Mr. Nightime Posted June 5, 2009 Share Posted June 5, 2009 HARMONICA ETIQUETTE Best recommendation I've read on this forum !!!!!! When I run into one of these animals on a jam, I give the harp player another solo and have the whole band stop playing and clap time. Hang the SOB out to dry. A friend of mine is a harp player that fronts his own band. He'll do this to HIMSELF, intentionally, of course. When he first hit town, the first people he jammed with was my buddy and I. He wanted to join us, but he just wouldn't shut up, and he tried to take over. No thanks. Club owner didn't like it, either. But, he's a nice guy, great player, I just don't want to be in a band with him. "In the beginning, Adam had the blues, 'cause he was lonesome. So God helped him and created woman. Now everybody's got the blues." Willie Dixon Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FunkKeysStuff Posted June 5, 2009 Share Posted June 5, 2009 When I run into one of these animals on a jam, I give the harp player another solo and have the whole band stop playing and clap time. Hang the SOB out to dry. Heh, that was what I did last time a harp owner* walked onstage, uninvited and in mid-tune, to "jam" with my band. When I cued the band to stop, he got the deer-in-the-headlights look, stopped playing, and then started yelling at me that "Aw man, that ain't fair." So the guitarist grabbed the mic from him as I tersely explained (while we were still playing, mind you) that anyone on that stage could bring the house down with an unaccompanied solo, and if he couldn't, that meant he didn't belong there. *I refuse to call him a "player." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pale Posted June 5, 2009 Share Posted June 5, 2009 Hey, if you're too unsophisticated to recognize an Em(#5) when you hear one, that's not the guitarist's problem. Yeah, it would be like that. If the guitarists actually played the #5. Custom handmade clocks: www.etsy.com/shop/ClockLight Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wmp Posted June 6, 2009 Share Posted June 6, 2009 Lots of folks overplay, but there's something special about bad harp players with diareah. For a moment there I thought one my favorites moved to your neighborhood. Until you mentioned the nice guy, great player part. Playing harp from the audience sure sounds familiar. One night not long ago, a very large, very drunk regular showed up wearing one of these. /B3and88.com/img/washboard.jpg Enough to make you miss a harp owner. We called him up on stage, let him screw over a three minute tune, and went on break until his washboard left the building. He stumbled around to everybody in the band asking, "Are you saying I suck? Huh?". I was the only one with the good manners to tell him the truth. You have to practice for years before you suck, and you're a lot worse than that. All these guys have been playing for thirty to fifty years. Take that thing home and practice for a few years, come by for another tune and we'll let you know if you suck yet. --wmp Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed A. Posted June 7, 2009 Share Posted June 7, 2009 I have a pet peeve about pronunciations, like: Multi Timbral, pronounced as timber, instead of tAmber My pet peeve are people who insist that the pronunciation is "tAmber" even when "timber" is perfectly acceptable: http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/timbre Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
orangefunk Posted June 7, 2009 Share Posted June 7, 2009 Regarding Moog, I pronounce it the Mooooooooooo way... always have and always will... yep I have known for decades that its more like Mogue but I (and seems like most players I know) prefer the other pronunciation... I also heard Rick Wakeman refer to Moog as Mooooooog and not Mogue... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FunkKeysStuff Posted June 7, 2009 Share Posted June 7, 2009 One night not long ago, a very large, very drunk regular showed up wearing one of these. Oh dear lord. A frottoir can be a cool thing in the right time and place, but when one shows up unannounced, watch out. To be fair though, a humble tambourine can inflict nearly the same amount of damage, and is much more portable and stealthy. I worked for a while with a Fairly Famous Singer who, in the course of her >30-year career, had never figured out how rude it was to play her tambourine from the audience at someone else's gig. Some years after my tenure with her, I was playing solo piano at a festival, and I heard someone in the audience shaking a tambourine. I thought, "Geez, that's the same annoying thing Maureen [not her real name] used to do." Then after my set I went backstage, and who's sitting there, three Merlots to the wind, but my former boss. "Maureen!" I gushed, with all the over-the-top fake saccharine happiness I could muster, "Was that you playing tambourine during my set?" She stammered back, "You know it was, baby!", completely oblivious to my dripping sarcasm. Kids, this is why alcohol and tambourines don't mix. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StanC Posted June 8, 2009 Share Posted June 8, 2009 I learned long ago that pretty much any chord called out by a guitar player is suspect. I've found it's usually best to ask the guitar player in one breath ... and then ask the bass player in the next breath. The real chord can usually be discerned from their combined answer. I have found that most of guitarists (not the jazz kind though) have problems with hearing chords that are built on 3rd or 5th rather than on the root. For example, sometimes you have to argue that it's not an E, it's a C with E in bass . But so many times guitarist (and other musos too) listen to bass player and immediately conclude that if the bass player is playing E than it must be an E chord. I find it best not to ask either for chords. I always ask for notes, or more frequently fret position. I'll figure it out myself. Similarly, how about (blues) songs that begin with a "V-IV" turnaround/tag. Many guitar players I've known would tell you it's in the key of "V" - because that's what it starts on! Gives a whole new meaning the phrase "Don't ask - Don't tell" LOL! Stan Gig Rig: Yamaha S90 XS; Hammond SK-1; Rehearsal: Yamaha MOX8 Korg Triton Le61, Yamaha S90, Hammond XK-1 Retired: Hammond M2/Leslie 145, Wurly 200, Ensoniq VFX Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mexico Charlie Posted June 8, 2009 Share Posted June 8, 2009 Years ago I played for a chick pageant type thing. One of the pageant chicks asked me to be her pianist. She said she would furnish the bassist, the drumist and the tunist. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ProfD Posted June 8, 2009 Share Posted June 8, 2009 Years ago I played for a chick pageant type thing. One of the pageant chicks asked me to be her pianist. She said she would furnish the bassist, the drumist and the tunist. Reads like she had a speech impediment. That ain't right mayne. PD "The greatest thing you'll ever learn, is just to love and be loved in return."--E. Ahbez "Nature Boy" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon May Posted June 8, 2009 Share Posted June 8, 2009 Don't know where I read it ... "A gentleman is someone who knows how to play a (reviled instrument of choice), but doesn't!" "I'm well acquainted with the touch of a velvet hand..." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jon May Posted June 8, 2009 Share Posted June 8, 2009 We once had a trumpet player ask if he could sit in on a couple of tunes at a rock gig. He was a young guy but had been schooled in Dixie and just warbled incessantly over everything, including the singer. Finally the bass player turned to him in the middle of a song ad yelled "Shut the F... up!!!"(Which was kinda rude but I nearly wet myself laughing). "I'm well acquainted with the touch of a velvet hand..." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
J. Dan Posted June 8, 2009 Share Posted June 8, 2009 Kids, this is why alcohol and tambourines don't mix. In my old band, an audience member got ahold of our cow bell off the stage and started running around the dance floor whacking it. This guy is always up dancing and having a good time, but my god, he couldn't keep time to save his life. I mean, it was pretty much just random. And a cowbell is fricking loud when you got somebody beating on it with all they got. I was starting to have trouble following the drummer because of the stupid cowbell. Luckily, somebody else from the audience finally chased him down and took it away from him and returned it to the stage. Dan Acoustic/Electric stringed instruments ranging from 4 to 230 strings, hammered, picked, fingered, slapped, and plucked. Analog and Digital Electronic instruments, reeds, and throat/mouth. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phred Posted June 9, 2009 Author Share Posted June 9, 2009 These are sooo great! These are exactly the stories I was looking for. I was starting to have trouble following the drummer because of the stupid cowbell. Ha Ha. We had a guy that used to do that at all of our shows, he would grab a tambourine, egg shaker, or cowbell from the singer's percussion stand and play god awful time. It seemed that he would always do it during the worst songs at the worst times. Ever tried to play the offbeat part of 'I feel good' while someone is randomly smacking a tamourine? Or the unison hits in 'Oye Commo Va' (sp?) when someone if hitting a cowbell out of time? My singer ended up tying the tambourine, and cowbell to his percussion stand for a while. I don't think he still does. Come to think of it, I don't think I have seen tambourine man is quite a while. I'm just saying', everyone that confuses correlation with causation eventually ends up dead. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil W Posted June 9, 2009 Share Posted June 9, 2009 Love this thread! Thanks guys! I once did a demo at a studio and used the house engineer who was more of an electronic music guy. Wow, that was great he said - it almost sounded like fretless bass! I was playing ....wait for it....a fretless bass. To him, fretless bass was a patch not an instrument. http://philwbass.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ITGITC Posted June 9, 2009 Share Posted June 9, 2009 Finally the bass player turned to him in the middle of a song ad yelled "Shut the F... up!!!" (Which was kinda rude but I nearly wet myself laughing). Oh how many times I've wanted to say that to someone in the band. Recently it was a female-type who had picked up a tamborine and was playing on 1 and 3. Non-Musos used to ask me if they could sit their drink/beer/glass of red wine/whatever on my keyboard ("only for a minute while I run to the ladie's room"). (Of course, I gave that guy a look like he was crazy... didn't help.) Has this ever happened to you? Sure it has. I'm not certain who it was here - probably Kanker, Sven, or Moe - who said that if someone put a drink on their keyboard, by the time they came back, it was gone... said keyboard player had absorbed it. Of course, no self-respecting Muso would ever ask if he/she could put a drink on your keyboard, right? Ummmmmm... OK, never mind. I forgot about the very-self-respecting-narcisitic-Divas out there. If you are a keyboard player and you don't know the type and haven't worked with the type, then you haven't been playing long enough. Stop reading this and get back out there & pay your dues! "Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and that which cannot remain silent." - Victor Hugo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kanker. Posted June 9, 2009 Share Posted June 9, 2009 I need to repeat my GC/Little Phatty story I'm in Guitar Center checking out the Little Phatty. Almost immediately, the salesman comes over and starts hard selling me. "Man, if you want that, you'd better buy it today. Everybody's wanting to buy that one once they play it" yada yada yada. He won't STFU long enough for me to dig into the thing, so I ask him "Do you know if this thing's monophonic?" The aggressive, hard-sell look on his face disappears and is replaced by an empty. vacuous look and he mutters "I have no idea what that means" and slinks away. A ROMpler is just a polyphonic turntable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FunkKeysStuff Posted June 9, 2009 Share Posted June 9, 2009 Plenty of people (musos and non) have asked if they could put a drink on my keyboard... but no one has ever asked a second time. On a regular club gig of mine, I've taken to unplugging my entire rig and moving it to the back of the stage during our set breaks. Why? Because that's when the "emcee" brings up stupid drunk girls (with their drinks still in hand) to dance onstage. At first he was like, "You don't have to do that, I'll keep an eye on it for you." Yeah right. Some clueless Paris Hilton wannabe who has checked both her inhibitions and her sense of personal accountability at the state line, is playing air guitar with her half-full Hand Grenade six inches from my rig while you're at the other end of the stage doing your "all the ladies on this side" schtick, and you're gonna protect my rig how, exactly? That's yet another reason I'm so happy about being able to cover the whole gig with the NE3: one tiny, lightweight keyboard on top of (*gasp!*) a single-tier X stand. The board and stand go together to the back of the stage, back side facing out, with my bench turned upside down on top of the keys -- altogether forming a wholly uninviting and impractical drink stand. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Skinny Posted June 9, 2009 Share Posted June 9, 2009 We had a backup singer that would put her tambourine on one of my keyboards. One time she set it on there and inadvertently pressed the "drums" button, so when I started playing, all I heard was a bunch of percussion sounds. The next set break, I called a band meeting, to make everyone aware of my new strict "absolutely nothing on my keyboards" rule... Stuff and things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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