As a live musician I totally agree with you, however it’s tough out there for venues with rising rents and audiences not showing up like they used to. Lots of spots I played at in the last few years have closed and many that are open are barely hanging on. Not sure what the solution is
As a fellow musician, AMEN! Bars were THE place for people to see live music and the up and coming generation is not drinking. While that is great for health, it leaves a void for live music because of, well, money. The legacy acts and mega-stars are able to pull it off, but everyone else is really struggling. About 80% of the places around me where I played are either closed or not doing live music. People forget the ecosystem that existed for all those epic bands of says past is drying up. I believe that playing music is a trade like all other trades. It takes time, dedication, and experience to excel...and the ability to make money doing it. If you cannot feed yourself by doing something, people will look for something else that does. By the way, I have been a music teacher and working musician for 39 years, so I have been around a bit.
ditto... i did a gig last night in an old style bar playing country music mostly...the audience is all over 60, perhaps partly due the music we are playing, but here on vancouver island, live music places and opportunities for local musicians is drying up! the places that are running are usually struggling... i've been playing for 50 years and 70..
Totally get it. I'm a Musician/performer/engineer/Artist with the "Creative Sickness" as I've called it for a long time. It informed everything I have ever done for well over 60 years.
I constantly "tell Stories" & make comments here & there & often refer to the Ancient Days ,when there were Thousands of gigs. EVERYWHERE.
I typically think of My "Night the music died" as a specific gig & all the social changes transpiring around clubs at the time. It is much farther back than I realized. This is not a current happening.
I could easily ramble on after seeing that Picture as it related one of my gigs to that picture. Too long to tell here but ... Oh Ya !
i spoke with my musician friend in toronto 2 days ago.. apparently he is keeping very busy and the small club scene in toronto is happening with lots of young blood! maybe it is better in the large urban centers.. he says places come and go.. drom taberna is the place he was playing doing a gig 230am to 345am!! so apparently live music on a small scale is still happening in toronto... hard for me to know, as i am isolated on vancouver island!
James, I am saddened over the lack of places to play. I'm in Vancouver, BC, nearly 70, and run into many who miss listening and dancing to the music that has great lyrics integrated into a well-formed melody. Why is it so challenging to bring back the dance halls? Is it mostly about cost?
i used to play and live in vancouver.. i moved to victoria in 86.. left at expo, lol.. lots of vancouver players have moved over here to the island over the last 10-20 years even more so.. the osborne bay pub - closes nov 27th... i am doing one more blues jam on the 20th, and i played with a 7 piece band there on this past sunday to a full house, but it will be over soon.. whether anything comes along to replace it... it is not looking good... to your question - i really don't know.. i think it is cultural and i would argue very differently then ted here... while it might be true shows like taylor swift and big name acts are doing fine, the places where these acts got their start are not doing fine and going out of existence... last time i played vancouver was 2018 2019 - blue frog and frankies a few times..
What a tragic sentence, "the places where these acts got their start are not doing fine and going out of existence." Gosh, there were SO many places offering all kinds of genres in the 1970s, when I first moved to Vancouver.
Frankly, the 'big names' adding glitz and glamour, it's a distraction. I went to a concert where it was one musician with their guitar, and the evening was memorial. Hearing the musicians flow into their music, with the love for the music, having a great time well, that is what makes the difference in attending LIVE .
I appreciate your reply, and hey, sorry to hear it's not much different over on the Island.
thanks! i don't know how young folks can make a go of it today... playing music for me was always a signing on to a life of poverty essentially... i must have been a monk in my previous lifetime, so i was used to it! fortunately i have a small pension - we still have them in canada - and own the place we live in.. i appreciate the additional income and i love playing music.. for me, i have always played because i love playing music and interacting with others on this level.. i never did it for the money... but it has worked out ultimately... i always had enough... i hope young musicians today can find places to cultivate their music, and it doesn't have to just be in some limited single or duo context, where they can play in a band and have an opportunity to do that for an extended period of time..
Ever see the B-Sides live at the Commodore? Talk about setting an audience on fire. I believe my sister actually seduced the lead singer after one of their concerts. Another great local band that could get an audience into off-their-head trippin' mode like the photo above was The Shuffle Demons. I saw them here in Toronto mid-80s on a Sunday aft at the Rivoli and I left hoarse from screaming so much.
