PG Music Home Forums General Discussion Off-Topic Could You Live From Making Music?

As I continue to digest the comments on this thread, it becomes more and more clear that we have people of varied areas of experience, and it is interesting to hear the perspective from the full time players vs the hobby players and dabblers. (I am a dabbler.)

As I sit here during my lunch break, at I job I enjoy very much (network support tech at a very large international company), I am listening to the CD of Sarah McLachlin's Mirrorball tour. This is one of my favorite songwriters, as well as one of my favorite performers, probably not hurt by the fact that she is a MAJOR babe, but it truly is her music that draws me to her. And I mentioned that because listening to the music from a tour I saw in person, it makes me think about all the club owners and musicians that spout the partyline statement "People don't want to hear originals."

Hmmm.... they don't?

People flock to see artists play originals. They are called concerts. 15-20,000 people at a time go to hear "originals". The difference is that Sarah McLachlin's originals are masterpieces and mine suck. People will be thrilled to hear GOOD originals. Every song ever written is an original to somebody.

I occasionally visit some of the local songwriter showcase nights and I hear a lot of crap. However, I usually hear maybe 2 decent songs a night. I have performed at a couple and hope I contributed to that group of 2.... The key difference here is that when you go to songwriter night, you are expecting original music. When you go to Bob's Bar and Grille you expect to hear "that song list". This is why you will never see me at Bob's Bar and Grille. If I am interested in hearing Free Bird (I am not) I will play it at home or in my car. I am in the group that would prefer a 90 minute set of mediocre original songs than 3 hours of flawlessly performed cover music. I make the conscious choice to be in that group, and as has become a popular phrase here, "mileage may vary".

So to those who want to play "that song list", you certainly can make a living doing it. The choice becomes do you WANT to play that song list, or do you have to. I make a decent living sitting here at this desk. That affords me the opportunity to say "If I ever DO decide to play again, it will be on my terms, not theirs." I would be interested in booking only 45-50 minute shows opening for people at venues one level above Bob's Bar and Grille that are designed to be concert venues, not restaurants that have music after the all you can eat fish special is done. There is a great need for good copy bands, and I have friends who play in them, but I don't go see them play. I do go to about 4-5 places that are more in the "concert" domain, and I watch skilled but financially stressed musicians play their original music, music that matters to them and thus comes from the heart. That stuff I have on Soundcloud isn't just "songs". They are stories about my life. Many Years Ago, Here Goes Nuttin', Do It All Again... those songs, to a casual listener, are just songs. To me, those are the story of when I quit drinking, that I know to not try getting married again, yet I might have done it a couple of years ago while I was involved with a girl who dumped me. And that dumping prompted Do It All Again, I'm The One, The One That Got Away... those songs matter to ME, and performing those songs is an experience much different from playing Mustang Sally and Gimme Three Steps. This is why I love Sarah's work so much. Can't you just HEAR the pain dripping out of those lyrics? This is why I wonder what happened to Diane Warren that she can turn out those painful love songs non stop the way she does. That is not innate. That comes from experience.

The part about "filling the dance floor" is meaningless to me. I prefer to play in a venue that doesn't even HAVE a dance floor. You are there to listen to me tell you stories. Save your dance moves for Soul Train.

But to make this as on topic as possible, sure you can make a living playing music. (Or selling drugs. Or turning tricks. Or selling handguns underground....) When music is your living your perspective is different and you do what you have to do. When music is your toy and you don't rely on it to pay your mortgage, your perspective is not likely the same as if you did. What I don't see is how I could go up and play cover music and try to sell CDs that are NOTHING like what I would be playing live. How many disappointed people would there be to think they are getting "Brown Eyed Girl" because they heard it live, pop the CD into their car on the way home from Bob's Bar and Grille and 12 country songs come out? Again just my opinion, but I believe you HAVE to play your originals to give them at least a taste of what is on your CD. (And I would NEVER record a cover song.) Once I have your 12 bucks (and I'll give it to you for 10 if you want me to sign it... ), it has long been sent to one bank or another to pay a bill... no refunds!

You do have some good points. But a lot of them apply to you and not everybody. That's OK because that's what we are discussing here. There is no right or wrong answer.

But people don't want to hear original music. Even when you go to a major name concert, they will play all their most popular old tunes and save a few of the new for later in the concert. The fans want to hear the songs they know by heart from the previous albums and radio play. And most importantly, the people go there to hear the star. Every new song is original music, but the audience wants to hear memories.

We play a couple of originals in the mix, and after the audience has heard them enough, some request them. But if we did all originals, they probably wouldn't have come to hear us in the first place.

