who don't know when or what to play, who fail at understanding the value of silence.

We've all heard players who stun us with their talent and those who are not so good. None of this belongs to any specific group, regardless of the instrument they choose to express their music.

 

And every one of us responds to those falures differently, in different times and places.

 

Otherwise, every thread on here would be somebody stating their case and everybody else saying "Yes, it's just like that."

Death by boredom?

It took a chunk of my life to get here and I am still not sure where "here" is.
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OT, but how do I turn on notifications for threads I post or reply to?

 

I should know this, but I don't see it.

 

Thanks.

 

I think you go to the "bookmark" icon in the upper left hand corner, next to the "Thread Options" button. Enable the bookmark to follow the thread.

 

Then when you go into your preferences, there's an option near the bottom to receive an email anytime there's activity on any of your followed threads (if you want this).

..
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2) Guitars that think every solo and fill is an invitation, especially playing over iconic piano parts (Ronstadt's "Living In The USA, for example) because he found a "really cool version" on YouTube with Eric Clapton. Dude, I'll defer to EC, but not you.

 

I once said to the guitarist/leader of a cover band I was in, "Hey, could we go back to playing the old version of that song?" When he asked what old version, I said "The one where the guitar didn't wheedle all over the keyboard solo." Thankfully he got the message.

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I once said to the guitarist/leader of a cover band I was in, "Hey, could we go back to playing the old version of that song?" When he asked what old version, I said "The one where the guitar didn't wheedle all over the keyboard solo." Thankfully he got the message.
WOOF. Probably not how my therapist would encourage me to deal with band conflicts, but effective nonetheless!

Samuel B. Lupowitz

Musician. Songwriter. Food Enthusiast. Bad Pun Aficionado.

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2) Guitars that think every solo and fill is an invitation, especially playing over iconic piano parts (Ronstadt's "Living In The USA, for example) because he found a "really cool version" on YouTube with Eric Clapton. Dude, I'll defer to EC, but not you.

 

I once said to the guitarist/leader of a cover band I was in, "Hey, could we go back to playing the old version of that song?" When he asked what old version, I said "The one where the guitar didn't wheedle all over the keyboard solo." Thankfully he got the message.

 

 

Argh, I hated being in a band like that. It had two guitarists, go figure--the "lead player" needed something to do while the other guy strummed big fat cowboy chords on his SG on every song (with a capo, hello tuning issues), so he wheedle-deedled CONSTANTLY. I really wasn't featured on songs, which doesn't bother me that much, but when I got to play something people hear as a keyboard part--example, New Years Day by U2--he'd play the same notes on guitar. Like dude,you have a guitar solo in EVERY song, and you are noodling over the vocals half the time.

 

That's one reason that one guitar is enough in a band unless the players are willing to leave some space for others. I guess that goes for any instrument but if there's two of something in a rock band, it's guitar.

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2) Guitars that think every solo and fill is an invitation, especially playing over iconic piano parts (Ronstadt's "Living In The USA, for example) because he found a "really cool version" on YouTube with Eric Clapton. Dude, I'll defer to EC, but not you.

 

I once said to the guitarist/leader of a cover band I was in, "Hey, could we go back to playing the old version of that song?" When he asked what old version, I said "The one where the guitar didn't wheedle all over the keyboard solo." Thankfully he got the message.

 

 

Argh, I hated being in a band like that. It had two guitarists, go figure--the "lead player" needed something to do while the other guy strummed big fat cowboy chords on his SG on every song (with a capo, hello tuning issues), so he wheedle-deedled CONSTANTLY. I really wasn't featured on songs, which doesn't bother me that much, but when I got to play something people hear as a keyboard part--example, New Years Day by U2--he'd play the same notes on guitar. Like dude,you have a guitar solo in EVERY song, and you are noodling over the vocals half the time.

 

That's one reason that one guitar is enough in a band unless the players are willing to leave some space for others. I guess that goes for any instrument but if there's two of something in a rock band, it's guitar.

 

That's why I refuse to join a band with more than one guitar player. I may want my role as keyboard player but I also recognize that the audience enjoys certain songs (IE AC/DC) where there are no keyboard parts, so I do play rhythm guitar for those songs that need it. Plus with one fewer musician in the band that's more $$$ in my pocket.

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I once said to the guitarist/leader of a cover band I was in, "Hey, could we go back to playing the old version of that song?" When he asked what old version, I said "The one where the guitar didn't wheedle all over the keyboard solo." Thankfully he got the message.

 

BRILLIANT

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I still like to play the organ and piano supporting parts on Clapton and SRV tunes. Maybe I'm just lucky to jam with the collaborative types, but when a jam starts and the right piano fills are there, and the signature organ riffs sound right, there's nearly always a nod for keys to take a solo.

 

Now that's not to say I've never had conflict. FAR from it; but I don't play with those groups anymore. Case in point, the beautiful two oscillator, octaves apart, synth solo that finishes From The Beginning was met with cheers of exhilaration at the first two rehearsals. Then the leader of the band decided he wanted to restructure the song the final practice before the show, so he makes up a little four bar part in the middle with all these weird chords and expects the keys to just plunk something out, then he takes the big finale on guitar. After some lengthy and lively discussion, the band conceded to keep the peace for the gig that weekend. I played the gig and plunked out that sucky new part. As soon as my gear was loaded and the cash was in hand, it was made clear that they could no longer count on my services as I had other more enlightening projects pending. A classic example of artistic differences?

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Someone embellished an ELP tune with a bunch of random chords? That takes some arrogance! Reminds me of a few of the departures you see in book-to-movie adaptations that leave me thinking..."Why?! You are not as genius as you think you are, while that person over there that wrote the thing in the first place? Yeah, that's genius." (Not to say all book-to-film changes are bad, take the Godfather I and II for instance...)
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I frequently dont want a keyboard solo in every song. Not when I'm the guitarist or the keyboardist. When I'm the guitarist I appreciate someone else carrying the load because 30 guitar solos per gig is fatiguing for the audience and for me. I dont have 30 different licks. I have about 10. But a guitar solo and a keyboard solo in every song is inappropriate unless it's a blues song. And a keyboard solo in a song that replaces a signature guitar solo disappoints the audience.

When I'm the keys guy I'm playing fills all through the song so if a solo comes up it's kind of like the fills just louder. But I want a couple of solos , but just where I want to. If there is no solo in the original arrangement I reserve the right to refuse the solo.

FunMachine.

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If there is no solo in the original arrangement I reserve the right to refuse the solo.
Hah! If there's none in the original arrangement, I often ask if we can add one. :-)

-Tom Williams

{First Name} {at} AirNetworking {dot} com

PC4-7, PX-5S, AX-Edge, PC361

 

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I'm not one to pick on guitar players these days. I've found that any musician with decent musical maturity will be fun to play with. And if that attribute is lacking, it won't be fun. Doesn't matter what instrument, really: guitar, drums, bass, harmonica, vocals, etc.

