Personal Improvement...

[EricBarker]

As I build my newly formed original band, and co-lead my friend's band, I've really started to think about areas I can improve my performance. I'm pretty solid on the keyboard material, so it's usually extra-musical issues that hold me back.

 

1) Get more gigs for my original band - We've only been at it about 2 months, got a good hour of material 50/50 covers/originals. Drummer wants to make money, wife wants to make money, I say $$$ is respect. But I'm super busy in my day job, and all my bands, and I just drop the ball on cold-calling venues to lineup gigs. We don't have enough material to carry a night, so I'm trying to leach off of other larger bands as opening acts. Thankfully, I'm in quite a few, and know many more. But I gotta do better. Summer schedule is starting to fill up.

 

2) Stage Volume - I'll admit it, I'm a hog. I'm always way too loud on stage. At 42yo, I've realized that I just NEED to be able to hear every note well. In a small town with small crappy venues, that's sometimes really hard. I walk away from almost every gig feeling guilty that I'm blasting my bandmates. I rarely get a tongue lashing by the FoH guy, but it typically translates in "The band is too loud, so I'm turning it all down"... but I know it's my fault.

 

3) Overplaying - This is related to #1, but I'm busy as heck. And I like it that way. Most of my favorite bands and musicians are very intense and play a lot. Rick Wakeman, Joe Zowinul, Derek Sherinian... all pretty spastic players and often the centerpieces of their bands. Because it's personal taste, it's hard for me to get away from. What can I say? I like the space being filled. Gotta work on keeping it tasteful, though.

 

4) Working on my high range (singing) - My wife is a trained opera soprano, so she's workin on me to keep my support up, and I've been concentrating on it a lot over the past few months, it's working. So not worried about my development there. I'm a baritone, but have a pretty large range. Still, I feel like I could be better belting out high tenor rock parts using "Mixed Voice". My wife doesn't know anything about that being a classical female vocalist, so I gotta take some voice lessons from someone who knows pop male vocal styles better.

5) Don't laugh at my own jokes - Come on, man, this is lame! I look back at videos of myself. I'd like to think I'm growing as a frontman, and pretty charismatic. But then I laugh after I tell something funny, and it's just dumb. I don't catch myself until after I do it, bad habit. STOP IT!

SO! What are some things YOU need to work on?

[SamuelBLupowitz]

I’m right with you on the not overplaying! I’m trying to learn to think like a horn player or singer more, specifically when soloing — leaving space for breath, or separating my run-on “sentences” into phrases with “punctuation.”

 

I hear you on the frustration of being able to hear yourself well enough without blowing away the rest of the band. It can be a real downward (upward?) spiral with the stage volume, especially when you don’t have your own monitor or FOH guy who knows the band (how often do we get so lucky?). Have you considered going the IEM route? Once I got a taste, I never wanted to go back.

[jeffincltnc]

I really want to improve as a backup singer - both in timing, preciseness as well as singing harmony.

 

I don't like how in videos seeing how much I am tweaking knobs and all over the place with controls as much as I am.

 

I need to improve stage wardrobe and dress like someone who is performing.

[PianoMan51]

A couple of hints on moving some of your list forward…

 

1. If you move yourself halfway towards your keyboard speaker, you will hear your keys 6dB louder, while remaining the same level to everyone else.

 

2. Regarding playing too much, there is some value in ‘playing tired’. I don’t mean ‘old and tired’, but rather  ‘I’ve played a lot today’ tired. I just rewatched the documentary on the Wrecking Crew. One new thing I understood was that they were always playing tired. No wonder they never overplayed. I know that I play much less but tastier after I’ve played out my first wind.Maybe put in more tough, fast tunes in the first set. Let the band shake out it’s sillies.

[EricBarker]

Yeah. Now that I think about it, #1 and #2 are totally connected. The better I hear myself, the less I play!

So here's the thing, I've decided that accept for short festival gigs, I'm never going to trust an Engineer for my monitor. I've made that mistake too many times. The best shows occur when I have my own personal keyboard monitor that I control, and I can take myself out of the monitoring equation for everyone else. I have a small Behringer Eurolive 150W amp that has laser focus. I just remembered that it has a mic stand screws on the bottom too, so I'll just put it as close to ear level as possible, off to the side.