And throughout the ages, where does it say the musician has to play songs he/she wrote themselves. Did Sinatra write his own songs? Elvis Presley? Luciano Pavarotti? Patsy Cline? and so on. And how many hit songs were written but not sung by the masters in Tin Pan Ally and/or the Brill Building? Since when does an artist have to sing his/her own songs to be valid? Did Irving Berlin ever sing on a hit record? Burt Bacharach? Cynthia Weil? (Well her husband Barry Mann did have one hit she co-wrote!)

And personally, I like playing music. No, I take that back, I LOVE playing music. And I play cover tunes, variations on cover tunes, complete re-arrangements of popular tunes and a couple of my own. I really enjoy my job and I really enjoy my audience.

If the people didn't know Sarah McLachlin, they wouldn't flock to hear her originals. But we live in an idol worship culture, and once the artist becomes a star, they become an idol, and even their worst is likely to sell.

I understand that you don't want to listen to "Free Bird" again. But you are a musician and don't listen like the rest of the world. When I go to a concert, it's a symphony orchestra. I don't even care to hear the stars do their music in person. I'd rather hear it on my iPod. But I'm not the general public either.

You said <<The choice becomes do you WANT to play that song list, or do you have to. >> and my answer is I WANT to.

My first professional gig was in Junior High School. I got into this little rock and roll band. We were terrible, but everybody was back then. We played cover songs that we loved to listen to on the radio. We practiced at each others houses and had a great time doing it.

Then we got a gig for a Jr. High School Dance (they would call it middle school today). There I was on the stage, having the time of my life doing those cover songs with my buddies, and the girl who wouldn't even look at me in English class was 'making eyes' at me. And at the end of the night they payed me money!!!!

I've been playing ever since. I backed up headliners in concert. I went through a jazz phase and played with some famous players. I've even had by bio published in Who's Who in Entertainment.

<<But to make this as on topic as possible, sure you can make a living playing music. (Or selling drugs. Or turning tricks. Or selling handguns underground....) When music is your living your perspective is different and you do what you have to do. When music is your toy and you don't rely on it to pay your mortgage, your perspective is not likely the same as if you did.>>

You could make a living doing tech support at a large international company as well. And if you enjoy it, if it's your bliss, then you are blessed.

I still love playing music as much as I did back in Junior High School. I own my own home near the east coast of Florida, and other than about 2 more years of mortgage payments, I have no debt at all. I'm making a living doing music and nothing but music.

As I said before, life is short, and there is no guarantee of an afterlife. If the clergy is correct, that will be great, but this life is the proverbial bird in the hand. Most people spend at least 2/3 of their waking hours at work. If your work is your bliss, you can spend that time in your bliss.

If you don't enjoy playing music and if you aren't willing to give up the Rolex and wear a Timex, or give up the Hummer and drive a Caravan, then you shouldn't be a musician. But for me, I have no need to compete with the neighbors to get a Hummer (I don't even like them), my Timex keeps perfect time, and I am enjoying my life. From the time I wake up until I go to sleep at night, I don't even feel like I'm working. But then I've always valued experiences over possessions anyway. Jamming with the Funk Brothers, Eric Burdon, Rick Derringer, Ira Sullivan, are worth more to me than the Hope Diamond. Playing in China and later walking on the Great Wall, seeing the Terracotta Army in person, going in the Forbidden City, and watching cormorant fishing on the Li River are worth more to me than a garage full of Hummers. Making friends in Puerto Rico, Jamacia, Canada, Mexico, and other countries and discussing world views with them is better to me than a dozen Rolexes. But that's me.

But we all have our priorities. If you need the Hummer, Rolex, Diamonds, and other material goods, don't go into the music business. Very few of us get there. Better stay away from pro sports, and all the other arts, and I hope whatever you chose works for you.

We all HAVE to make a living. At least those of us without parents in the upper 5%. So if I have to make a living, I'm going to make it by doing something I truly enjoy. And I've done that.

I've played songs written by Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Goffin & King, Willie Dixon, Davis & Bacharach, Lennon & McCartney, Leiber & Stoller, Antonin Dvorak, Paul Desmond, Kris Kristofferson, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Sedaka & Greenfield, Pomus & Shuman, Rogers & Hart, James Brown, Gershwin & Gershwin, McKinley Morganfield, Cole Porter, Bob Dylan, Otis Blackwell, and scores for other composers of popular and not-so popular music from the last few centuries. Each style requires me to put on a different musical 'hat' and I truly like that. I'm in my 60s now and am not even beginning to get tired of it. There is so much more to explore. There are so many more tunes to learn. And so many more musical instruments go learn to play.

Not only am I making a living playing music, I'm LIVING my life thanks to music. YMMV

Notes

Notes,

I am not dissing the tune, I would just like to stop the replay button in my brain.

I'll start to work on a Ray Charles' Drown In My Own tears, that should clear the head.

