ambient

What were your parent’s thoughts on this, when you were in your teens? My thoughts no, definitely not. I love jazz, and experimental music, both of these are in my opinion very healthy. I think one of the reasons why it’s so healthy is partly down to technology, people can record professional quality albums in their spare rooms, then they have sites like Bandcamp to distribute it through. Some artists I know are producing amazing and beautifully packaged music.

I didn’t realise people still used hardware drum machines.

There’s a pool of songs, same as with jazz bands. Sex on fire, Valerie etc.

Exactly, they’ve just transposed it up.

Listen to Anthony Jackson, he uses low notes on the B string a lot. Listen to him with Hiromi, Steve Khan or Michel Camilo. I transcribed a lot of his lines a few years ago. This is with Michel Camilo, from the album ‘we three’, here he’s playing a low C.

Anything. Don’t treat it like that. Play low E at the 5 fret, F at the 6th etc. Play across the fretboard, rather than along.

Have you seen the documentary about them? I watched it a few years ago, they mentioned how many top line session guitarists they went through for I think, just one guitar solo on one song.

I love well arranged and well produced albums. I’ve always been fascinated by the technical side of music too. Steely Dan always seem over produced to me though.

Yeah, I used them last year, I think it was you told me about them.

Very good points. That’s something I discovered last year. I was selling a bass, there was a guy in France who wanted to buy it. I did investigate insuring it separately, that was quite expensive though.

Watch out for the exchange rate, especially if you have the option of paying using PayPal. The pound is pretty week at the moment, almost parity with the Euro. I ordered a new field recorder from Thomann on Sunday. It was B-stock, and quite a bargain, the advertised price was £70 less than the new price. I initially went to pay with PayPal, with their exchange rate though, it was over £20 more than the price on Thomann’s site, so I paid direct through Thomann and was charged the advertised price.

I might be overdramatising the risks, but a quick google search shows the potential for fraud. Whoever you use, just make sure the item is fully insured and tracked, and make sure that instruments are covered. Often buried away in the small print you’ll find instruments are excluded, or only covered up to a certain amount. I just had something arrive 5 minutes ago that I ordered from Thomann. I ordered it Sunday evening. It was shipped with UPS.

There’s quite a well used scam where a buyer uses their own courier, I believe in the scam the courier is fake. It’s similar to where someone pays using PayPal, then collects it, or has someone else collect it, usually using the excuse that they’re themselves too ill. It’s fraught with potential problems, for instance you’re supposed to ship to the registered PayPal address, if he’s booked it, how do you know where it’s gone? What if it gets damaged en-route? In most cases eBay side with the buyer. It’s just not something I would ever do.

Does that give you any protection at all, if anything went wrong? Where’s your proof that it’s been sent? There’s no way I would do that.

I was there a month or ago, they had an excellent selection of used instruments in. I think a lot of their used stock are instruments being sold for customers.

If you’re given a lead sheet or chord chart and see Gm/C7/FM for example, that’s a pretty common jazz chord sequence. The notes G, C and F are the root notes for each of the chords. You'd usually build a bass line starting on each of those notes. You'd add other notes from the chord, or even from the scale. The sequence I used as my example is a what’s called a II/V/I in F major. So Gm your root is G, then you’ve got Bb which is the minor 3rd, D which is the 5th, then F which is the minor 7th. For C7 you’ve got C which is the root, then E which is the 3rd, G which is the 5th, and Bb which is the dominant 7th (C7 is shorthand for dominant 7). On the F chord you’d play F as the root, A as the 3rd, C as the 5th and E as the major 7. Sorry if you already know that. You can download different volumes of the real book from various places, they have hundreds of tunes in them. Most bands have also released songbooks that have the chords. There’s also various websites that have chords for pretty much anything. They’re not always accurate, but can be good as a starting point. For example, just type in the words Valerie chords, you’ll come across hundreds of sites.

Chord charts. Chord tones or notes are mostly what the notes in the bass line are created from.

What sort of charts, standard notation? Dep gigs I’ve done tend to be either here’s the set, we do it in these keys. Others have been written out gigs, where you have to sight read. These sometimes have a few songs segued together, so you need to follow the chart to know what’s going on. I’ve never had a rehearsal with any dep gig, it’s quite a big responsibility. For me it’s not about stage presence, it’s turning up prepared to play the songs, that’s the job. I don’t think you did too bad considering it was your first attempt. It sounds like you learned at lot from it too,

It’s actually quite a widespread and very much misunderstood problem for musicians. Isn’t it why Kate Bush stopped performing? I spent three years studying at one of the London music colleges. I have anxiety problems anyway, mostly due to my ASD. I’d been playing professionally for a few years beforehand, and never really had a problem with performance anxiety. I had a major problem with it at uni though. We used to have live performance workshops each week. I would get so nervous though, I’d literally be trembling with nerves. It was the same in exams. Of the four or five tutors I had, only two understand and helped, the others were; to put it frankly, hopeless. As people have already said, meditation, and being fully prepared can help. The Alexander technique is good too. Alcohol doesn’t in my experience work. I don’t drink, but I’ve encountered people who do, and I’ve seen people using it to suppress their nerves, it actually makes it worse, and definitely has an adverse effect on the performance. I think it can become that you drink to relieve nerves, it makes you mess up, so you get nervous, so drink more......etc.

Have you tried hypnotherapy? Both my aunt and my brother have used it successfully, one for fear of heights, the other flying. I suffer terribly from anxiety problems, I use propranolol, it can help for performance anxiety too, lots of classical musicians and opera singers use it. You’d need it prescribed.

Not playing particularly no, my gigs over the last three years have mostly been solo gigs too. The only one I was very nervous about was one I did with Steve Lawson. I find meditation beforehand really helps. The thing I’ve always disliked is the period before and after the gig, having to interact with people. Especially if you’ve just played solo, people assume you’re this super-confident person, and I’m not. If you get nervous playing, just make sure you’re well prepared. It’s only music at the end of the day. If you get so nervous that you don’t enjoy it, then why are you doing it?

Have you seen this guy? I bought one of his albums last year.

Have you seen the orchestra of the enlightenment? I’d never heard of a theorbo until I saw them. I believe the neck is hinged.

There’s often little room for anyone. I occasionally play with a trombone player, we're usually squashed into a corner. Oddly though they tend to make room for us once we start playing, nothing quite like a trombone slide moving in and out, just a few centimetres away from your head to make you reconsider sitting in such close proximity to the band.