 

Adding a keyboard solo to a song that didn't have one in the original can be a nice musical surprise for the audience. I bet you didn't know that "Angel From Montgomery" had a great keyboard solo, did you? We also have a number of songs where keys do the first solo, then guitar solos, and then we weave for another round. Great way to build musical excitement.

 

In my local market, I'm only aware of a few other keys players lost in a veritable sea of guitarists, drummers, bassists, etc. Prospective bands are sometimes put off when I explain the supply/demand situation, not to be arrogant or anything, just that a decent keys player has a lot of choices these days.

 

That being said, there's plenty of demand as everyone is tiring of the all-guitar power chord lineup. The only roles more in demand than keys seem to be great vocalists and smokin' violin players, especially those of the female persuasion. See the band "Highwomen" for what really sells locally these days.

Want to make your band better?  Check out "A Guide To Starting (Or Improving!) Your Own Local Band"

 

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You know, I've seen a couple dozen of these "guitar players play too loud" threads, and not once have I seen a single post that acknowledges the central problem that a guitar player faces. Not one.

 

So...here goes...

 

It's called tone. Okay?

 

The only thing that keyboard players face that compares to what guitar players have to deal with is reproducing a Hammond/Leslie in full cry. Period. Nothing else remotely compares.

 

Note, please, the number of threads where members of this forum have argued, complained, sought advice, whined, fought, and just generally made tone-fools of themselves whilst discussing Hammond tone and how to get it. Go count the threads. I'll wait here. On second thought, no, I won't. It'll take too long for you to return from your survey and I've got things to do.

 

Although keyboard players have Hammond emulations of various sorts available, there is no universal solution to the Hammond problem unless you intend to bring a real Hammond and a real Leslie to the gig and cut loose. The grind. The swoosh. The sheer physical presence of the tone is inimitable. The emulations ain't right. They're just approximations. Sometimes better. Sometimes worse. Sometimes just flat rained out. But never perfect.

 

Piano? Well, you've got your Steinways, your Yamahas, your Bosendorfers, etc. At which point you begin arguing about which piano sound you want, but wait...there's an argument I've never seen...the fidelity of the speakers you're playing through. Honestly, there ought to be a thread where people discuss which PA speakers are the highest fidelity in order to get the best piano tone across to the audience. Like a really big stereo. Never seen it. Yes, people talk about which PA speakers are "best," but I've never once seen a thread where people actually talked about the nuances, like the wood of the body of the piano, the dynamics, the midrange, the bass, the depth of the image, etc. (My background in high end audio comes in here. That hypothetical thread could potentially be lengthy.) But that still doesn't approach the Hammond tone thing.

 

That Yamaha DX7 sound? A Moog riff? A Farfisa? A Roland? A Yamaha? A Korg? All those are played clean 99.999% of the time. There's no need to reproduce the sound of an overdriven amp to make it sound right. You turn the volume up. You turn the volume down. It's the same sound, just more or less of the same thing. You can't do that with a guitar! The amp is an intrinsic part of the tone and for better or worse, the tone is intertwined with the volume. It's the nature of the beast. You cannot change that one central fact.

 

Except for Jon Lord--he of the Hammond through Marshall stacks--and he's the exception that proves the truth of what I'm saying.

 

It's the Hammond problem, people!

 

If you want anything other than the cleanest of tones, a guitar amp doesn't sound right until it's turned up. Period. It's that fucking simple.

 

Mesa and Marshall tackled the problem by adding a second volume knob--one that allowed the player to turn up the gain of the the front end of the amp. It adds distortion. Only...the problem is that it doesn't add the same kind of distortion. It's a different sound. A Marshall Plexi does NOT sound the same as a Marshall with a Master Volume. The Plexi has a grinding, growly sound that you've all heard on Deep Purple and Led Zeppelin albums. Master volume amps have a fizzy sort of distortion that's more high frequency-oriented. Think '80s era metal. All Marshall and Mesa accomplished by giving guitar players this option was to invent a whole new range of tones for guitarists to emulate.

 

Well, there are various effects pedals, right? Fuzz boxes and overdrive pedals and emulations and stuff. Go buy an effects pedal and all your problems will be solved, right? Not! There's never been an effects pedal that properly mimics the tone of a Marshall stack driven to the limits. They simply don't exist. The reality is that you've only discovered a whole new rabbit hole of sounds that you're expected to reproduce during your gig.

 

Ooops.

 

Okay, so you're a guitar player. You've got a gig. In that gig you're going to be expected to play tones that originated from Fender amps, Marshall amps, Mesa amps, etc. All at different volume settings, but frequently WAO. All during the same gig. What are you going to do? Do you take one of each? What wattage? One 4 x 12" or two? Pretty soon you're packing enough equipment to require your own, separate truck. Oh, you say to yourself, let's see, tonight we'll be playing to 300 people, so I'll set up with the 50W Marshall head and one cabinet. Except there's that other song that takes a Fender, so I need to take in the Fender Twin. Etc. And all night long, you're swapping between amps and trying frantically to match volumes. It's a bloody nightmare. Expensive, too. You're going to need to own separate 50W and 100W heads from multiple manufacturers, plus an array of cabinets that would make a music shop faint.

 

And the next night it's a gig for 1200 people. Time to pull out the big guns. Full 100W Marshall stack with two cabs. The Fender Twin will need to be mic'ed. On and on.

 

Let's see a show of hands. How many of you carry a Rick Wakeman sized rig? Now...how many of you carry two or three Rick Wakeman sized rigs and select from the stuff in the truck the gear you will need for that night's gig?

 

The first question alone will cut the pool or respondents to maybe a handful. The second will cut it to zero.

 

Unless you're willing to compromise on your Hammond tone ("Oh, hey, this tune needs a Hammond, so I'll use this churchy-sounding Gospel Hammond setting on my $200 keyboard to play Smoke On The Water. The audience won't care!"), don't complain about the guitar player. He's got his own problems, okay?

 

Note that I've not even begun to address the problems bass players face.

 

Yes, playing loud is fun. Got it. Yes, there are guitar players who won't balance with the rest of the band no matter what. That's also true for drummers, bassists, vocalists, and even (gasp!) keyboardists. But there's this whole other aspect to the "guitarist who plays too loud" complaint that never gets addressed. I have now pointed out that there's an elephant in the room.

 

Grey

I'm not interested in someone's ability to program. I'm interested in their ability to compose and play.

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Disagree. I have no pity or mercy for players who must deafen for the sake of tone.

 

Just because you need the amp to run at full cry doesn't mean you have to dump all that acoustic energy into the room. In 1973 my guitar player was using a '59 Les Paul sunburst thru a 100W Marshall, and controlling his volume with load resistor boxes.