Later,

Sometimes the weirdest tunes appear in my head. Songs I haven't heard for years, and even songs I didn't especially care for. The only way to get them out is to replace them with something else, and "Drown In My Own Tears" is an excellent substitute

Notes

I just thought of a song I wish I could cover and it might make some laugh:

Captain & Tenille's "Love Will Keep Us Together". Still one of my favorite keyboard basslines of all time.

-Scott

Ah .... Ray Charles. I have a friend here who recently added "You Don't Know Me" to her show. And when she sings "Afraid and shy... I let my chance go by...." in the bridge, all the feeling I have for her but can't act on come out and I get teary eyed. This is one of those "She is the most awesome girl I know but it ain't gonna happen" scenarios.

On topic.... she COULD make her living just from music, but she is well into a career that is her security. She is doing an album right now and from the rushes I have heard it belongs on a Nashville radio station right now!! She could do it. She chooses not to. Part time only.

I write my own songs but I like doing cover songs. Bob and I had a blast doing our latest - Walk A Mile In My Shoes by Joe South and the response so far is that people are really enjoying it.

When I lived in Nashville, I always enjoyed a good writers night but I also enjoyed a good cover or tribute band. Heck, I've even enjoyed some good Elvis impersonators. If it's a song I like and the performance is good I'm getting caught up in the music and having a good time.

Kudos to Notes and Lelani for sticking with their passion for playing live and making their living from it. And others on here as well.

There's nothing like that energy from a live audience. Writing a good song is a high I love too but it's apples and oranges.

For someone starting out today I think it might be harder to make a living playing live unless they are willing to travel, are very good at promoting themselves and make the right connections. But to a certain degree it's always been that way.

Even making it a secondary income, I agree much depends on location, how far you're willing to go and how much time, effort and money you're willing to invest. Our own Silvertones has made an inspiring effort and had some real ups and downs - most just because of his location.

And for you, Josie, it is extra hard because you never know when half of your state will be under water.... gotta be rough to have a gig canceled because the venue is floating away.

I never asked... are you far away from the coast so you don't have to worry about the flooding?

I had a very nice job (career if you like) and played in several bands at the same time. Not a lot of gigs and the money was not important (if you split by 6 people, the pay isn't all that good...)
Then I was asked to do solo-gigs using backing tracks. Rate of gigs went up and the pay was quadrupled. I had a 40+ -hour day job and three all-night gigs a week. Sure, I made a lot of money, but being married and a baby coming... My wife and I decided that we wanted to have more quality time. And so we bought just that: time for ourself. Unfortunately it was not possible to do my job part-time. Stepping down the career ladder was no option for the company. So we decided that I quit my job. That was the moment that I went "Pro". That was 6 years ago.

It all went pretty well. Sure, we didn't have the double income any longer. But I was making the same or more money than my regular job. Now with the crises and all the gigs got fewer. But I record bands and choirs with my mobile recording studio (48 separate tracks digital) and I do jobs as a sound engineer.
So you can say I still make my living with music. I am still self-employed. Though I love recording, producing and doing live sound engineering, I can happily say that the gigrate is going up again.

And what is wrong with playing certain songs that the audience wants to hear? Does playing that song makes you a lousy musician? Is it because it has three simple chords and that it isn't a challenge for you as a musician? For me, I get a lot of enjoyment out the reaction of the audience. If they like the songs (even if they're not my taste) and have a good time with them, who am I to say they're listening to the wrong kind of music? Should I tell them that what they like isn't really music?

If you want to sell your goods, you'll have to produce what the people want. If your customers want a cheap car with a large payload area, you better not make a Ferrari...

Mike, that is the gist of the discussion. There is a group that is happy to play "that set list" and those who are not. Those who play music for 100% of their income have to take jobs sometimes that require playing songs they don't enjoy. They are able to put on the game face and play those songs. I would hate it, so I don't do it, though that's not the only reason. I can't cut it anymore.

Your car analogy kind of works, but it's maybe 10 degrees off center. You can choose to sell a lot of cheap cars or 1 really expensive one. If you make your living selling cheap cars, sell as many as you can using any means necessary. If you have other income and any money made selling cars is a windfall, then you are in the other group.

Nobody is telling the crowd what to like. However, the guys who won't play "that set list" ARE telling the crown what they are going to hear, like it or not. And if it's not, I won't be back and won't really care. I pay my bills from my day job these days. Judging by your photo I am a lot older than you and I am at an age where toting barge and lifting bale (setup and teardown) is not all that attractive to me. I play one show per year now, and at that show I just show up with my horns, someone carries them in for me, I play, someone carries my horns out, and they then stay in my 2nd floor studio until rehearsals start next year. I play them all year, but for what I enjoy now after retiring from the band life, writing and recording. And if I never sell a song, so be it. I will keep trying until I don't have breath left to blow though my saxes. But schlepping gear from bar to bar or bowling alley to bowling alley... that's not for me anymore.

