Bilbo

[quote name='pete.young' timestamp='1408450958' post='2530238'] At least you didn't call me. Things weren't even close to desperate :-) [/quote] Double bass gig, Pete. I didn't think you played double bass?

Maybe it's just that, whereas we old folks used to wait for the latest stuff to appear, people now jump around the history of music to find interesting things. Like authors, we find one we like and then read all of their stuff; sometimes its a current book, sometimes a classic. I think young people do know the old stuff but also listen to the new. The field is so much alrger than it was in my day, although you wouldn't know it if you visted a high street record store. I guess this is why we saw the demise of such stores. The market is now SO diversified, the locals cannot possibly stock a sufficiently wide selection AND generate a profit. Interesting that we now see more second had record stores than new ones (the music industry equivalent of charity shops!!).

[quote name='bassace' timestamp='1408466788' post='2530497'] 73 I saw myself on YouTube from a gig two weeks ago. Time to stop. I can still play, lift the cab, but.............time to stop. [/quote] We need the link!! We need the link!!

21 years ago!! That's amazing. A bit like Neil Peart being the new guy in Rush.

They said I was too old. Bastards.

I used to sing at school and won the local Eisteddfod year after year )(6 – 9 years old) until the inevitable happened (kerchuck). I remember seeing two films (actual reel to reel movies) in my first music lesson at the Comprehensive school; it was Peter and The Wolf and Ravel’s Bolero – both as a sort of guide to the orchestra. I ran home and told Mum and, lo and behold, she had the Ravel piece on a record!! I wore it out. I knew I wanted to play but my parents would not have had the money for lessons or an instrument. I asked in school if I could use one of theirs and they said no. Hated them ever since but, at around 12, I visited dome older cousins and one of them gave me a guitar. To say it was a piece of crap is an understatement but, if I tell you it had 2 nylon strings and 4 steel ones, you will get the idea. I cocked about with that until I left school and, on the day I started work (1980) I ordered a Hondo II Precision copy (black) and a Carlsboro Cobra combo. I am ready to roll!!. I learned at home and, the following December, I got an audition into a local NWOBHM band called No Quarter. Local heroes so you can imagine, I was sh***ing myself. I did the audition with my Hondo and Carlsboro and got the gig on the proviso that I got a bigger amp. Enter Sound City amp and custom 2x 18 cab I bought off the band’s ex-bass player followed by Frunt transistor amp (remember the – I bought it because Percy Jones endorsed them and I was already looking over the fence at fusion). We were in the studio within weeks and did a Friday Rock Show session early in 1982 (I think) before recording a track for the Heavy Metal Heroes Vol 1 LP. It’s been downhill ever since Then came an Aria SB700 before, in 1986, still in my Percy Jones pohase, I got my Wal Custom Fretless (£740). I have since had a Washburn Status headless (Jon Caulfield still has it, I think), a Status Energy 6 and 4 but they have all gone and it’s only the Wal now. Left No Quarter after 2 years because I wanted to play fusion and prog. Got into a band that rehearsed but never gigged and set up my own band that rehearsed and never gigged before joining Silent Partner in Chepstow with Grant Nicholas of Feeder fame and producer Brian Sperber). Did a couple of gigs and recordings but that petered out and, by this time, I was at last playing Jazz in Cardiff (getting on for 30 by now). Forward most of two decades and I start playing the double bass and running my own Jazz events. I wish I had done it years ago.

Got another session in last night and got what I have done into Cubase and added nylon guitar and fretless bass. Now I need to think about my VSTs. The ones I used yesterday had a slow attack on the strings and sounded out of synch as a result. Need to find another sound to approximate an accordian!! The one on Sibelius sounds perfect but I cannot use it 'off piste'!! This part is always frustrating because you can spend hours on just searching for a sound and make no real progress on the project.

Yeah! The other guys are REALLY good!!

I guess its about your approach. Trying to do the rock 'n' roll rebel thing when you are 'getting on' in years can look a bit silly but, if you approach the issue with humility, why worry? As a 51 year old jazzer, I recently did a gig with the 75 year old Peter King and he totally kicked our arses into next week! Lots of jazzers keep going until health or heart attacks prevent them continuing. As long as you have the chops and don't look a bit sad, there is no reason to stop. As for what young kids think, I really don't give a rat's arse. There is nothing more uncool than a teenager who thinks s/he's cool.

Of course todays kids will reminisce about the stuff they listen to today. Most of what is popular at any point is filtered through time and what remains is a 'best of' selection. I often think, when I look back to charts of yesteryear, 'what was that, I don't know that band, who is he' and so on. Over time, the various artists are honed down to a select few and we 'forget' the dross (unless there is something specific it references for us. My first single was Billy Don't Be A Hero by Paper Lace. I later tried to swap it for Good Grief Christina by Chicory Tip. Both significant records for me, both utter sh*te to everyone else! Popular culture HAS to change, that is what it is for!!

I am not a teacher but I hear some use language as a means of focussing the mind of the student. For example: 2 beats is Apple, 3 is Banana, 4 pomegranate and so on. COuld this be varied to meet his needs?