The other day, I got to talking with the engineer before the show, had a good feeling about him, so I let my guard down, said "nah, you go ahead and run monitors, I trust you". He was great, but it just wasn't right. He also started panicking mid-set because he got complaints from elderly customers about the noise volume, and made the mistake of tweaking the gain. As a result, all the monitors dropped and EVERYONE turned up. He profusely apologized later, but I've just had this happen too many times, gotta take matters into my own hands.

[EricBarker]

35 minutes ago, jeffinpghpa said:

I really want to improve as a backup singer - both in timing, preciseness as well as singing harmony.

 

I don't like how in videos seeing how much I am tweaking knobs and all over the place with controls as much as I am.

 

I need to improve stage wardrobe and dress like someone who is performing.

 

Backup singer is HARD, to be sure. The key is to pry your eyes up and watch the lead singer. I'm terrible about this, but every time I think to do it, my blend improves 200%. There's this instant connection that can only occur when you're watching them.

 

Tweaking knobs doesn't really bother me. It's part of the performance. Kiddos love nothing more than a DJ who's sitting with an NI Machine rig making big obvious controller twists. If you can't play it down, play it up.

Wardrobe should be simple enough. Now that you're conscious of it, just fix it, and have fun with it. Talk with your band, do they have a dress code, do they have theme nights? Sometimes you'll be surprised how others want to present themselves. I was in an Irish dance band for years where everyone suddenly realized they wanted to dress really flamboyantly, opposite of what you'd expect. We had a lot of fun with it, and sometimes coordinated. Even within a genre it can vary a lot. I often find myself wanting to do the opposite of the norm to shake things up. But that's not for everyone.

[KuruPrionz]

2 hours ago, EricBarker said:

As I build my newly formed original band, and co-lead my friend's band, I've really started to think about areas I can improve my performance. I'm pretty solid on the keyboard material, so it's usually extra-musical issues that hold me back.

 

1) Get more gigs for my original band - We've only been at it about 2 months, got a good hour of material 50/50 covers/originals. Drummer wants to make money, wife wants to make money, I say $$$ is respect. But I'm super busy in my day job, and all my bands, and I just drop the ball on cold-calling venues to lineup gigs. We don't have enough material to carry a night, so I'm trying to leach off of other larger bands as opening acts. Thankfully, I'm in quite a few, and know many more. But I gotta do better. Summer schedule is starting to fill up.

 

2) Stage Volume - I'll admit it, I'm a hog. I'm always way too loud on stage. At 42yo, I've realized that I just NEED to be able to hear every note well. In a small town with small crappy venues, that's sometimes really hard. I walk away from almost every gig feeling guilty that I'm blasting my bandmates. I rarely get a tongue lashing by the FoH guy, but it typically translates in "The band is too loud, so I'm turning it all down"... but I know it's my fault.

 

3) Overplaying - This is related to #1, but I'm busy as heck. And I like it that way. Most of my favorite bands and musicians are very intense and play a lot. Rick Wakeman, Joe Zowinul, Derek Sherinian... all pretty spastic players and often the centerpieces of their bands. Because it's personal taste, it's hard for me to get away from. What can I say? I like the space being filled. Gotta work on keeping it tasteful, though.

 

4) Working on my high range (singing) - My wife is a trained opera soprano, so she's workin on me to keep my support up, and I've been concentrating on it a lot over the past few months, it's working. So not worried about my development there. I'm a baritone, but have a pretty large range. Still, I feel like I could be better belting out high tenor rock parts using "Mixed Voice". My wife doesn't know anything about that being a classical female vocalist, so I gotta take some voice lessons from someone who knows pop male vocal styles better.

5) Don't laugh at my own jokes - Come on, man, this is lame! I look back at videos of myself. I'd like to think I'm growing as a frontman, and pretty charismatic. But then I laugh after I tell something funny, and it's just dumb. I don't catch myself until after I do it, bad habit. STOP IT!

SO! What are some things YOU need to work on?

My singing continues to improve, just singing more makes a difference.  Patience helps too. 

 

I used to overplay. Then I got a little Tascam recorder and listened to what the band sounded like. 

It made me remember when my brother brought home records by Thelonius Monk, he truly understood the beauty and power of silence. 

Yes, EVERY space must be filled, many of them need to be filled with SILENCE. A constant barrage loses impact quickly, tension and release!

 

And LOUD? Foof!!! Long ago and far away, I bet nobody would have known if you were playing or not, I had a Mesa Boogie half stack with EV and JBL speakers. 

