first gig

[Ian Sharrock]

C'mon folks, tell us all about your very first live gig.

 

Mine was when I was 9. My parents bought me a Lorenzo electronic chord organ for Christmas, 1971 & 6 months later I found myself on stage on my own, in front of 300 or so parents at the school concert.(Just to point out I'm completely self taught & had never played a keyboard before). I'm booked to do 3 songs. (Funny, I don't remember volunteering for the gig!) I managed one & a half before nerves took over, my bottle went & I ran off stage.

 

Never been frightened of an audience since, mind. I think they call it "being thrown in at the deep end!"

[Mr. Nightime]

I don't remember much about my first performance as a singer. I was 3, and was the featured soloist in the Children's choir in a big Baptist church in Chicago. I think that was because I was the only little kid that could sing in tune.

 

I remember my first performance as a keyboardist vividly, though. I was around 8 and had been taking organ lessons for 2 years. I played How Great Thou Art in our suburban Chicago Baptist church. It was a Sunday night, and I was terrified. Not so much stage fright, I was worried I'd mess up. I played it flawlessly, and afterward, as I walked back to my seat, I let out an audible sigh that totally embarassed my parents, and drew a laugh from the congregation. I didn't care, I'd done it.

[Joe P]

My first gig with a band was back in the late '80's in Bayonne, NJ. Place called The Chatterbox on Kennedy Blvd.

 

Wednesday night, and we were hounded by a drunk for just about the whole night. He kept coming up on stage and grabbing the mics until our bass player just freaked on him. Last we saw he was walking home with the pool rack around his neck.

 

I played some type of Panasonic keyboard that I had on loan from a friend. I eventually upgraded to a DX7s on top of a Hammond M3 and Leslie 44W, all of which I still own.

 

Regards,

Joe

[ProfD]

My 1st gig was inthe mid 80s. I was 14 or 15 years old. Me and a few cats put together a band and decided to do an outdoor concert in the neighborhood. It was all fun & games until I learned about the technology (GAS), gigging for $$$ and the whole 9 yards. Here I am 20 years later, completely hooked on this drug called music

[SilverDragonSoun]

We played at a place called Straw Hat Pizza in Northern California. I remember it being a small, rowdy crowd and because we had image, it didn't matter how good or bad we played,the girls treated us like Gods. I remember being nervous and belting out Jump, Mr Crowley, Tom Sawyer, Limelight and Open Arms as a few of our covers. I think the year was 1985.

[Sandy Hemenway]

First piano performance (outside of student/parent recitals) was 2nd grade rep in the school talent show. IIRC, I played "Swan Lake". While I was a bit nervous, the strange thing was that the worst of the nerves didn't get to me until AFTER I finished playing.

 

First 'major' gig I ever played was "Maple Leaf Rag" in the State 4-H talent show, (roughly age 13), for a crowd of several thousand.

[Dave Horne]

Forgetting my church job when I was 14 or 15, my first combo job was probably when I was 16 or so. We had a four piece group, The Variations (how original), consisting of a Thomas organ, sax, trumpet and drums. This first job was in a fire house somewhere in NJ not very far from Philadelphia. We went several hours overtime and it was probably a six or seven hour job.

 

I'm pretty sure Windy (Wes Montgomery) and the Alley Cat were played several times.

 

From that group only two of us stayed in music as performers. The other two are making much more money - one is a top guy for a large software company and the other is an audio engineer for Sony.

[mate stubb]

My first classical piano performance I can't even remember.

 

My first band gig I was 14 and we played a teen party in a girl's living room. It was packed (doesn't take but about 20 people to pack a living room). We made $30 and blew it on a strobe light.

 

No, not one of those electronic strobes with a Xenon bulb. It was a big plywood box with a hole in it and a sewing machine motor driving a disk with a corresponding hole and a spot light bulb.

[stepay]

My gigging past is odd to say the least.

 

Started playing solo piano pieces in church at about age 11 (my dad, now retired, was a United Methodist minister). Quit doing that by about age 16 when I quite playing completely until about age 19 when in college. Did first gig outside of a church in the early 90s at a place (no longer there) in Redwood City, CA called The Farm House. I just remembered that I sucked bad. Kind of had no business playing in that band then. Fortunately I got better. After 1993 I stopped playing gigs and didn't play another live gig until August 2003 when my basement band at the time did a gig for 70 people at an outdoor party. That fueled the fire so that in Feb. 2005 I joined the band I'm currently in, and we've done more than 40 gigs since with many more to come.