I've got a bit of a lull in my schedule, and have been noticing "ask me anything" threads popping up. Since I'm a dirty musician and not a productive member of society, I figured I'd open this thread to questions about music.

Anything is welcome, from theory and composition questions to questions about the lifestyle of a musician and gigs. (IRL, the amount of people who ask me if I do heroin is ridiculous)

Specific instrumental questions are OK, but other than for the saxophone/clarinet, there are probably people on the forum more qualified to answer them than me.

Lexpar

1813 Posts

January 10 2011 06:34 GMT

How many gigs do you play a month, in what city, pulling in how much on average per gig? On what instrument and what style of music?

Thanks.

Myrmidon

United States9452 Posts

January 10 2011 06:45 GMT

Did you go to school? Which program? I've known quite a few people that went to some kind of music school, but a lot of them ended up deciding to do something else.

[NyC]HoBbes

United States803 Posts

January 10 2011 06:46 GMT

On January 10 2011 15:34 Lexpar wrote:
How many gigs do you play a month, in what city, pulling in how much on average per gig? On what instrument and what style of music?

Thanks.

1. I'm still a student, so not that many; maybe 10 a month
2. New York. If I decide to go professional permanently, I've been considering a move to New Orleans. If I decide to go to college, I'll play in whatever town I go to school in.
3. Gigs can pay between $50 and $400, depending on the length of set, venue, etc... There's a delicate balance to be walked between asking for too much as a young guy and asking for too little and undercutting the established pros in the area.
4. I play Jazz, and my main instrument is Alto Sax

[NyC]HoBbes

United States803 Posts

January 10 2011 06:48 GMT

On January 10 2011 15:45 Myrmidon wrote:
Did you go to school? Which program? I've known quite a few people that went to some kind of music school, but a lot of them ended up deciding to do something else.

I haven't attended a conservatory, although I might at some point in the future if I find that I'm not having success

Lexpar

1813 Posts

January 10 2011 06:50 GMT

You don't think New York is a good city to be a musician? In Montreal there's practically no music scene. Only a handful of major clubs, and even when a popular local band plays people don't show up. Low population city + language barrier + general apathy. I was thinking of moving to New York to work in music. What do you think?

[NyC]HoBbes

United States803 Posts

January 10 2011 06:56 GMT

On January 10 2011 15:50 Lexpar wrote:
You don't think New York is a good city to be a musician? In Montreal there's practically no music scene. Only a handful of major clubs, and even when a popular local band plays people don't show up. Low population city + language barrier + general apathy. I was thinking of moving to New York to work in music. What do you think?

New York has an amazing scene, but cost of living is so insanely high that it makes it hard. You have to work like an absolute dog. I have a friend who plays with the Radio City Christmas Spectacular; he does 6 shows (a little under 2 hours each) consecutively each day.

Lexpar

1813 Posts

January 10 2011 06:59 GMT

That's what I figured. It's hard to know without living in the city. Most people's appraisal of their cities music scene is very subjective. I can't really imagine anywhere else on the east cost I'd want to live and work in music other than New York.

If your geography is shit, Montreal is about a 5 hours drive north of New York. Not east or west, just north.

I've some friends from there. It sounds like an incredible place.

relyt

United States1073 Posts

January 10 2011 07:06 GMT

is it hard to find gigs/work as a musician?

unit

United States2621 Posts

January 10 2011 07:14 GMT

#10

as a young aspiring saxophonist, what would your biggest most important piece of advice be? (im on alto, love music, esp. jazz and reggae, and am considering going all the way into performance/composition)

HwangjaeTerran

Finland5967 Posts

January 10 2011 07:23 GMT

#11

How do you memorize song structures, I dunno much about the jazz you play and how you approach the music but this is something I'm having trouble with. Should I just try to memorize the parts relative to the key - like one part: I - VII - ii and the other: V - iii - IV - I . I dunno if this makes any sense to you but I just can't keep the long structures in mind when I need to practice a whole lotta different songs.

Kiante

Australia7069 Posts

January 10 2011 07:26 GMT

#12

Would you regard the statement "I like the mathematical side to metal" as absurd?