[quote name='Dad3353' timestamp='1408359034' post='2529264'] On se lèche des babines... [size=4] [/size] [/quote] What's the worst thing that can happen?

I made some progress over the weekend so should get something in this month. Not sure how 'finished' it will be. though. It all depends on how much time I can put in on it. What I have so far is a Sibelius chart that sounds great as a substantive skeleton track (bass, accordian, flute, piccolo, flugelhorn and strings). It needs to be converted into a MIDI file, uploaded onto Cubase and populated with VSTs before I add more 'real' instruments (nylon guitar and electric guitar at least) and some vocals. It could be done, though. We'll see.

Despite having met several people from the BC community in real life, I am pretty sure I have never seen any of them play!! I think I have jsut got to the point where I play gigs but never really go and seem any!! I did se Jasper Holby once and he is on here but never posts (he PM'd me after I posted a transcription of Abraham's New Gift)

I spent the weekend trying to find a dep for a Jazz gig (double bass) I cannot do at relatively short notice (family issue). I had to ring 9 guys before I found one who could do it. THen it dawned on me. I am everyone's 9th call guy and they were all busy because they had been called before me and I had been the 9th guy called for the gig I had!! Bugger!

Been solely a fretless player since about 1986 (some fretted work but minimal). Now I don't own a fretted bass. Ironically, however, I have recently been thinking 'shall I'? I even wanted to try playing with a pick again, having not done so for decades. I find myself mildly irritated by my own slight out of tuneness which probably comes of not enough practice aggravated by the lowest current gig rate for months (2 eac in July and August) !! I think I am just having a Steve Swallow love-in and nothing will come of it.

This summer has been my worst, gig-wise, in decades. Ever since I can remember, summer has been defined by two or three gigs, even four, every weekend throughout July and August, weddings, garden parties etc all good payers. This year; next to nothing. One Jazz gig in July (with Phronesis pianist Ivo Neame so I am not complaining) - that was it. One gig in a whole month! Nothing else. August sees me getting one duo gig I have done once a month for about three years and two one-off Jazz gigs over the August bank holiday weekend. 13 gigs in July and August 2013. 3 in the same months in 2014. Everyone is speculating that, becasue there is no money around, the weddings/parties etc are less ostentatious and live bands were the first to go. Any views? What's it been like at your end?

I think you are over complicating it. Start with the principle that you want to get the best signal at all points in the process. Set your amp eq flat and your preamp eq flat and start there. Mess about with the preamp first and then, if you want more control, tweak the amp. The idea is to get a decent pickup sound THEN a decent pre-amp sound and THEN a decent amp sound in that order. Otherwise you are working on the basis of amplufying a crap pick up sound snd a crap pre-amp sound before trying to get the amp to work it's magic. It's illogical. Start the other way around.

[quote name='eightbitraptor' timestamp='1408011767' post='2526197'] omfg that's beautiful! [/quote] Actually, I think it's Fugly but beauty is in the eye of the beholder

I am not so aure (although I am not discagreeing per se). When I taught (late 1980s/early 90s), it seemed that everyone could play Teen Town or some BIlle Sheehan/Stu Hamm/Flea stuff and so thought they had it all nailed. When you introduced them to the concept of 'music' that wasn't based on acrobatics, they got the 'ump (I didn't actually use those words). I think tere was an element of the 'wow' factor around then, certainly. It may have waiend now but I still hear young kids talking Wooten and the other whizz bang circus freaks.

In general terms, then, would it be fair to say that teaching, like gigging, is defined by the vaguaries of the 'freelance' world and sometimes you are busy and sometimes less so? As someone who has been in full-time employment for the last 27 years, that scares the s*** out of me but I guess it is no different to any area of self-employment.

I used to covet a Flamboyant six string headless I saw once. I have always loved the shape of the body these basses but never liked the headstocks so the headless was perfect for me. Never going to have the money for one, though, so game over. I am happy with my Wal and rarely play electric on gigs now (given the choice, everyone prefers the double bass in Jazz and I mostly play Jazz so that's that).

I have not taught for a long time (decades) and am not intending to start any time soon but I wanted to expore a few of the issues I have had previoulsy that put me off the idea. When one thinks about children and piano lessons, there is always this image in my mihnd of kids going once a week for years, even decades if they really take it seriously. I found, when I taught, that my students ca,e in three camps; the 'one off' who I saw once and never saw again, the 'occasional' who wanted the odd lesson but never really committed, and the 'eager beavers' who kept coming and soaking up whatever I threw at them. The percentages were about 40/40/20. I am, thereofre, curious to know what number of regular students people have. I am poretty confident that, if I started teaching bass in a town like Felixstowe, I would be lucky to find three in total and the idea of a teaching 'career' is pure fantasy. So, how many students have you got, how often do they come and how long do you hold them for?

I always thought Rod had a great voice but was plagued with crap material and crap arrangements. I don't own a single recording of his and can't see that changing anytime soon.

'I've heard of the drummer coming in late but he's still unloading the van, FFS'!!