Donny, you're right about "the crutch". I'll start off with a "cheat sheet" for the first time I do a tune. If I throw it away after the first or 2nd time, I'm fine. but, if I don't do a tune frequently, the sheet stays around. Some I have are really yellow. I'm going to clean house this week.

Happy birthday, by the way!

R.

Is the thing that bugs you the most, Donny, seeing the music, or just the 'heads down' attitude?

I've seen PLENTY of non-reading keyboard players do that!

I really like the trend towards big color screens on the arranger itself, where sheet music, cheat sheets or just lyrics can be displayed. The thing is, these are being displayed in an area where the audience EXPECT you to look (at least from time to time) so you don't get quite the same reaction as to a 'bookworm'.

So far (due to my G70's OS) I only use it for the occasional lyric, but if I were doing a jazz gig, or a gig that involved a LOT of requests, having a cheat sheet display would be a life saver, and avoid the flipping through fake books between songs, etc., that seems to bug you.

The on-screen displays seem to offer the best compromise between the necessity of sheet music on some types of gigs (remember, SOME gigs require a vast repertoire of unrehearsed tunes) and the appearance (at least to the audience) that you are not reading from a fake book. Even a MusicPad Pro has to stick up and look like some kind of 'book'...

Certainly, learning your core repertoire as quickly as possible is part of the skills a pro should have, but off the cuff requests, or songs you may not have performed for a few years, what is better? To use the display, or either not do the tune at all, or clam it up badly?

Thanx Russ ...55 came to fast ....most times after all these years I can just listen to a tune and play off the top of my head ....after all how many chords combinations can there be? most are pretty mush the same ....ya

Diki.....the heads down staring at the sheet Constantly alienating yourself from the audience is most annoying to watch....playing music is a Battery between the Musician & the Audience which makes it all click. Intermittent downward glances to make changes are expected but there is a way to keep the crowd involved in the mix.....no matter what kind of gig it is.
Let someone video tape your gig & learn from what you see & hear.

I am lucky in that I don't have to worry about keeping eye-contact with the audience... in fact most of the times is the audience that keeps eye contact with me!

i know my core songs, but i also use chord cards (about the size of a postcard) with just the chord changes and turn-arounds) and some prompt words...the lyrics system on todays keyboards means all of these can be stored onboard and referred to when needed...so in effect i can have a rep of thousands of songs, rather than the 100 or so learnt by memory and then repeated ad finitum (ad nauseum) for every gig....
reading is a skill, and if not practised is lost...those who refuse to practice their reading would be useless in a session situation or when called upon to back for a solo artist, who DO use charts and god help you if you mess-up!!! nothing pleases me more than getting a new chart book and being able to play it from the "get-go" no practice first, no matter what key,...its certainly a skill i will keep practicing...my early accordion days also gave me the ability to not look at the keys when playing, so even when i am playing bass lines and right hand i can maintain eye contact with the room,with the occasional glance to a card for an unknown song....bottom line its okay for someone to read a chart, as long as they are proficient in physical playing skill and keep some sort of contact with the audience...although when you look at a concert pianist they rarely if ever look at their audience whilst playing, but they still entertain...hmmmmm
cheers
dennis

When you talk about an Entertaining Concert Pianist & Reaction with an Audience with the audience No One did better then the MASTER Himself.........
http://www.victorborge.com/

As a singer for years I felt and many I performed with considered having the words in front of you was a no no.

However as the memory has got worse I have had to turn to to the words on paper and have found that my performance has actually improved.

There was always a certain amount of tension
because of the fear of forgetting the words.

It is possible to see the words or the music
as well as keep some eye contact with the audience.

Afterall that is what you do when you sing the classics in a large choir.

We all have different abilities and short comings so our approaches will all be diferent and who is to say what is the right one.

Cousin Ken

I wish I (and my wife) could work without books.

Unfortunately we do 300+ songs that run the gamut from those tricky Jazz songs (I find the chord structure in some of those songs to be intimidating) to lyric intensive Rap/RnB
(anyone tried remembering the ENTIRE rap to Bust-a-move????)

We pretty much know our core songs too, but there are requests for stuff (or "different" gig situations we find ourselves in) that require us to do songs we haven't done for AGES.

Ya know, there is even a school of thought I've encountered where some performers think it's only PROFESSIONAL to have your lyrics etc handy because to forget the words of a beloved song makes your audience pretty unhappy, and does make the performer look silly...

It's worth noting that we use almost entirely SMFs - so the arrangements are set in stone, not arranger styles, where the PERFORMER can dictate the way the song goes (if they, say, forget a verse) so it really is a "discipline" to play with a sequence in that regard.

In short, we have our books within "eyeshot" and keep them unobtrusive to the audience.

We get the words right.
We get the arrangements right.
We do, honestly, a STAGGERING range of material.

All thanks to the books.

good post hellboy...