I've learned to bring a small amp and a tiltback amp stand so I can aim it at my head. Then it doesn't need to be nearly so loud and I can hear it well. 

In fact, I've grown so tired of loud drummers and everybody turning up to hear themselves over that racket that I've decided to work on a solo act with acoustic guitar and vocals. 

 

[stoken6]

Gotta love this board - keyboard player says he's too loud, and a guitar player gives him advice about lowering the volume!

 

I never had the thing of being too loud - I'm super-sensitive to excess noise, so I have an instinctive reaction of "too much on-stage volume, I'll turn down to try and alleviate". 

 

Anyone here trying to improve their time/groove?

 

Cheers, Mike.

[KuruPrionz]

12 minutes ago, stoken6 said:

Gotta love this board - keyboard player says he's too loud, and a guitar player gives him advice about lowering the volume!

 

I never had the thing of being too loud - I'm super-sensitive to excess noise, so I have an instinctive reaction of "too much on-stage volume, I'll turn down to try and alleviate". 

 

Anyone here trying to improve their time/groove?

 

Cheers, Mike.

I've been recording whenever I can. I don't use a metronome, I use drum tracks, the grooves are different and how you fill in is different. If I play bass, I lock to the kick, if I play guitar I lock to the snare. Dropping vocals on top is yet another groove layer. 

[Bill H.]

5 hours ago, EricBarker said:

 

 

4) Working on my high range (singing) - My wife is a trained opera soprano, so she's workin on me to keep my support up, and I've been concentrating on it a lot over the past few months, it's working. So not worried about my development there. I'm a baritone, but have a pretty large range. Still, I feel like I could be better belting out high tenor rock parts using "Mixed Voice". My wife doesn't know anything about that being a classical female vocalist, so I gotta take some voice lessons from someone who knows pop male vocal styles better.

SO! What are some things YOU need to work on?

A word of caution from someone who's been there: If you push your voice out of it's natural range, there could be consequences. For years I wanted to sing higher than my vocal cords were comfortable with - hitting (for example) the high "C"s in Can't Get Enough when my natural range was a few semitones lower. And I could do it by singing from my throat rather than diaphragm, and pinching my vocal cords. But after a few years of that, I couldn't... or anything else. It took several years before I could sing much of anything again. 

 

 If you wake up hoarse the next morning, you are doing something wrong.

 

So what do I need to work on the most? Probably accepting that I'm now a senior, and need to finally grow up  

[cphollis]

My list is shorter than yours, but still important to me.  I don't sing, for example, and someone else gets the gigs, not me!

 

I cured my overplaying by being repeatedly annoyed by my busy hands on recordings.  I found that the open spaces sounded really, really good, even by doing something as simple as forcing myself to play half as many notes, solos included.  It also made me focus more on the tones I was getting vs. lots o' notes.  Much improved in the mix as a result, and lots more room for others.  And there are still plenty of fun parts to stretch out on. 

 

I cured my volume habit by putting an extra 10% "more me" in my IEM mix,  and trusting the sound tech make the right choices for the FOH.  As you know, there's a lot going on with keys, and you *do* want to hear every nuance (is that filter where I want it?) so yeah I need to cut a hair above the drums, guitars, etc. in my ears.  I just don't want to impose that on everyone else!

 

As you might know, I dislike loud stage equipment as I believe there's less and less real need for it anymore.  But if you're going to do it, yeah, it takes a while to get the precise balance between what you hear, what other musicians hear and still leaving enough room for FOH to do what they need to do.  That's much easier to do when everyone is using sound isolation like IEMs.

 

As far as stuff I am personally working on, I tend to space out on longer pieces towards the end of the night, and forget where we are in the song -- did we do the bridge already, or did I just imagine it?  Paying attention can be hard when you get lost in the music! 

 

I also am making sure I am physically and mentally rested for a performance, as that can be a big factor on how I feel about the night.  Protein snack bars and sparkling water for the win!

 

Best of luck with your endeavor!

[Jim Alfredson]

IEMs are a game changer. I recently took over most lead vocal duties in the Pink Floyd tribute band I play with. Without IEMs, I wouldn't be able to sing that entire show. It's right at the top of my range and if I push at all, I'm screwed. With IEMs, I can hear everything and not have to strain my voice. 