 

One could do the same now, or simply mic up a 5W amp.

 

I have solved the Hammond problem myself. In my basement lies an 1100W leslie rig which can scream at a whisper if I want. Tube amp running full throttle for tone, reamped thru a clean solid state amp giving independent control of volume and tone.

Moe

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Nice post, Grey. I'll even enhance your argument for a few data points, and then respectfully disagree at the end.

 

Which Hammond sound? Loud/quiet Key Click? Drawbar-to-drawbar leakage, key-to-key leakage, new caps? Jimmy Smith's broken percussion? Can't change any of those once you've picked your B3, even if it's from Goff.

 

Amplification: 122RV? 147 (My favorite!)? Slow Leslie? Brake Leslie? Static Low Rotor? One mic? Two? Four? Stock Hammond cabinet?

 

No one Hammond rig will give you all those. Clonewheels, maybe -- I personally love everything about my PC3, excepting the C/V (which is merely adequate).

 

That said, why is either group trying to exactly emulate someone else's sound? As I reminded my bandmates last night, if you want exact, just play a record. Um, CD. Uh, MP3. Ahh, WAV file. but I digress....

 

Here's where I differ a bit: it seems to me that, just as the advantages of my PC3's organ outweigh its disadvantages (for me), there are a lot of guitar players who could address the problem with a good amp emulator or two, that model not only the preamp but the power amp and the speakers, all at line level. The versatility would, IMO, outweigh the disadvantages of not sounding precisely like that Fender Twin, Bassman, Marshall, Mesa Boogie, or Peavey that ended up being this night's selection.

 

I have two wonderful keyboards -- PC3 and PX-5S -- that include speaker, cabinet, and/or amp emulation in their effects options. Accurate? Dunno. Versatile? Oh, yeah.

-Tom Williams

{First Name} {at} AirNetworking {dot} com

PC4-7, PX-5S, AX-Edge, PC361

 

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This thread...:noway:.

 

1) I have posted many times to the effect that no one, regardless of what instrument they play, wants a bass player who plays more than the bare minimum. Whole notes. Half notes. Quarter notes. Maybe, if you're a good boy, you'll be allowed to play an eighth note once per gig. Maybe. Don't press your luck.

Grey

See, now this is something I don't get. My favorite bassist I ever played with was a guy named Perry. He had great dynamic control and added a lot to songs. Not to the point of being distracting from the entire song, but lots of little harmonics and "growly" bits, some slap, chord runs, and other fun things. If I remember correctly he had a multi-fx unit he ran with his bass amp, though for the life of me I can't remember what he actually used it for (maybe compressor and EQ with some fuzz occasionally or some chorus). Man I miss playing with him (I moved five hours away from the area some years back). The key with him is that he knew how to play to the song. If a song didn't call for a funky slap-filled bassline, he didn't play one. On the other hand, on upbeat tunes, he took them to a whole new level.

 

On another note, at my current church, it's a very rare occasion that we have a bassist. We play contemporary music, but in our town of about 3,400 we might have three bass players (two go to our church), and one works a lot of Sundays and rehearsal nights. As the main keyboardist (when I'm not playing the grand), it falls to me to provide the basslines. Usually I add a two or three-octave bass layer in the left hand, or I'll just do a flat-out split with only the bass in the left hand if I can get away with it. Fellow keyboardists: you will never look at basslines the same after having to try and approximate them like a good bassist would while playing keys (or even standalone key bass). There's a lot of fine details that are very tricky to work with, really what you could call "tone" and dynamics (tip - disable the sustain pedal for the bass sounds - it helps the bass sound more like an independent instrument).

 

 

And the too loud thing is rampant, hard to say who to blame? Drummers buy the kits their heros use, how do you play one of those sets quietly? Then the bassist turns up so they can hear themselves, not realizing that they are throwing a wall of volume out about 30 feet. The vocalist starts asking the sound guy to turn up the monitors, while holding the mic in a way that turns it into an omni-directional feedback machine. The guitarist hears this roaring mass of almost good stuff and turns up the amp until it "sounds good", not realizing that they've brought a sledgehammer to swat flies...and singers who sounded lke somebody killing an animal...

 

Gosh, why does this sound like 60% of band rehearsals I've been to... :roll:. This is so true though.

 

Had a keyboard player who put his amp on the floor behind him and turned it way up. I was on the other side of the stage. I asked him once "You got ears in your ass?" and he just looked at me like I was insane. I showed him my amp stand, aimed my speaker at my actual ears. Weird.

 

Awesome...usually that's what guitarists are asked as you probably know. I tried so hard to convince this one *acoustic* player to get an amp stand - half-deaf, played with his Crate amp with the chorus effect at 100% at about 91 dBa, but when he could hear anyone else he played wonderfully; sadly we now don't play together because I'm "way too sensitive and everyone likes it loud anyways" (ah no, we had tons of complaints and at that level it was hazardous - we were in a wood-paneled smallish room so it bounced around). I don't put up with rude people after two chances.

 

 

For the same pay as the guitarist gets I get the joy of buying and transporting 4 times the equipment, covering multiple parts, standing in the background hoping to be heard, and getting an occasional solo.

 

Actually, I had it lucky. My first band was very nice and helpful as I was learning to be a keyboardist in a band. My second band was very popular, but the leaders were piles of $@@@. After a disagreement in which they voiced their displeasure that I would not let them micromanage my every note we both found out how valuable a good keyboardist with equipment really is. I ended up playing with them for two more years. No other decent keyboardist in the city was willing to put up with their crap. It was not a good experience, but it taught me a lot.

 

Drummers and guitarists are a dime a dozen. A good keyboardist with equipment is gold. Too bad the pay scale does not reflect it. But you do have job security.

*Good* drummers are far from a dime a dozen IMO. There are many that are adequate, but an actual rock-solid drummer that adds a lot to the music is difficult to find a lot of the time.

 

Yeah, the job security thing. It can also give you a fair amount of pull in some cases. Case in point - I've been the lead pianist and keyboardist at three churches. At two of them, we have gotten into major problems with stage volume. People can get very crabby if you suggest any changes that affect them, to the point of mocking and spreading rumors. The amount of backstabbing I've seen thanks to email threads that have gotten attached to other emails is ridiculous. Sadly it is usually the guitarist or the sound engineer - oddly enough it's never the drummer, bassist, or singers. In both cases I've actually told those in charge that I will leave and no longer play if they can't get the volume under control, because it's a health risk and I will not risk my ears for them (my family has a history of early deafness so I'm on borrowed time I fear). The thing is, if I leave, they have no one to hold their band together musically, and I do a lot of other things for them. Heck, I make up for three or more instruments sometimes. So they fix the volume problem. And generally no one is the worse for it, with the exception of the one guitarist where we simply don't play when the other is up that week - no problems, no conflicts. Better for both of us.