It's a real problem - I just wrote about that on my page. Venues need support as a lifeline to musicians, as this is a way that we do not have to compete with AI acts/artists. We have an area where talent and the ability to play live matter - we need to grow this area to combat the focus on AI and the way it's being engineered (or used) to phase out musicians from the 'business' of making music.
There is an interesting connection between the musician and a live audience. They really need each other.
One of my favorite stories:
Several years ago my late wife and I were attending a fundraiser for a local politico. He had a band playing boomer classics, nobody was paying attention and you could tell the band was just going through the motions. I took my wife out on the dance floor and we started to dance to a Sam Cooke number they were playing, slow and swaying. I swear the more we danced second by second the better the band played. We are a social species, dance and music are part of our evolutionary history.
August 1987. A hot summers day in NYC. After a long day, we stayed up till 3 am to go to Barry Harris Jazz Workshop on 8th Avenue. Down from the garden. Old, dingy club, no bar. Old wooden tables. I'm still in college checking out the jazz scene with an older friend who played sax and just left the army.
He goes over to speak with some guy. Didn't really pay attention until he came back and asked me if I knew who he was speaking with. I said "no" He says: That Jaco Pastorius. My ears perked up but only a little bit. I had a couple of Weather Report Cassettes but that wasn't my music back then.
This langy white guy gets on the stand. Everybody is just fiddling around with their instruments. Jaco turns to the piano player and asks < can you play America. Japanese guy waves him off like get out of here. Stop messing around. Then he yells back to the piano player in a sarcastic tone and says, "Well do you know how to play Satin Doll?" in a very sarcastic tone like do you know how to play Mary Had a Little Lamb
He counts it off and the jam session begins. Jaco is playing upright bass. Rhythm section and a trumpet player and a sax player. I'm thinking just another bass player with a name. I'd been in class with Ron Carter for a semester.
They started to play and all of a sudden I heard a bass player like I never heard a bass player. All the other players disappeared, and I was totally entranced by Jaco's playing and mannerisms. He was an eclectic dude. Made strange faces when he played, but it was if every note floated off that bass into the air and the bass player was the star of the band. A bass player is usually the solo that puts everyone to sleep. The notes floated into the air and it was almost as if I could see each note as well as feel it.
An upright bass player never did that to me. I was transported to another world. Suffice to say, I became a Jaco fan on the spot. WTF did I just witness? Some lanky, eccentric dude first messing around playing America and then owning Satin Doll like it had been written in the future.
One week later, I was in Greenwich Village subway station, near the basketball courts, next to the Blue Note. And I see this shirtless, barefoot guy at the end of the station playing with a Ukulele. I walk closer to get a better look and I'm like damn, "that's the worlds greatest bass player hanging in the subway without a shirt or shoes" So I go up to him, introduce myself, tell him I heard him last week at the session and that he had promised to help my friend get a gig. He's like oh yeah. "Do you have 5 bucks so I can get some breakfast?"
I'm like "alright man, but I don't think this is for breakfast" Imagine the bass player that changed the instrument forever, penniless and barefoot in the subways asking for 5 bucks?
Guy was a genius. Put me in an altered state in a New York Minute. Those were the kind of encounters one could have in New York City when there was a live jazz scene and the masters were still alive. LIve music wasn't just about the music. It was also about the hang.
I suppose that this story supports Frank Zappa's wisecrack that 'Jazz is the music of poverty'.
Jaco was before my time, so I couldn't experience him live. But when I first heard his bass parts and compositions on record they were so vivid and alive that, as you put it, you could almost see the notes.
As someone who had a truly transcendent concert experience with Patti Smith not 4 days ago, and has in fact taken away lifelong memories of transcendence and connectedness each of the four times I've seen her, I completely agree with this take and I'd add that the cool thing about live music is that good live performers have a very long shelf life and in many cases just keep getting better. Even once people stop caring about an artist's new albums, artists who had a fair amount of initial success (or had delayed success) can keep making money playing the hits and selling merch for potentially decades, and can keep actually growing their skill at performing that whole time. It's a great way for an artist whose new work isn't finding commercial success to keep earning some income and reaching new fans with their art.
