SteelyDan

Okay folks, please be patient with me as I am dealing with a great degree of frustration and just need to vent.

Like most of you, I've been a lifelong jazz fan, played in big band and combo settings in school, and even though I wouldn't come close to describing myself as anything close to a "pro" I've had a lot of fun in the process.

Now, as a part time comeback player the group's I can participate in are a little limited. As a result, I was overjoyed when asked to play in rock band that is part Dave Mathews/ part Jet. 1st rehearsal went great; the frontman/bandleader is a music ed major and seemed to understand my limitations as well as my strengths. Ffwd to this weekend's gig: I show up to the sound check as planned and find out we're not doing any of the material we'd previously practiced! Frontman changed his mind at the last minute because he had a sudden rush of inspiration and "wrote" new songs for the performance.

So, I'm thinking that it's bad, but not disastrous; at least we have charts. Lo and behold when he hands me the "music" it's nothing more than words with some chord changes. No time signature, no directions on repeats, rests, no nothing! Then, after the gig, he pulls me aside and tells me he's disappointed whith my playing that evening. Even goes so far as to try to give me advice on how to play trumpet! For goodness sake's he was showing me fingerings for guitar and explaining how understanding the use of a capo would help me "visualize" the music.

Has anyone else had to deal with the closed minded garage band mentality before? Have you had any success getting them to understand that high brass is physically different from strings? Short of dropping out I have no idea how to approach/resolve the situation.

Thanks for letting me rant,
Steely

gzent

Wow, that was rather bizarre.

Luckily, I've been blessed with a pretty good ear so I can pick up pop/rock tunes within a chorus or so.

Hmmm, I guess if you aren't comfortable playing from chord sheets, then I'd move on, learn quickly, or get good at hand-writing tunes between sets.

Good luck,

Greg

SteelyDan

gzent,
It was definitely uncomfortable. Like I said, I'm a comeback player with a limited amount to practice. I thought I'd done a good job of explaining to him that it's going to take me a while before I can consistently play by ear and improvise on charts I'm unfamiliar with. I guess he either didn't understand what I meant or assumes it'll be easy for me when he hands us last minute program changes. As it turns out, I'm not the only band member that's upset by his artistic liberty and I'm beginning to see why there's so much turnover with personnel. And he wonders why there's never any consistency to the group as a whole.

I'm ranting again, sorry. In the meantime thanks for your input.

Steely

gzent

High turnover is a red flag. But, its nice to make cash playing the trumpet.