 

I'm no virtuoso, but I've turned down more offers than I've considered.

 

Reasons for not playing or quitting:

 

3) Bands that want a KB to be the horn section, string section, whatever-is-needed section. You want horns? Hire some horn players.

Gee, I love those gigs, thanks for leaving them for me. :laugh:;) In reality, I've designed my rigs to be able to cover 90% of instruments if needed with good sound quality. But I grew up with a CVP Clavinova as my "piano at home", so I've played with all kinds of other instrument sounds since about 2 years old lol. It does help with arranging songs though. Playing strings, for example, doesn't sound great with block chords. Independent phrasing and note movement in the proper ranges, with no grouped notes, will help the realism 100%. Then when you want to record a song and have strings, you can sound a whole lot better. I wouldn't have ever learned that had it not been for a music director/keyboardist who had a liking for strings on almost every song. To be honest, it was really boring at first for someone who was used to playing piano/pad layers and bell/brass/string accents on upbeat songs as the lead pianist/keyboardist, not to mention synths and clavinets lol. Yet I wouldn't trade that for anything - it makes a huge difference when writing and sounds so much better live than playing chords.

 

That's one reason that one guitar is enough in a band unless the players are willing to leave some space for others. I guess that goes for any instrument but if there's two of something in a rock band, it's guitar.

 

That's why I refuse to join a band with more than one guitar player. I may want my role as keyboard player but I also recognize that the audience enjoys certain songs (IE AC/DC) where there are no keyboard parts, so I do play rhythm guitar for those songs that need it. Plus with one fewer musician in the band that's more $$$ in my pocket.

 

The only multi-guitar combo I like is one acoustic and one electric. Sounds great and it's my preferred band configuration actually. Two electrics? Only played with that a couple of times and it wasn't the greatest; too much sonic mud. Two acoustics? Good if they're not playing the same parts all the time. I also played with three acoustics for a while; not my favorite but when they all had the same timing it was okay, mainly because those were all rather thin-sounding acoustics. But when they weren't synced on timing...

 

I frequently dont want a keyboard solo in every song. Not when I'm the guitarist or the keyboardist. When I'm the guitarist I appreciate someone else carrying the load because 30 guitar solos per gig is fatiguing for the audience and for me. I dont have 30 different licks. I have about 10. But a guitar solo and a keyboard solo in every song is inappropriate unless it's a blues song. And a keyboard solo in a song that replaces a signature guitar solo disappoints the audience.

When I'm the keys guy I'm playing fills all through the song so if a solo comes up it's kind of like the fills just louder. But I want a couple of solos , but just where I want to. If there is no solo in the original arrangement I reserve the right to refuse the solo.

 

Yeah, that's me (note I don't play guitar live, so this is as a keyboardist). I do my melodic stuff in fills between sections of the songs, or in bridges and build-ups. Stands out plenty. No need for solos all the time. If I'm offered one, I'll usually take it, but I like to have it planned out a little bit ahead of time. And if it's over a section I don't like, I'll usually decline. Something I've found is that a "solo" on keys doesn't necessarily need to be an eighth-and-sixteenth-note showstopper. My best solos have been melodic Hammond solos, kind of like Santana on organ, and dynamic polyphonic string lines with a sweet melody line. On holiday music bells are nice.

 

 

 

Wow, what a wall of text. :snax:

Yamaha: Motif XF8, MODX7, YS200, CVP-305, CLP-130, YPG-235, PSR-295, PSS-470 | Roland: Fantom 7, JV-1000

Kurzweil: PC3-76, PC4 (88) | Hammond: SK Pro 73 | Korg: Triton LE 76, N1R, X5DR | Emu: Proteus/1 | Casio: CT-370 | Novation: Launchkey 37 MK3 | Technics: WSA1R

Former: Emu Proformance Plus & Mo'Phatt, Korg Krome 61, Roland Fantom XR & JV-1010, Yamaha MX61, Behringer CAT

Assorted electric & acoustic guitars and electric basses | Roland TD-17 KVX | Alesis SamplePad Pro | Assorted organs, accordions, other instruments

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The level you need to be at to be decent to play out on keyboards is so much higher than the "average guitar gunslinger".

 

True, but the level an average keyboard player needs to be "decent" is nothing to brag about either.

I've been in too many bands where the keyboardist either did not solo at all or only soloed when they had a specific little piece that they could play by rote.

Extend the song because the dance floor is full and it's almost break time? Uh-oh, uncharted territory - "Mommy!!!!" :laugh:

 

That's not how it works when you get a request that the band doesn't "know" - you don't get a chart and you shouldn't need one.

 

Okay, respectfully, I'm going to have to push back a little on this. In my experience this comes down to two things - "reading" skill and "improvisational" skill. This also ties into being a music reader versus playing by ear. Unless you are in jazz, your majority of pianists are being taught to read music, to read notes, to interpret the written page. Most keyboardists started with piano. Organ is even more so - three staves of notes. Then comes reading from lead sheets - usually after maybe 8 years of piano honestly. Many teachers simply aren't going to be doing that. It's focused on piano as a solo instrument. And even in orchestral situations, or Broadway, there are likely going to be written parts for the pianist and keyboardist. It's simply how piano is taught. Note - if you're in jazz, then you get a lot of work in improvisation and ear training. Otherwise, not so much.

 

Where this becomes problematic is when (in my case, as a 11 year old) your church's music director offers you the chance to play with the contemporary band for a week or two, and you agree. You receive the music, and realize that it's lead sheets with the melody and chords. You've only read music, and played a bunch by ear, but never read a chord labeled as a chord in your life. I had to buy a large book with a lot of chords in every key signature to get those parts ready in time. Never before had I seen suspended chords for example, yet contemporary Christian music uses tons of them. There's also a significant variation in the way that chords are denoted. As an example, I've seen a G major suspended 2 chord written as "G2, Gsus2, "Gs2", and "GSUS2". Suspended 4 chords are even worse. Half the time the person making the lead sheet will just write "Gsus" or "Fsus", not even "G4" or "Gsus4".

 

In my case I have a fairly strong ear (in fact 80% of my solo gigging material was learned that way, both on piano and accordion). It helps me in situations like what you mentioned, or in learning a piece quickly. I sat in on accordion with a New Orleans jazz quintet, and that was eye-opening. Chord changes shouted as we played occasionally, no charts, quite difficult to be honest. Luckily I have some experience with the genre. The ability of a keyboardist or pianist to work with no music and no chords at all is NOT indicative of their playing level - it's simply a reflection of their training, and ear. And let me tell you that I know concert pianists who have difficulty just going off of a chord chart, and likewise keyboardists who always use chord charts who have no sense of timing (because of there being no timing implied in the chart), and get thrown for a loop by even a lead sheet, much less written music. Yet would the concert pianist be considered a "decent" player at best? I think not. Different skill sets do not a poor musician make. And no matter how good one's ear is, it can't make up for experience. And it will always be difficult to play a song you've actually never heard before in a live situation because of a request. It's helpful if someone in the band can at least tell you the key signature and section order. And don't expect the keyboardist to start playing signature parts in a song they've never heard, nor to start playing immediately - if they have an ear it's useful for them to get a feel for the song before playing too much.