That said, it's got to be acknowledged that touring is brutal. It's hard on relationships, hard on families, hard on the body. If you have kids or want to have kids, boy, being a touring musician fcking sucks. I am hoping and praying for my own sake that Rosalia is going to announce a Lux tour real soon now...but she doesn't sound that excited about the prospect, and I can't say I blame her.
I saw Patti Smith 4 or 5 years ago. I hadn't seen her since her since her "Wave" tour. I loved the "Wave" concert, but the recent concert was even better. Her voice has aged beautifully.
As a prior small time producer at a micro venue hosting local and DIY music acts, this article really resonates. And the scale does make a difference; artists performing to a 50 seat audience note the amazing dynamic between themselves and attendees. These dives are never a money maker, but are the heart of neighborhood culture at its best.
Amen! Learning to make music is the only way to our community future health.
Find the documentary If You Knew Sousa, all about the big John Phillip. Amongst so many things, he refused to believe in recorded music, as his band broke all records touring country by train. And thus every small town in America now had a band of their own.
I remember the old movie the about Souza starring Clifton Webb. Wonderful. Although I think that it is hard to find now.
I am also reminded of Captain Aubrey and Dr. Maturin in the Patrick O'Brian novels. Their evening entertainment on board ship was to play the latest compositions for violin and cello. The quality of playing, "sawing away" as Aubrey called it, was not important as the enjoyment of just making music.
This is the kind of thing i think people should be considering. Hell i remember when groups of people would sing together for no other reason than there was a group of people and what should we do. Phones and a too easy but dull life killed all that.
But i dont think people can do anything anymore unless money is involved
Yes, I think you're right about the need for a transaction for something to be considered valuable.
I have a friend who is Estonian and he told me that the country still refers to their version of the fall of the Berlin Wall as The Singing Revolution. Making music is not just fun, it has power.
I’ve made my living working in bars, concerts, festivals and more and more as I get older, at cultural institutions like libraries for close to 50 years. I’ll be 69 next week. Probably average 10 or so gigs a month. Used to do over 20 a month until I hit 65 and said “enough!” But I still love it and have no intention of hanging it up. Played a fundraiser at the Symphony Hall last night, playing Fats Waller, Louis Jordan, etc. What a ball. Back in the 90s I played a concert in Pittsburgh backing up Big Jay McNeely! What a great gig! He was very nice. Hanging out after soundcheck/rehearsal, Jay told me “RJ, these records we make ain’t nothing but calling cards for getting gigs” and so it is! Truer words have never been spoken.
I love this piece and can't stop thinking of the many examples in my life when I was transported by the stories the musicians were telling from stage; most recently when I was transfixed by Larnell Lewis (and the amazing steelpan virtuoso Joy Lapp) at Berklee. It was as if everyone in the house was connected by a mutual feeling of joy, astonishment and head-shaking appreciation of what the virtuosos on stage were serving up that night. What a rush to enjoy music that way.
...And that feeling becomes deep-seated memories that last a lifetime. In 2018, as my elderly father-in-law was convalescing from illness, he shared a story about being blown away by a trombonist in the Fifties who closed out a big-band set in NYC by performing "When The Saints Come Marching In" while standing on the piano. Everyone in the house was shouting, clapping, stomping, then followed the trombonist as he led a march right out the doors of the club and onto the streets.
I did a quick search and found the guy: Conrad Janis, who later became a recognizable character actor in film and TV (he played Mindy's dad on "Mork and Mindy").
Just for kicks I reached out to Conrad and shared the story. His wife got back to me immediately to say how happy Conrad was to hear that my father-in-law remembers him more than 60 years later, and that he was still jamming every week at age 90 with the Beverly Hills Unlisted Jazz Band. Can you imagine how thrilled Dad was when that fleeting connection was re-established after all those years?
This is the power of live music.
Ted, thank you always for reminding us of the human connections that make life worth living.
One big thing.....you can't "pirate" a live performance. Oh, you might sneak a video or audio, but it's a laughable comparison. You had to be there. Great for musicians. When I was a kid, we could take our horns a go place to place in the Village and learn from masters. That might be coming back!
I worked at a record store that sold "import" albums - live bootlegs really. The long-form matters. Not the same, but definitely more interesting that studio records a lot of the time, and so much better than ten second video
The company Live Nation is here in Japan rebuilding infrastructure and stadiums to streamline concerts for western acts so they can simply show up do their thing and move on to the next venue. They’ve begun doing it here and across Asia.