Invictus

Singapore2697 Posts

January 10 2011 08:26 GMT

#13

how do you improve sight-reading? other than massively playing through many pieces, is there something definite that you can work on to improve sight reading?

d3_crescentia

United States4053 Posts

January 10 2011 15:07 GMT

#14

How do you get gigs? I write music and do some stuff on the computer, I've never played with a live band before and it sounds like something I'd like to try sometime.

Nuttyguy

United Kingdom1526 Posts

January 10 2011 16:39 GMT

#15

Are you scared of becomming a typical hobo? in the FAR future?

[NyC]HoBbes

United States803 Posts

January 10 2011 17:03 GMT

#16

On January 10 2011 16:06 relyt wrote:
is it hard to find gigs/work as a musician?

It entirely depends on where you are and who you know. In NYC, there is a lot of work to go around, in other places, less so.

On January 10 2011 16:14 unit wrote:
as a young aspiring saxophonist, what would your biggest most important piece of advice be? (im on alto, love music, esp. jazz and reggae, and am considering going all the way into performance/composition)

Get extremely, extremely comfortable playing in all 12 keys. Play with as many people and in as many styles as you can, generally just expose yourself to and participate in as much music as possible.

On January 10 2011 16:23 HwangjaeTerran wrote:
How do you memorize song structures, I dunno much about the jazz you play and how you approach the music but this is something I'm having trouble with. Should I just try to memorize the parts relative to the key - like one part: I - VII - ii and the other: V - iii - IV - I . I dunno if this makes any sense to you but I just can't keep the long structures in mind when I need to practice a whole lotta different songs.

It’s less about memorizing the changes and more about hearing them. If you’re having trouble with the form of a song, put on some speakers and solo along with it until you can hear the changes going by and play with them. When I was first starting to improvise on the sax, my teacher would have me spend hours of practice time playing whole note solos to the changes of a song, then half-note solos, then quarter-note solos, and finally free improvisation. The goal was to get me to internalize the changes while figuring out how to outline them improvisationally in solos of more and more complexity. Hope this helps.

On January 10 2011 16:26 Kiante wrote:
Would you regard the statement "I like the mathematical side to metal" as absurd?

I know absolutely nothing about metal, but I would regard the statement “I like the mathematical side to music” as completely reasonable.

On January 10 2011 17:26 Invictus wrote:
how do you improve sight-reading? other than massively playing through many pieces, is there something definite that you can work on to improve sight reading?

It’s mainly just persistence, but there are ways of practicing sight reading that can help you improve faster. Read a piece through, WITHOUT STOPPING, even if you make a mistake, just find your place as you go and keep going. Once you’ve read through it once, read through it again, looking to get all the notes down, then the accents and the dynamics. Once you’ve read it a couple of times, read it looking to play note for note and accent for accent exactly what is on the page. Etudes and fingering exercises are also great for sight-reading, as they train both your reading and your technical ability, and are generally short enough to be quick reads. For me, sight-reading was like riding a bike, one day it just sort of “clicked”, and I’ve been quite good at it since. You don’t need to kill yourself over practicing it; 15-30 minutes a day of reading should considerably improve your reading ability if you make sure to do it every day.

On January 11 2011 00:07 d3_crescentia wrote:
How do you get gigs? I write music and do some stuff on the computer, I've never played with a live band before and it sounds like something I'd like to try sometime.

Getting gigs is really a combination of connections and marketing. Personally, I played with a youth program that was relatively well known in NYC when I was a kid, and this was quite helpful in getting work later, as I had played many of the venues I was looking to get work in, and had played with and knew many people in the music scene. I started getting a bunch of sideman/session work, and from there expanded to getting gigs booked for my own projects. A good friend of mine did it very differently- he started a band and played competitions until he got some publicity, then started offering to open for bigger acts for free, until they were well-known enough among the music community to start getting hired themselves.

On January 11 2011 01:39 Nuttyguy wrote:
Are you scared of becomming a typical hobo? in the FAR future?

If music doesn’t seem like it can make me a living, I’ll probably go to college and get a degree before giving it another shot, so no, I don’t worry about becoming a hobo. Busking on the street is pretty fun though, but not as a full-time thing.