(Ask any recently divorced man!) 😂

I honestly think that it is MORE important than most that arranger players listen to sophisticated music, and good tight real players as much as they can.

Most of us play singles, either gigging or at home. As such, we get no feedback from bandmates on the stand as to whether we are up to snuff or not. The drummer never glares at us for dragging, or swamping him, the guitarist never gives us a sideways look when we play a horrible solo, the horns don’t raise their eyebrows when we get the chords wrong..!

The only way to push yourself as a solo performer is to raise the bar on what you listen to, to never become complacent about your playing, to never settle for ‘good enough’. Good enough isn’t ’great’!

And especially when playing imitatively, the better the musicians you listen to like horn players, guitars etc., the more you are going to push yourself to approach their level of playing, and to learn the idiosyncrasies of their instrument and style.

You can get a lot of useful feedback from your bandmates, but an arranger just sits there silent, never criticizing, never praising, never pushing you. You only get that listening to the real thing.

These guys are the real thing… 🎹😎