Of course only big names acts get to participate in this money scamming venture.
I grew up in the 80s with the DIY punk rock ethos. In the end, everything gets commodified and nobody seems to give a shit.
They are no longer artists after getting swallowed up by the system.
A family friend of mine swears that they saw a young Reginald Dwight play regularly at one of our local pubs. It's probably true - they are of a similar vintage and Reg is a local hero where I am from.
(For those who don't know, that young pub pianist Reg grew up to be Sir Elton John).
I stream at home and still play Cds {FYI I am about to spend $500 to replace my Bluray CD player that is skipping/dropping out] so I am commited to all ways to get music. You are 100% right nothing beats the live experience. Ticketmaster seems to be taking advantage of us and final prices have gone through the roof. What I have been doing lately is going to music performanes at house concerts [performances in private setings-often large basements etc where suggested contribution is $40. or less] . I am going to Jazz concert at Annapolis church this eve] and I go to other churches, halls; private not for profit spaces etc with concerts . No you wont see Taylor or Mick etc but there are so many great artists that are under the radar and we need to search them out.
I think we’re all too quick to lay the blame on Ticketmaster. Those big artists you name.. they get 99% of all the profit from tickets. Those artists are in complete control of whether dynamic pricing is used or not. They hide behind Ticketmaster as no fan wants to think the artist they love is taking advantage. But the flip side is they have to because most people - not you as you claim to still buy albums! 👏👏 - will only stream music. Leaving artists only tour revenues.
JACO was my first bass teacher at the U of Miami in th fall 1974. later on I played with Othello who was the steel drum player on all Jaco's records and Jaco use to come in and hang out and sit in on our gigs in Ft Lauderdale , this was just as he was becomig famous , joining Weather Report etc. He was an incredible musician and a force of nature . I was incredibly blessed to have known him and to have spent time in his presence.
The internet scales content.
Live moments scale humanity. 😎
As a live musician I totally agree with you, however it’s tough out there for venues with rising rents and audiences not showing up like they used to. Lots of spots I played at in the last few years have closed and many that are open are barely hanging on. Not sure what the solution is
As a fellow musician, AMEN! Bars were THE place for people to see live music and the up and coming generation is not drinking. While that is great for health, it leaves a void for live music because of, well, money. The legacy acts and mega-stars are able to pull it off, but everyone else is really struggling. About 80% of the places around me where I played are either closed or not doing live music. People forget the ecosystem that existed for all those epic bands of says past is drying up. I believe that playing music is a trade like all other trades. It takes time, dedication, and experience to excel...and the ability to make money doing it. If you cannot feed yourself by doing something, people will look for something else that does. By the way, I have been a music teacher and working musician for 39 years, so I have been around a bit.
ditto... i did a gig last night in an old style bar playing country music mostly...the audience is all over 60, perhaps partly due the music we are playing, but here on vancouver island, live music places and opportunities for local musicians is drying up! the places that are running are usually struggling... i've been playing for 50 years and 70..
Totally get it. I'm a Musician/performer/engineer/Artist with the "Creative Sickness" as I've called it for a long time. It informed everything I have ever done for well over 60 years.
I constantly "tell Stories" & make comments here & there & often refer to the Ancient Days ,when there were Thousands of gigs. EVERYWHERE.
I typically think of My "Night the music died" as a specific gig & all the social changes transpiring around clubs at the time. It is much farther back than I realized. This is not a current happening.
I could easily ramble on after seeing that Picture as it related one of my gigs to that picture. Too long to tell here but ... Oh Ya !
i spoke with my musician friend in toronto 2 days ago.. apparently he is keeping very busy and the small club scene in toronto is happening with lots of young blood! maybe it is better in the large urban centers.. he says places come and go.. drom taberna is the place he was playing doing a gig 230am to 345am!! so apparently live music on a small scale is still happening in toronto... hard for me to know, as i am isolated on vancouver island!
