A few days ago in another thread Gary mentioned that when he was working full time he would learn a new tune every week and now he still trys to learn a new tune once a month. My first thought was, what does he mean by learning a new tune? Is this full memory or just setting a tune up and being able to use a cheat sheet? In amy case a new tune once a week only ads up to 52 tunes a year. Maybe enough to get through a 4 hour gig. In the meantime, what do you do in order to have a full book of tunes to play out with?

I notice that most of you use some form of a registration file and this obviously helps once you've found a style thats suitable but doesn't help with the lyrics or chords. I'm also curious as to how long does it take for you to nail down the style, voices, and tempo for a new song.

Overall, the question is how do you go about setting up a play list? Any general help in this area would be most helpful.

I exercise a similar discipline, and if you add those 52 fresh tunes to the 1000s of songs you've retained from playing every year .... it adds up, and gives you choices. One thing I always did was try to never play the same FIRST song ever in the same room... it's difficult, but I'm still trying to stick to that. I'm sure that after years go by, I'll repeat an opener, but the regulars that show up each week will never be able to set their watch by my sets.

From what I've gleaned, there must be at least three or four ways to set up play lists. I have no need for them since I never perform and never will. Hopefully, Gary Diamond and the others who discussed this very subject a few days ago will "chime-in" with advice.

It boils down to what works best for your performing situation and preferences. It may take a day or two to get responses because it's Friday and weekend performance time for many of our resident geniuses, so please be patient.

Don't know if you are a HOG fan or not but we sure didn't have much to brag about... football wise this year. I hear our basketball team is rated highly... but we don't get much Razorback News over here in West Mayberry. One of my classmates was from Mountain Home. Great guy... now if only I could remember his name. My wife threw away my annual 'cause it had a photo or two of me with girls I'd met before she came along.

One word of encouragement... most PSR Arrangers don't make drastic changes in their layout unless some striking new technology is coming into focus before new model production time. Take a peek at the PSR website if time is of the essence for you. They have tons of topics and posts about this subject. Gary Diamond is a serious contributor there.

Best of luck and Merry Christmas,

----Dave

Making a playlist

1-We make a list of songs that we are familiar with.
2-If you are playing gigs, and you are sensitive to your audience, they will let you know what type or what songs they want.
3-You constantly upgrade your playlist, deleting and adding. I played in a N/H. for three years. My play list changed from Five Two type of music to disco and upbeats music, it is what they wanted.
4-As a home player a playlist is made by songs that appeal to you. It is like taking trips to places you want to see. Your playlist will be made up of songs that that YOU like, songs that have that may have a special meaning to you.

Learning/Memorizing songs

1-Home players and players who play differ here.
2-The home player has no need to learn a song, many use a written music to guide him. On occasions he might memorize a song.
3-The gigging musician will always perform better when he memorizes the song. He is aware of the chord progressions, the different keys, the structure of the song. Learning the melody of a song is normally the easy part.
4-There is something magical that happens when you memorize a song and play many times – your hands learn the song. What does that mean? Your hands go to the next chord without thought. As I am leaving my garage I reach up and press my remote -- after a while I did that without thought – started the car and reach up for the remote.
5-I find memorizing lyrics is the most difficult part of memorizing. On one of my jobs I saw a stunning woman sitting in all her glory at the bar – legs crossed gently. I learned that she was a lead singer in a Broadway musical. I asked her how she memorized the lyrics of the many songs she needed to perform. I never forgot what she said. “I look for the story being told in the lyrics. Then I put myself in the middle of the story, trying to feel the emotion” Wow, she was right in. I used that method, I got more of me into the song, and memorized 90% of the lyrics. The other 10% I made up. (smile)

OK, it’s 4am, and I felt like doing something, gotta go, John C.

PS, Dave I like this --
Do your best to be invisible... and kind.

I agree with everything you said, Bruno:

Did you get up early... or stay up late? LOL! I'm so grateful I don't have to memorize the lyrics... even those I have written. I write them down, file them away and retrieve them when I need to send a lyric to a producer or artist... or use for re-writing the whole darn song if I believe it needs rough justice!

Thanks for your PS... I've wished I could be invisible often... usually when I've put my foot in my mouth!

Merry Christmas!

----Dave

Good topic, Earl. First and foremost, I do not use cheat sheets, I cannot read the dots and play at the same time - just something that I never was able to master. Usually, if I hear a song, after listening to it a couple times I can figure out the chord progression fairly easily. Yeah, I may miss some of the passing chords, but by and large, it all comes together.