[EricBarker]

One thing that’s naturally keeping me from overplaying is, I play synth bass on the majority of my bands. So I at least don’t have 2 hands of keys going on all the time!

 

I realize that bass is my strongest and favorite role, and it keeps me grounded.

[yannis D]

No 3 is the top priority IMO. Or at least it should be. From audience perspective, a musician who overplays destroyes the ambience. Ans it drives me crazy when i myself overplay, and listen to a recording of it

[elif]

LH bass/clonewheel player here.  I need to work on picking the tunes to solo on and to relax while soloing.

 

Regarding volume,  I also must hear myself in context with the band. However, how to get it right depends on the stage setup and volume.  I play through a Leslie and a separate bass amp so location of those is important.  In extreme cases (boomy subs), I've used full coverage headphones to try to keep listening levels at a reasonable volume while hearing both of my instruments and the band clearly.

[allan_evett]

21 hours ago, EricBarker said:

The other day, I got to talking with the engineer before the show, had a good feeling about him, so I let my guard down, said "nah, you go ahead and run monitors, I trust you". He was great, but it just wasn't right.

Most of the time I self-monitor keys. If I've worked with a particular engineer or their company, and have been able to hear keys clearly in their monitors, I'll sometimes leave my cabinet in the vehicle. Band stage levels need to be reasonably consistent for that to work though. 

 

Case in point: I did a gig last August at an area casino, outdoors near their pool. It was with a Buffett/Yacht-Rock tribute I gig with 6-10 times a summer.  The engineering team was very experienced and I felt comfortable using their monitors. Also the staging was very tight, so fitting my cabinet up there would've taken some juggling; easier to go with their setup. The onstage mix was solid, and this particular act is conscientious about stage levels; so I could hear everything clearly all evening. 

Fast forward to a gig I did about three weeks ago; same casino and sound people, different 6-piece band (previously have played out with the two front guys as a country/americana trio). I went with the house monitoring again, and what a mistake! The band mucked with their stage levels all freakin' night, and there was no need to do that. Half the time I couldn't hear myself, the other half I was too loud to my ears, and couldn't hear some of the other members. 

 

Other than the Buffett tribute - on larger stages - I'll self-monitor for all else this year; not worth the aggravation for three hours.  That group has an area club gig in early June, but I'll still be using my own monitor.  It's a new room for the act, etc...

[EricBarker]

Conversely, I have the opposite problem with Vocals. Because I'm not the full-time lead singer (usually countermelody vocals and occasional leads), I tend to stiff myself on vocal monitoring. Since I've got my own keyboard monitor, I often turn the other monitors toward other bandmates (because there's always one less monitor than musicians on stage), as an attempt to help out. I have a very loud resonant voice, so I think "eh, I don't need it that much". Then I oversing like crazy over the loud 5-piece rock band!

 

I could pipe my vocals through my personal monitor too, but that would be an ordeal. I'd need to get a vocal DI with a Thru... hey, maybe that isn't a terrible idea.

[stoken6]

1 hour ago, EricBarker said:

I could pipe my vocals through my personal monitor too, but that would be an ordeal. I'd need to get a vocal DI with a Thru... hey, maybe that isn't a terrible idea.

This is why powered speakers (and mixers, and headphone amps ...) that can send just one channel to a THRU output are such a useful idea. 

 

Alternatively a 1-channel mic splitter isn't a big deal, cost-wise or hassle-wise.

 

Cheers, Mike.

[EricBarker]

I wish someone made a 4-channel monitor speaker with passthroughs on every individual channel. That would be SUPER helpful to a lot of musicians, I'd think.

 

I just realized I have an old Shure PM4 miniMixer that would be perfect for this. It was originally intended to use with an IEM system, but the system it's attached to is ancient and broken. It has 4 combo XLR/Line inputs, and 4 XLR passthroughs on the back, plus a Mix Out. This would take care of all my DI needs and give me a feed to a personal Monitor. Brilliant!

Still, wish I had all this combined with a speaker, that would be the holy grail.

[Nathanael_I]

As fun as new instruments are, there is little to compare with the joy obtained from a better monitoring experience.  Being able to hear oneself and others clearly is just so important.  Too loud, too shrill, bad balance, frequency masking - all can really put a damper on enjoyment.  Solving monitor issues is probably the only "tech" thing that can compete with the musical issues you listed in the original post.  When the IEMs are right and the band is in the groove - man... so much fun - and no ringing ears, no threshold shift.