 

A final thought - musicians at the world-class level often read music live, and that's for everyone in the band. Percussion/drums, bassist, guitarist, keyboardist, orchestra, whatever. Over time they'll know the songs well enough to not need the music in some cases. Part of that may be because substitute players sometimes need to come in - crash course time! On the other hand, if you look at a band like Dream Theater, Jordan Rudess uses an iPad with full keys notation live. Is he a lesser player for it? Broadway and pit orchestras use notes. Are they at a lower level than a regional cover band? I think not.

Yamaha: Motif XF8, MODX7, YS200, CVP-305, CLP-130, YPG-235, PSR-295, PSS-470 | Roland: Fantom 7, JV-1000

Kurzweil: PC3-76, PC4 (88) | Hammond: SK Pro 73 | Korg: Triton LE 76, N1R, X5DR | Emu: Proteus/1 | Casio: CT-370 | Novation: Launchkey 37 MK3 | Technics: WSA1R

Former: Emu Proformance Plus & Mo'Phatt, Korg Krome 61, Roland Fantom XR & JV-1010, Yamaha MX61, Behringer CAT

Assorted electric & acoustic guitars and electric basses | Roland TD-17 KVX | Alesis SamplePad Pro | Assorted organs, accordions, other instruments

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Keyboards are my primary instrument, followed by rhythm guitar. I grew up with a bad a## guitar player brother who had all the good amps through the 70s/80s so I know those amps and tones very well. As an EE, I have a pretty good understanding of tube guitar amps and am well aware of the right and wrong way to run a guitar amp. So...

 

You know, I've seen a couple dozen of these "guitar players play too loud" threads, and not once have I seen a single post that acknowledges the central problem that a guitar player faces. Not one.

 

So...here goes...

 

It's called tone. Okay?

 

Sorry, I have discussed this on KC before. If you can't get "that tone" without being LOUD, then you're not trying hard enough. More below.

 

The only thing that keyboard players face that compares to what guitar players have to deal with is reproducing a Hammond/Leslie in full cry. Period. Nothing else remotely compares.

 

Apparently it hasn't dawned on you that we do use tube amps with electric pianos. A Wurlitzer or Clavinet through a cranked tube guitar amp is a glorious thing. Before the era of keyboard amps and powered PA cabinets, keyboard players were stuck with GUITAR AMPS. My favorite amp with my Rhodes is a British guitar amp, a 1963 Selmer "croc-skin" Truvoice Twin Thirty with original G12 speakers and original Mullard in the preamp. As a guitar player, I own several speaker cabinets with different speakers - greenbacks (including pre-Rolas), 30s, 65w, vintage G12 alnicos, alnico blues, Jensen alnicos, etc. I'm not shy about experimenting with keyboards through different guitar speakers, and the suitcase bottom of my Rhodes happens to be equipped with 4xCelestion 75w - A GUITAR SPEAKER. Even a low mu 12AU7 preamp like a bass amp can add color to a keyboard that an EQ cannot do.

 

It's the Hammond problem, people!

 

You do err as you do not know keyboardists well enough. Ever hear of Jan Hammer? The Cars 1st album? Ultravox? All of them pumped their synths through tube guitar amps to get a certain tone. Why should guitar players have all the fun?

 

If you want anything other than the cleanest of tones, a guitar amp doesn't sound right until it's turned up. Period. It's that fucking simple.

 

BS. If you can't get "that tone" without being loud, then YOU'RE NOT TRYING HARD ENOUGH.

 

Mesa and Marshall tackled the problem by adding a second volume knob--one that allowed the player to turn up the gain of the the front end of the amp. It adds distortion. Only...the problem is that it doesn't add the same kind of distortion. It's a different sound. A Marshall Plexi does NOT sound the same as a Marshall with a Master Volume.

 

As an owner of a vintage non-master volume Marshall 1987 guitar amp and former owner of a Mesa Boogie MkIIa, I understand this intimately and do not disagree. A dimed non-master volume Marshall has a great tone. The M/B was too damned loud with the MV set at 2, that's one of the reasons I sold it. The master volume misses out on an important contributor of "tone" - power amp distortion. A solution with its own set of problems. That's also where almost every amp modeler misses the mark - they model the preamp but not the power amp. The power tubes, output transformer, PI, plate voltages, feedback architecture all contribute to "that tone". Yes even the lowly PI that few players swap out tubes. I put a NOS GE 5751 (selected 12AT7) in the PI of my Marshall and the sound was fuller. That's because they measured the mu of each triode, and the ones with closest matched triodes were stamped 5751. With matched triodes in the PI, each power tube gets the same level signal and you get fuller tone. The 5751 isn't a high gain dual triode like the 12AX7, but in the PI it sounds great. As an EE I know stuff like this.

 

I'm a stickler for authenticity with keyboards and guitars. The major reason I have multiple guitar speakers is that the sounds of the 60s, 70s, 80s, etc are associated with speakers available during that era. I learned quickly that Marshall 4x12 cabinets do have a certain sound, other brands of 4x12 cabinets don't sound like Marshalls. Want the sound of 70s stuff like southern rock, hard rock, Bad Company, etc? Use Celestion greenbacks. Early 60s blues rock? G12s or Jensen alnicos. Heavy metal? Celection 65w or 75w speakers (70w Celestions are DOGS). All speakers associated with the era of those genres. While Greenbacks have a great crunch they will not do clean, they sound dirty no matter what. I need both crunch and clean in the band I am currently in, so my solution was 4x12 loaded with Celestion 65w in a 1960B straight cabinet. No longer need multiple amps. You can't accuse me of not knowing the intricacies of guitar amp systems.

 

When I get that Marshall barking by overdriving the power amp, I know exactly what you mean. So... how does one get "that tone" without being loud?

 

Attenuators were never the best solution. And here's where my EE knowledge works to my advantage... the output stage of a tube guitar amp interacts with the reactive load that a speaker coil represents. An attenuator is only a pure resistive load, no reactance. The amp will not sound the same with a purely resistive load. Speaker emulators are not only attenuators, they are reactive loads that make the guitar amp do what it does best.

