.. also at the convention they had a "dueling pianos" act ... these two guys could play just about anything... At one point, one of them started playing "Sweet Caroline" and about half way through says "I'll quit playing this for a buck" ...someone pays, and then it was "I'll play it again for 5 bucks"... sure enough someone paid and then it was "I'll stop for 20..." well you can see where this was going, and it went until some guy actually put 50 bucks down to stop!!! ... they pulled this routine a couple of times during the night... Obviously, this type of gimmick probably won't work at your usual gigs, but in the right spot with the right (drunk) crowd, it can certainly bring in some extra cash .....
t.

My son told me about a dueling piano bar in Tulsa. There were Okla State U fans, Tulsa U. fans there and Oklahoma U. fans there also. One guy would start playing, say, Boomer Sooner, OU's fight song. Some OSU fan would give him $5. to stop, then the other guy would start and he would get paid to stop, then somebody would pay to hear OSU's fight song, and then somebody else would pay to stop it,---you get the picture. My son said there were several hundred dollars in each jar.
I got a request the other night, but I couldn't do it because the mic wouldn't fit!
DonM

....
I often say I'll try to honor any request other than "shoot the piano player" ....
g'night....
t.

I played that routine a few years back and HATED it. We had 4 players (2 pairs) that rotated nonstop....playing the same stuff OVER and OVER and OVER. It was begging at it's very LOWEST, and I am so glad it's over. The 4 oof us used to bring in about $600 in tips each night, and we got a pretty fair salary as well.....still wasn't worth all the agg.
Too many drunks.
Never got to finish a song.
WAY too loud and unruly.
Hated it. Just hated it.
We were forced to conform to a routine that was started at a place (in Maryland ,I think)called "Little Ditties" and I remember doing piano man and singing the line:
"sit at the bar and put bread in my jar ...... put BREAD in my jar .....(repeat) so many times till people were shamed into stuffing the jat just to shut us up. I felt like such a street urchin. Like we were cheating them all.
Disney does a cleaned up version on their cruise line, and people seem to enjoy it, but as a player who loves to sing - it's a nightmare. Childish, unruly and rude.
(all stuff that goes over great in bars)
Popular songs were:
Paradise by the Dashboard lights
Sweet Caroline
Brown Eyed Girl
Joy to the world

..... anything with a hook that people could sing to. We once got the bidding for Sweet Caroline up to $75. 5 to start - 6 to stop - 10 to start up again...15 to stop..... on and on and on........ What a mess.

I'm so glad that's over. It was the answer to the K bars at the time. It let everyone sing and get nuts.....but it made me crazy. Too little art and too much energy...combined with LOTS of booze. That spells my worst fears. I don't miss it a bit.