James, I am saddened over the lack of places to play. I'm in Vancouver, BC, nearly 70, and run into many who miss listening and dancing to the music that has great lyrics integrated into a well-formed melody. Why is it so challenging to bring back the dance halls? Is it mostly about cost?
i used to play and live in vancouver.. i moved to victoria in 86.. left at expo, lol.. lots of vancouver players have moved over here to the island over the last 10-20 years even more so.. the osborne bay pub - closes nov 27th... i am doing one more blues jam on the 20th, and i played with a 7 piece band there on this past sunday to a full house, but it will be over soon.. whether anything comes along to replace it... it is not looking good... to your question - i really don't know.. i think it is cultural and i would argue very differently then ted here... while it might be true shows like taylor swift and big name acts are doing fine, the places where these acts got their start are not doing fine and going out of existence... last time i played vancouver was 2018 2019 - blue frog and frankies a few times..
What a tragic sentence, "the places where these acts got their start are not doing fine and going out of existence." Gosh, there were SO many places offering all kinds of genres in the 1970s, when I first moved to Vancouver.
Frankly, the 'big names' adding glitz and glamour, it's a distraction. I went to a concert where it was one musician with their guitar, and the evening was memorial. Hearing the musicians flow into their music, with the love for the music, having a great time well, that is what makes the difference in attending LIVE .
I appreciate your reply, and hey, sorry to hear it's not much different over on the Island.
thanks! i don't know how young folks can make a go of it today... playing music for me was always a signing on to a life of poverty essentially... i must have been a monk in my previous lifetime, so i was used to it! fortunately i have a small pension - we still have them in canada - and own the place we live in.. i appreciate the additional income and i love playing music.. for me, i have always played because i love playing music and interacting with others on this level.. i never did it for the money... but it has worked out ultimately... i always had enough... i hope young musicians today can find places to cultivate their music, and it doesn't have to just be in some limited single or duo context, where they can play in a band and have an opportunity to do that for an extended period of time..
Ever see the B-Sides live at the Commodore? Talk about setting an audience on fire. I believe my sister actually seduced the lead singer after one of their concerts. Another great local band that could get an audience into off-their-head trippin' mode like the photo above was The Shuffle Demons. I saw them here in Toronto mid-80s on a Sunday aft at the Rivoli and I left hoarse from screaming so much.
Thank you all for taking the time to read and like what I wrote. Here is a short video response: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FVSxnVvRGKw
It's a real problem - I just wrote about that on my page. Venues need support as a lifeline to musicians, as this is a way that we do not have to compete with AI acts/artists. We have an area where talent and the ability to play live matter - we need to grow this area to combat the focus on AI and the way it's being engineered (or used) to phase out musicians from the 'business' of making music.
There is an interesting connection between the musician and a live audience. They really need each other.
One of my favorite stories:
Several years ago my late wife and I were attending a fundraiser for a local politico. He had a band playing boomer classics, nobody was paying attention and you could tell the band was just going through the motions. I took my wife out on the dance floor and we started to dance to a Sam Cooke number they were playing, slow and swaying. I swear the more we danced second by second the better the band played. We are a social species, dance and music are part of our evolutionary history.
Jack
August 1987. A hot summers day in NYC. After a long day, we stayed up till 3 am to go to Barry Harris Jazz Workshop on 8th Avenue. Down from the garden. Old, dingy club, no bar. Old wooden tables. I'm still in college checking out the jazz scene with an older friend who played sax and just left the army.
He goes over to speak with some guy. Didn't really pay attention until he came back and asked me if I knew who he was speaking with. I said "no" He says: That Jaco Pastorius. My ears perked up but only a little bit. I had a couple of Weather Report Cassettes but that wasn't my music back then.
This langy white guy gets on the stand. Everybody is just fiddling around with their instruments. Jaco turns to the piano player and asks < can you play America. Japanese guy waves him off like get out of here. Stop messing around. Then he yells back to the piano player in a sarcastic tone and says, "Well do you know how to play Satin Doll?" in a very sarcastic tone like do you know how to play Mary Had a Little Lamb
He counts it off and the jam session begins. Jaco is playing upright bass. Rhythm section and a trumpet player and a sax player. I'm thinking just another bass player with a name. I'd been in class with Ron Carter for a semester.
They started to play and all of a sudden I heard a bass player like I never heard a bass player. All the other players disappeared, and I was totally entranced by Jaco's playing and mannerisms. He was an eclectic dude. Made strange faces when he played, but it was if every note floated off that bass into the air and the bass player was the star of the band. A bass player is usually the solo that puts everyone to sleep. The notes floated into the air and it was almost as if I could see each note as well as feel it.