 

My choice was the old Groove Tubes Speaker Emulator. How do I know it does the job? Yours truly Mr EE read the patent. It didn't hurt that I have a copy of the GT Tube Amp book. I set up the Marshall 1987 through a 4x12, then replaced the 4x12 with the GT speaker emulator which was plugged into a low wattage flat frequency keyboard amp, and I got that dimed Marshall bark tone WITHOUT THE LOUD VOLUME. INCLUDING THE FEEDBACK. I showed it to my guitar playing brother and he couldn't tell the difference. I used that setup with bands and the primary guitar players I worked with liked my tone.

 

Well, there are various effects pedals, right? ... There's never been an effects pedal that properly mimics the tone of a Marshall stack driven to the limits. They simply don't exist.

 

They will never exist. The dynamic interactions and non-linearities between the output stage and speakers are too complex for a battery powered device or even a tiny DSP.

 

Okay, so you're a guitar player. You've got a gig. In that gig you're going to be expected to play tones that originated from Fender amps, Marshall amps, Mesa amps, etc. All at different volume settings, but frequently WAO. All during the same gig. What are you going to do? Do you take one of each? What wattage? One 4 x 12" or two? Pretty soon you're packing enough equipment to require your own, separate truck. Oh, you say to yourself, let's see, tonight we'll be playing to 300 people, so I'll set up with the 50W Marshall head and one cabinet. Except there's that other song that takes a Fender, so I need to take in the Fender Twin. Etc. And all night long, you're swapping between amps and trying frantically to match volumes. It's a bloody nightmare. Expensive, too. You're going to need to own separate 50W and 100W heads from multiple manufacturers, plus an array of cabinets that would make a music shop faint.

 

You're fanactical about authenticity as I am, I've had the same struggles. My current band needs both Marshall crunch and Fender clean. Luckily when I bought the Marshall 1987 it had been modified - the two preamp channel tubes were cascaded, similar to the later Marshall 2203. As a former MB owner I immediately understood the value of this, but found it behaves better than the MB. Through that amp, I can go between crunch and clean just by my touch and picking technique. Strum lighter and the tone cleans up. Even with a LP. Straight into the amp, no pedals. None of my other amps can do that, not even my modelers. The Marshall 2203 MV version of my 1987 doesn't sound as good. My 1987 does have a master volume modification but I run it full bore (effectively taking the MV out of the circuit) while keeping the channel input volume low - output stage distortion sounds far better. That Marshall with the 4x12 loaded with Celestion 65w speakers gets me both Marshall crunch and Fender clean.

 

The next best amp for crunch/clean is my M/B Lonestar loaded with EL34 power tubes. Two completely independent amp channels each with 100w or 50w configurations. It's not the typical M/B high gain sound, they designed the amp to appeal to Texas blues-rock players. One channel is voiced like a blackface Fender, the other is voiced like a Marshall (the EL34s are essential but it lacks the Marshall feedback).

 

I should add that in addition to tone of guitar amps, I'm intimately familiar with tone of guitars. I understand the intricate details of LPs, Strats, Teles and own a good specimen of each of them. I also appreciate the value of good tonewoods as there are plenty of LP/Strats/Teles that sound like dogs. A dog $5000 LP with curly maple sunburst top is going to sound like a dog through any amp. That's another discussion.

 

And the next night it's a gig for 1200 people. Time to pull out the big guns. Full 100W Marshall stack with two cabs. The Fender Twin will need to be mic'ed. On and on.

 

Let's see a show of hands. How many of you carry a Rick Wakeman sized rig? Now...how many of you carry two or three Rick Wakeman sized rigs and select from the stuff in the truck the gear you will need for that night's gig?

 

The first question alone will cut the pool or respondents to maybe a handful.

 

*raises hand*. I have gigged with as many as seven keyboards, along with rack mounted modules.

 

The second will cut it to zero.

 

What were you saying about the Hammond problem...? For most gigs I use a clone wheel organ (and as a guitar player I know how to fine-tune the tube overdrive in my XK3) with Leslie simulator. I do own a real tonewheel Hammond and Leslie but I only gig them for those shows where I'm playing lots of Hammond parts. So yes, I had to scale my rig for the demands of the show (I still do that with my current system). My keyboard sound system? A pair of small Bose 802s that can compete with a 100w full stack.

 

Unless you're willing to compromise on your Hammond tone ("Oh, hey, this tune needs a Hammond, so I'll use this churchy-sounding Gospel Hammond setting on my $200 keyboard to play Smoke On The Water. The audience won't care!"), don't complain about the guitar player. He's got his own problems, okay?

 

After having spelled out my credentials, I'm more than qualified to complain about guitar players.

 

Yes, playing loud is fun. Got it. Yes, there are guitar players who won't balance with the rest of the band no matter what. That's also true for drummers, bassists, vocalists, and even (gasp!) keyboardists

 

I do know a keyboard player who plays very loud, so I won't deny that guitar players are the only guilty ones.

 

But there's this whole other aspect to the "guitarist who plays too loud" complaint that never gets addressed. I have now pointed out that there's an elephant in the room.

 

And I figured out how to address the elephant in the room. If *I* can get good tone without the loud volume, why can't guitar players?

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You know, I've seen a couple dozen of these "guitar players play too loud" threads, and not once have I seen a single post that acknowledges the central problem that a guitar player faces. Not one.

 

So...here goes...

 

It's called tone. Okay?

...

 

That Yamaha DX7 sound? A Moog riff? A Farfisa? A Roland? A Yamaha? A Korg? All those are played clean 99.999% of the time. There's no need to reproduce the sound of an overdriven amp to make it sound right. You turn the volume up. You turn the volume down. It's the same sound, just more or less of the same thing. You can't do that with a guitar! The amp is an intrinsic part of the tone and for better or worse, the tone is intertwined with the volume. It's the nature of the beast. You cannot change that one central fact...

 

If you want anything other than the cleanest of tones, a guitar amp doesn't sound right until it's turned up. Period. It's that fucking simple.

 

Having gotten into electric guitar in the last few years myself, I can agree that the amp is a significant factor in your sound. As it would be with a Rhodes, but that's beside the point. What you're talking about with having to turn up for tone is mostly a tube amp problem, and is the reason why early rockers trashed their hearing. You couldn't get distortion without turning your amp up to the point of distortion. Simple. The thing is, we're almost seventy years in the future now. There are options. Now, I would agree that a lot of amps don't sound as good at really low volumes, but a medium volume should be just fine. Particularly with an EQ section, a boost/comp pedal, and some kind of gain control. If you *really* want a naturally-overdriven speaker sound without trashing the hearing of your bandmates, you can use an iso box with a mic and a monitor, or better yet something like the Boss Waza Tube Amp Expander. It's not really cheap, but if someone's really a tone addict they've probably invested thousands in gear anyways. There are also amps with direct outs and cab sims, all kinds of things. That's before we get into things like the Kemper Profiler and modellers.