Now, after all these years, I still have never been able to memorize all the lyrics to all the songs I performed, therefore, I have the ones that I have not memorized on a netbook PC so I can glance at them from time to time if I get lost along the way, which has happened. I can clearly recall that one night, while working in the Florida Keys, I fired up on Margarettaville, a song that I have performed thousands of times. For the life of me, Nibblin On Sponge Cake didn't come into my mind that night. So I just began as an instrumental, clicked the mouse, brought up the lyrics, then went into the song as if nothing happened. No one in the audience knew I had a brain fart.

When I commented "New Songs", I was referring to songs that I had never played, and in some instances, never heard. My old friend, Don Mason, hit me with several challenges in past years, to play and sing songs I never heard before me mentioned them. Each and every time, I went to You Tube, brought up the song, then sat down at the arranger keyboard, picked out a style that came relatively close to the original song, then saved the information into the Music Finder Directory so I could quickly recall the style, tempo, intro, and variation. Most of the time, the one touch settings were more than adequate for the right hand voices. Then I would go on to learn the lyrics, which often took a couple hours, when to kick in vocal harmony, breaks, fills, etc... It was challenging, but also a lot of fun, especially when I listed to my recording of the finished product, which I would email to Don, or in some instances, post the song on one of the forums for feedback.

As for set lists, I never used one, mainly because I didn't want to sound like the same trick pony every time I stepped in front of my audiences. Instead, I would often fire up the keyboard and perform one of the new songs I recently learned and see how the audiences responded. More often than not the response was positive, so I guess I was doing something right.

During a typical, 1-hour show at a retirement community, assisted living center or nursing home, I performed about 20 songs, sometimes more, sometimes less, depending on the average song length. About 90 percent of the shows ended up going for more than an hour, but the ADs and the audiences loved it when I went a bit overtime. I tried to stay as upbeat as possible, and provide as much variety as possible to keep things interesting. I wanted to keep their hands clapping, toes tapping, and for those that could, keep them dancing.

Some of the new songs I learned took as much as a week to learn them because they were in different languages, languages I did not speak. I mainly limited these to Italian and Spanish, but did manage to learn a couple in Polish for when I performed at Polish birthday parties. Also tried to learn one in Japanese, but I just couldn't master the lyrics for Suki Yaki and finally just did it as an instrumental, which came out OK. Click here to hear my rendition of Suki Yaki All my foreign lyrics were memorized phonetically, but no one in the audiences new that I couldn't actually speak that language. Consequently, there were times when someone would come up to me speaking Italian or Spanish, assuming I could converse with them, in that language, which I couldn't if they paid me a million dollars.

My biggest disappointment now is that I had to retire after more than 30 years of being on stage. When my back gave out, followed by my lungs, I no longer was physically capable to be an on stage entertainer, singer or musician. I've since sold my PA systems, gave away all my fancy, silk vests and tuxedos, sold the headset mics, and gave away hundreds of custom made cables. I still play the S-950 nearly day, and have one custom console, but the early onset of Parkinson's Disease has made this increasingly difficult. Gonna see the VA doc in mid January about getting some meds to control the shakes in my hands. There are no meds that will provide me with enough air to sing the way I could just a couple years ago when I retired.

Well, that's my experiences in this business, guys and gals, and I'm sorry for being so wordy on the subject.

All the best,

Gary

Gary all good info...
learn the songs & lyrics put the charts away and look
at the audience & smile, they see you enjoying it in return they will enjoy it. Always looking like a deer in the headlights
or with head down all they see is your bald spot..lol

LOL, Ironically, the bald spot is the only bright spot in health these days -for some strange reason, it's beginning to fill in with hair, though the hair is snow white.

I agree that eye contact is among the most important aspects of being an on stage entertainer/performer. That's one of the reasons I went with that tiny netbook PC because it doesn't block the view between me and the audience, but it is positioned just fine so I can glance down at the screen when I need to, and the audiences don't seem to notice. When I had a larger, notebook PC off to the side on a stand, not only did it block the view, but it was obvious when I had to look at that 15-inch screen.

Gary

Gary,
You never will be too wordy. I have always respected your professionalism, your approach to gigs and being a musician. Have learned a lot from you. It has made me a better performer. It must be frustrating for you not to be able to perform, but your memories are gold.

Gerry

Yep Gary learning the songs without charts and lyrics is one thing but being able to tell the story
and look into peoples faces and make them believe the story your singing is another.....
the EYES are always on you and you have to be in charge
and forge ahead big time every performance or
it could be your last time you play there..