An upright bass player never did that to me. I was transported to another world. Suffice to say, I became a Jaco fan on the spot. WTF did I just witness? Some lanky, eccentric dude first messing around playing America and then owning Satin Doll like it had been written in the future.
One week later, I was in Greenwich Village subway station, near the basketball courts, next to the Blue Note. And I see this shirtless, barefoot guy at the end of the station playing with a Ukulele. I walk closer to get a better look and I'm like damn, "that's the worlds greatest bass player hanging in the subway without a shirt or shoes" So I go up to him, introduce myself, tell him I heard him last week at the session and that he had promised to help my friend get a gig. He's like oh yeah. "Do you have 5 bucks so I can get some breakfast?"
I'm like "alright man, but I don't think this is for breakfast" Imagine the bass player that changed the instrument forever, penniless and barefoot in the subways asking for 5 bucks?
Guy was a genius. Put me in an altered state in a New York Minute. Those were the kind of encounters one could have in New York City when there was a live jazz scene and the masters were still alive. LIve music wasn't just about the music. It was also about the hang.
That's quite a story. Thanks for sharing it.
I suppose that this story supports Frank Zappa's wisecrack that 'Jazz is the music of poverty'.
Jaco was before my time, so I couldn't experience him live. But when I first heard his bass parts and compositions on record they were so vivid and alive that, as you put it, you could almost see the notes.
As someone who had a truly transcendent concert experience with Patti Smith not 4 days ago, and has in fact taken away lifelong memories of transcendence and connectedness each of the four times I've seen her, I completely agree with this take and I'd add that the cool thing about live music is that good live performers have a very long shelf life and in many cases just keep getting better. Even once people stop caring about an artist's new albums, artists who had a fair amount of initial success (or had delayed success) can keep making money playing the hits and selling merch for potentially decades, and can keep actually growing their skill at performing that whole time. It's a great way for an artist whose new work isn't finding commercial success to keep earning some income and reaching new fans with their art.
That said, it's got to be acknowledged that touring is brutal. It's hard on relationships, hard on families, hard on the body. If you have kids or want to have kids, boy, being a touring musician fcking sucks. I am hoping and praying for my own sake that Rosalia is going to announce a Lux tour real soon now...but she doesn't sound that excited about the prospect, and I can't say I blame her.
I saw Patti Smith 4 or 5 years ago. I hadn't seen her since her since her "Wave" tour. I loved the "Wave" concert, but the recent concert was even better. Her voice has aged beautifully.
As a prior small time producer at a micro venue hosting local and DIY music acts, this article really resonates. And the scale does make a difference; artists performing to a 50 seat audience note the amazing dynamic between themselves and attendees. These dives are never a money maker, but are the heart of neighborhood culture at its best.
How about making music?
The old days of sheet music, parlor guitars and pianos.
That is ultimate in live music; you make it yourself!
Amen! Learning to make music is the only way to our community future health.
Find the documentary If You Knew Sousa, all about the big John Phillip. Amongst so many things, he refused to believe in recorded music, as his band broke all records touring country by train. And thus every small town in America now had a band of their own.
I remember the old movie the about Souza starring Clifton Webb. Wonderful. Although I think that it is hard to find now.
I am also reminded of Captain Aubrey and Dr. Maturin in the Patrick O'Brian novels. Their evening entertainment on board ship was to play the latest compositions for violin and cello. The quality of playing, "sawing away" as Aubrey called it, was not important as the enjoyment of just making music.
This is the kind of thing i think people should be considering. Hell i remember when groups of people would sing together for no other reason than there was a group of people and what should we do. Phones and a too easy but dull life killed all that.
But i dont think people can do anything anymore unless money is involved
Yes, I think you're right about the need for a transaction for something to be considered valuable.
I have a friend who is Estonian and he told me that the country still refers to their version of the fall of the Berlin Wall as The Singing Revolution. Making music is not just fun, it has power.
I’ve made my living working in bars, concerts, festivals and more and more as I get older, at cultural institutions like libraries for close to 50 years. I’ll be 69 next week. Probably average 10 or so gigs a month. Used to do over 20 a month until I hit 65 and said “enough!” But I still love it and have no intention of hanging it up. Played a fundraiser at the Symphony Hall last night, playing Fats Waller, Louis Jordan, etc. What a ball. Back in the 90s I played a concert in Pittsburgh backing up Big Jay McNeely! What a great gig! He was very nice. Hanging out after soundcheck/rehearsal, Jay told me “RJ, these records we make ain’t nothing but calling cards for getting gigs” and so it is! Truer words have never been spoken.