 

 

Mesa and Marshall tackled the problem by adding a second volume knob--one that allowed the player to turn up the gain of the the front end of the amp. It adds distortion. Only...the problem is that it doesn't add the same kind of distortion. It's a different sound. A Marshall Plexi does NOT sound the same as a Marshall with a Master Volume. The Plexi has a grinding, growly sound that you've all heard on Deep Purple and Led Zeppelin albums. Master volume amps have a fizzy sort of distortion that's more high frequency-oriented. Think '80s era metal. All Marshall and Mesa accomplished by giving guitar players this option was to invent a whole new range of tones for guitarists to emulate.

 

Well, there are various effects pedals, right? Fuzz boxes and overdrive pedals and emulations and stuff. Go buy an effects pedal and all your problems will be solved, right? Not! There's never been an effects pedal that properly mimics the tone of a Marshall stack driven to the limits. They simply don't exist. The reality is that you've only discovered a whole new rabbit hole of sounds that you're expected to reproduce during your gig.

 

Ooops.

 

Okay, so you're a guitar player. You've got a gig. In that gig you're going to be expected to play tones that originated from Fender amps, Marshall amps, Mesa amps, etc. All at different volume settings, but frequently WAO. All during the same gig. What are you going to do? Do you take one of each? What wattage? One 4 x 12" or two? Pretty soon you're packing enough equipment to require your own, separate truck. Oh, you say to yourself, let's see, tonight we'll be playing to 300 people, so I'll set up with the 50W Marshall head and one cabinet. Except there's that other song that takes a Fender, so I need to take in the Fender Twin. Etc. And all night long, you're swapping between amps and trying frantically to match volumes. It's a bloody nightmare. Expensive, too. You're going to need to own separate 50W and 100W heads from multiple manufacturers, plus an array of cabinets that would make a music shop faint.

 

And the next night it's a gig for 1200 people. Time to pull out the big guns. Full 100W Marshall stack with two cabs. The Fender Twin will need to be mic'ed. On and on.

The question is, is it personally worth it to someone to do all that? If I had roadies and was doing a professional tour, it could be a heck of a lot of fun and as long as I could afford to pay all the guys helping decently (because I have a conscience), I could justify it. But it seems like (and I know this makes some people get really irritated) in most cases you wouldn't need the 100% same setup as the original artist for recording each and every song when you play it live; 95% of the sound would likely work just fine for anything but the recording studio or world tours (where you *would* likely have roadies etc). So maybe one or two good amps and a modeller to cover the rest, with a footswitch to switch between them. That's what we keyboardists have to deal with too. Heck, from what I've seen a good number of touring acts don't even haul all the stuff they use in the studio out on the road. Some high-profile guitarists have used things like the Kemper Profiler to replicate their favorite setups, and apparently it's good enough for them.

 

Let's see a show of hands. How many of you carry a Rick Wakeman sized rig? Now...how many of you carry two or three Rick Wakeman sized rigs and select from the stuff in the truck the gear you will need for that night's gig?

 

The first question alone will cut the pool or respondents to maybe a handful. The second will cut it to zero.

 

Almost. I've done four keyboards, two accordions, a speaker, three mics, a mixer, an electric guitar, a Native American flute, and all the wiring, equipment, and stands that implies. Which is pushing it for a single-man load-in for a band gig. Now I have a lot more stuff - rather than take it with me in a truck and choose at the gig, I choose before I leave for the gig. My options include nine keyboards/synths, three accordions, several mixers, three mics, two guitars, amp sim and fx boxes, endless accessories, six keyboard pedals, multiple monitoring options, different cord lengths, DI boxes, stand attachments, multiple music/mic/guitar/keyboard stands, and a lot more. That"s only including easily-portable gear. If a gig paid enough, we can add in an Allen church organ, three other organs, and an upright piano. The difference is that I only bring what I need for a given gig. And let me tell you, it's difficult to decide sometimes, or to find the perfect sound. Just because turning up the volume on a keyboard doesn't change it's tonality doesn't mean you can easily get the exact sound. It's so difficult, in fact, that you can buy Mainstage patches made by the original artists themselves for their own songs, if you're a laptop user. I honestly don't think that keyboardists are any less of perfectionists than guitarists (at least not the pro ones). I can quite literally spend hours on a single song"s sounds and still not be happy. It's a never ending battle of programming and trade-offs, what's actually reasonable, and how much I want to haul.

 

My current sound engineer told me that musicians, particularly guitarists and keyboardists, are the most insane type of perfectionists, he's never met a "normal" one in all his years of high-end church work - but we sound great because of it.

 

 

Unless you're willing to compromise on your Hammond tone ("Oh, hey, this tune needs a Hammond, so I'll use this churchy-sounding Gospel Hammond setting on my $200 keyboard to play Smoke On The Water. The audience won't care!"), don't complain about the guitar player. He's got his own problems, okay?

 

Note that I've not even begun to address the problems bass players face.

 

Yes, playing loud is fun. Got it. Yes, there are guitar players who won't balance with the rest of the band no matter what. That's also true for drummers, bassists, vocalists, and even (gasp!) keyboardists. But there's this whole other aspect to the "guitarist who plays too loud" complaint that never gets addressed. I have now pointed out that there's an elephant in the room.

 

Grey

 

Okay - the best guitarist I played with ran a handbuilt '65 Strat replica into a tube Princeton Reverb, with an Ibanez Tube Screamer before it. He could get almost anything but a really high-gain tone out of that combination, and he never went above 75dB or so. It sounded FANTASTIC. We miced it with an SM57, and were good to go. He didn't even use an amp stand. That's not a particularly quiet amp. But he made it work great on a medium-sized stage five feet from everyone else, some around him, some behind, some in front, etc. He didn't have to turn it up over the drummer, nor over the piano. Yet he got a good volume and a great tone from it without deafening everyone.

 

Hearing should never be sacrificed for the sake of a sound. Ever. Because you can't get it back, and someday you WILL regret not taking care of it, regardless of how you feel now. I don't know any musician that's experienced hearing loss from high levels that would do it again. Because it's awfully important to be able to hear your employer, your wife/husband, your kids, your grandkids, your doctor, and a lot of other things. If my father had had better hearing in his '50s, a heck of a lot of things in my childhood would have been better; all the arguments and stupid crap were mostly caused by him simply not hearing squat. Not to mention the links between early hearing loss and dementia (hearing loss increases your likelihood of developing dementia, and earlier). How about tinnitus? There are enough things in our everyday environment that we can't control - why aggravate it? Because if you lose your hearing, you won't even be able to enjoy that awesome "tone" ever again.

 

 

Disagree. I have no pity or mercy for players who must deafen for the sake of tone.

 

Just because you need the amp to run at full cry doesn't mean you have to dump all that acoustic energy into the room. In 1973 my guitar player was using a '59 Les Paul sunburst thru a 100W Marshall, and controlling his volume with load resistor boxes.