RJ Spangler in Detroit
I love this piece and can't stop thinking of the many examples in my life when I was transported by the stories the musicians were telling from stage; most recently when I was transfixed by Larnell Lewis (and the amazing steelpan virtuoso Joy Lapp) at Berklee. It was as if everyone in the house was connected by a mutual feeling of joy, astonishment and head-shaking appreciation of what the virtuosos on stage were serving up that night. What a rush to enjoy music that way.
...And that feeling becomes deep-seated memories that last a lifetime. In 2018, as my elderly father-in-law was convalescing from illness, he shared a story about being blown away by a trombonist in the Fifties who closed out a big-band set in NYC by performing "When The Saints Come Marching In" while standing on the piano. Everyone in the house was shouting, clapping, stomping, then followed the trombonist as he led a march right out the doors of the club and onto the streets.
I did a quick search and found the guy: Conrad Janis, who later became a recognizable character actor in film and TV (he played Mindy's dad on "Mork and Mindy").
Just for kicks I reached out to Conrad and shared the story. His wife got back to me immediately to say how happy Conrad was to hear that my father-in-law remembers him more than 60 years later, and that he was still jamming every week at age 90 with the Beverly Hills Unlisted Jazz Band. Can you imagine how thrilled Dad was when that fleeting connection was re-established after all those years?
This is the power of live music.
Ted, thank you always for reminding us of the human connections that make life worth living.
One big thing.....you can't "pirate" a live performance. Oh, you might sneak a video or audio, but it's a laughable comparison. You had to be there. Great for musicians. When I was a kid, we could take our horns a go place to place in the Village and learn from masters. That might be coming back!
I worked at a record store that sold "import" albums - live bootlegs really. The long-form matters. Not the same, but definitely more interesting that studio records a lot of the time, and so much better than ten second video
Live music is one of the singular pleasures of life, and a force to be reckoned with.
The company Live Nation is here in Japan rebuilding infrastructure and stadiums to streamline concerts for western acts so they can simply show up do their thing and move on to the next venue. They’ve begun doing it here and across Asia.
Of course only big names acts get to participate in this money scamming venture.
I grew up in the 80s with the DIY punk rock ethos. In the end, everything gets commodified and nobody seems to give a shit.
They are no longer artists after getting swallowed up by the system.
But nothing beats live music in a pub/hotel like when Dr John played in the back room of the Half Moon in Putney, just him and a piano. Brilliant!
A family friend of mine swears that they saw a young Reginald Dwight play regularly at one of our local pubs. It's probably true - they are of a similar vintage and Reg is a local hero where I am from.
(For those who don't know, that young pub pianist Reg grew up to be Sir Elton John).
I stream at home and still play Cds {FYI I am about to spend $500 to replace my Bluray CD player that is skipping/dropping out] so I am commited to all ways to get music. You are 100% right nothing beats the live experience. Ticketmaster seems to be taking advantage of us and final prices have gone through the roof. What I have been doing lately is going to music performanes at house concerts [performances in private setings-often large basements etc where suggested contribution is $40. or less] . I am going to Jazz concert at Annapolis church this eve] and I go to other churches, halls; private not for profit spaces etc with concerts . No you wont see Taylor or Mick etc but there are so many great artists that are under the radar and we need to search them out.
I think we’re all too quick to lay the blame on Ticketmaster. Those big artists you name.. they get 99% of all the profit from tickets. Those artists are in complete control of whether dynamic pricing is used or not. They hide behind Ticketmaster as no fan wants to think the artist they love is taking advantage. But the flip side is they have to because most people - not you as you claim to still buy albums! 👏👏 - will only stream music. Leaving artists only tour revenues.
JACO was my first bass teacher at the U of Miami in th fall 1974. later on I played with Othello who was the steel drum player on all Jaco's records and Jaco use to come in and hang out and sit in on our gigs in Ft Lauderdale , this was just as he was becomig famous , joining Weather Report etc. He was an incredible musician and a force of nature . I was incredibly blessed to have known him and to have spent time in his presence.
I love that picture. I think we’ve used it in an AoM article somewhere