 

One could do the same now, or simply mic up a 5W amp.

 

I have solved the Hammond problem myself. In my basement lies an 1100W leslie rig which can scream at a whisper if I want. Tube amp running full throttle for tone, reamped thru a clean solid state amp giving independent control of volume and tone.

 

Yep.

Yamaha: Motif XF8, MODX7, YS200, CVP-305, CLP-130, YPG-235, PSR-295, PSS-470 | Roland: Fantom 7, JV-1000

Kurzweil: PC3-76, PC4 (88) | Hammond: SK Pro 73 | Korg: Triton LE 76, N1R, X5DR | Emu: Proteus/1 | Casio: CT-370 | Novation: Launchkey 37 MK3 | Technics: WSA1R

Former: Emu Proformance Plus & Mo'Phatt, Korg Krome 61, Roland Fantom XR & JV-1010, Yamaha MX61, Behringer CAT

Assorted electric & acoustic guitars and electric basses | Roland TD-17 KVX | Alesis SamplePad Pro | Assorted organs, accordions, other instruments

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Disagree. I have no pity or mercy for players who must deafen for the sake of tone.

 

Just because you need the amp to run at full cry doesn't mean you have to dump all that acoustic energy into the room. In 1973 my guitar player was using a '59 Les Paul sunburst thru a 100W Marshall, and controlling his volume with load resistor boxes.

 

One could do the same now, or simply mic up a 5W amp.

Yep.

+2

 

Cheers, Mike.

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I"m a guitarist. For real. I"m not that bad.

 

But yeah. That"s one of the approaches I take. I have a 5 watt 1-12 combo. That gets mic"d. It"s great for a dirty Tele , Brad Paisley kind of vibe. But it"s a one trick pony. But the Modern Country band I played in from 2008-2013 that was perfect.

 

I usually need more clean headroom. I like gigging with my Mesa Boogie Rectoverb 25. I can run it in 10 watt mode but using pedals I like 25 watts best. My 50 watt Boogie has a Kendrick attenuator. I can brake the speaker by 6 or 12 dB. That worked well in the 90s but modern production requires lower stage levels. This year I got the Helix and we go direct to desk and monitor through IEMs. The other guitarist I often work with does the same thing but uses the Kemper.

 

But frankly I miss out on a lot of this drama. Players know who the players are. Players play with each other. Players understand production requirements. Asking 'What does the gig pay?' Is a valid approach because morons don"t book great gigs.

"It doesn't have to be difficult to be cool" - Mitch Towne

 

"A great musician can bring tears to your eyes!!!

So can a auto Mechanic." - Stokes Hunt

 

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I have solved the Hammond problem myself. In my basement lies an 1100W leslie rig which can scream at a whisper if I want. Tube amp running full throttle for tone, reamped thru a clean solid state amp giving independent control of volume and tone.

 

Moe - Since this kind of veered off to a sub-topic would you mind sharing some detail? Specifically what kind of solid state amp and is it as simple as inserting it between the 122/147 amp output and Leslie cabinet eq/speaker? Any specific requirements for the amp I/O nominal level/impedance would be helpful. Even better if you can provide an ots example.

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Players know who the players are. Players play with each other. Players understand production requirements. Asking 'What does the gig pay?' Is a valid approach because morons don"t book great gigs.

 

:yeahthat:

 

QFT

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Back in the day my organ was the loudest thing on stage. My lowboy has a 200 watt amp with a EV bottom driver and a Atlas PD-60 in the horn. Man that thing was crazy loud.

"It doesn't have to be difficult to be cool" - Mitch Towne

 

"A great musician can bring tears to your eyes!!!

So can a auto Mechanic." - Stokes Hunt

 

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I'm in a hurry, but I'll drop in this one thing: Yes, attenuator boxes exist. They have another name--"tone suckers." The purely resistive ones are the worst, but even the more sophisticated ones with reactive components are lacking. If you folks have found attenuators that you're happy with, more power to you (no pun intended), but I've never heard one that doesn't alter the tone, nor does anyone I've ever spoken with about the subject. At least, no one who's serious about tone. Some are. Some aren't. It varies from player to player.

 

If your attitude is that the guitarist's tone doesn't matter, then I hope you don't post here that you're not satisfied with your tone. That would be rather hypocritical, wouldn't it?

 

For the record, I've got a Marshall 50W Plexi reissue (model = 1987X?) with an early '70s 4 x 12" slant cab (unfortunately, not the original Celestions), so I went towards the smaller end of the scale, wattage-wise. No, I haven't played guitar in a band, I just use it here at the house. I have not found a way to get a good crunchy tone at less than 6 or 7, which is actually more-or-less full volume. I've got two Mesa Boogies, a III and a IV. I mostly use them for Fender-ish tones, although they're not really suited for that. They're kinda their own thing. The master volume does allow you to get distortion at lower volumes, but it doesn't sound right to me; I'm more interested in '60s/'70s overdriven tones, not '80s. And, yes, they'll get stupidly loud. Much louder than I want or need.

 

Bass? Let's not open that can of worms. Guitar's bad enough.

 

Grey

I'm not interested in someone's ability to program. I'm interested in their ability to compose and play.

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I'm in a hurry, but I'll drop in this one thing: Yes, attenuator boxes exist. They have another name--"tone suckers." The purely resistive ones are the worst, but even the more sophisticated ones with reactive components are lacking. If you folks have found attenuators that you're happy with, more power to you (no pun intended), but I've never heard one that doesn't alter the tone, nor does anyone I've ever spoken with about the subject. At least, no one who's serious about tone. Some are. Some aren't. It varies from player to player.

 

I'm going to ask one question: have you or have you not personally tried this GT Speaker Emulator? By "personally" I mean actually hooked it to your guitar amp using a good guitar and played the emulator through a sound system with decent quality, not by assessment from YT videos or opinions formed on discussion forums or from other players.

 

Your statement "if you folks have found attenuators that you're happy with" implies you have not tried every emulator on the market and have formed the generalized blanket assessment "they have another name-- "tone suckers"."

 

Have you or have you not tried this speaker emulator?

 

http://www.analoguediehard.com/studio/guitars/groove_tubes-speaker-emulator/groove_tubes-speaker-emulator-stock.jpg

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Back in the day my organ was the loudest thing on stage. My lowboy has a 200 watt amp with a EV bottom driver and a Atlas PD-60 in the horn. Man that thing was crazy loud.

I was recently directed to a YouTube video that a fan posted of a band I was with in 1970. I had a chopped CV3 and a 122 on steroids, positioned behind me and up on a riser so the horn projected over my head (I can"t believe I can still hear). Anyway, the sound was recorded from a single mic at the board, so it was what it was. The organ was the loudest, shrillest Instrument on stage. Did we always sound like that? Somebody should have said something!

____________________________________
Rod

Here for the gear.

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