I have SO loved this discussion!!!

Eddie,

Don't have to worry about that. A cat 2 and we're all outta here. Thank God I'm far enough inland that my home has never flooded. Got caught in street flooding once in my car when the rain deluge overwhelmed the pumps. We have pumps sort of like N.O. After what happened in N.O. we may all be fleeing a cat 1.


But in winter we get lots of nice days when the rest of the country is iced. And what other state would create a seasoning spice blend that's so hot it's called, "Slap Ya Mama." LOL!

When I was very young, I started playing pop music. I was in Junior High School, we played classical in band, standards in the after-school "stage band" and top40 with my friends. The top40 was our music, the rebellious rock and roll.

But back then I had my standards. I refused to play country music. Back then country was very simplistic (so was pop), had no saxophones (with the exception of Boots Randolph) and it whined a lot.

A couple of years later, we had to learn a country song for a bar owner that we played regularly in. The guitar player said, "It's acting. Just put on an imaginary cowboy hat and pretend." So he taught me the song on the bass, the bass player played rhythm guitar, and I was off in root/five land. I was actually pretty happy to be playing another instrument.

I don't have those "standards" anymore. Whether the song is challenging or simplistic, I just put on the appropriate imaginary hat and have fun doing it.

But I have to be able to pull it off and it has to work with your baby-boomer targeted audience. So that means no rap and no heavy metal. But if we had enough requests AND if we could cover the song in our duo, I'd learn it, put on the imaginary hat and have a good time exploring that genre.

So who cares if it's a song by the Archies or Buck Owens and his Buckaroos? Not me.

When I was in school and in the concert band we played everything from Modest Mussorgsky's "Pictures At An Exhibition" to Antonín Dvořák's "New World Sympbony" (both great pieces of music) to Franz Lehár's "Merry Widow Waltz" which is as corny to my ears as Muskrat Love.

I take them as the come, have fun doing them, and put my all into each performance. And it's a lot more fun than back in my youth when I had things I didn't want to play.

Notes

Procol Harum did Bach in "A Whiter Shade Of Pale", Dan Fogelberg took the meldody from Tchaikovsky's "1812 Overture" and turned it into his "Same Old Lang Syne", The Nice did Sibelius and Bach, Barry Manilow's "Could This Be Magic" is basically a Prelude by Chopin (and he even shared with him the writer's credit), and dozens of others abound.

Plus every Symphony Orchestra in the world is basically a Cover Band. They don't write their own music.

How many great jazz artists covered Broadway show tunes? Can't count them all.

There is nothing wrong with playing songs written by other people. There is nothing wrong with writing your own songs. There is nothing wrong with writing songs for other people to play.

This whole idea that doing someone else's songs makes you a "cover band" and is a negative term is something invented by people who haven't got anything better to do but try to elevate themselves by cutting other people down. But the joke is on them, IMHO it doesn't elevate them one bit, instead it puts a dark cloud over their name.

Notes

+1 Bob!

People have been in cover bands ever since there were paid court musicians - even way back to the writing of the Psalms and probably before that. Many of the Psalms have notes at the opening (to be played or sung according to the tune of ____ ). When king Saul hired David, what was it for? Saul hired David to play the lyre for him when Saul was being tormented. http://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20samuel%2016&version=NIV

David is credited with writing many of the Psalms. Take note that in some of his Psalms (for example, Psalm 22) David writes who the Psalm is for in Saul's organization and to what tune it's supposed to use. Here's the note from the NIV for Psalm 22: For the director of music. To the tune of “The Doe of the Morning.” A psalm of David.

David was writing lyrics to a cover tune. Sure looks like he was hired to do so, as he submitted the lyrics to the director of music (he wasn't the director of music at the time - I wonder who was?)

These Biblical references are in no way intended to try to introduce a religious bent to this discussion, but only to show that cover tunes have been a regular part of society and put meat on the table for probably the world's most famous lyric writer with documented texts. There are probably others from other cultures and religions for which I have no awareness.

For me, if I didn't learn how to play cover tunes, my songwriting skills would suffer. Then again, I've only been paid to play a few times in my past, so I'm not making a living at it. If I did, then it would be called 'work' and not 'play' - to me at least. Notes' notes here give me some pangs of jealousy, but he has had to work really hard at what he does, to get to the point of being able to enjoy all aspects of his music playing. Even bands that do just their own songs tire of their own songs.

I remember going to a Chris Rice concert (Chris is a popular singer/songwriter in Christian Pop) where he HAD to sing his CARTOON song. He wrote a song that dropped cartoon names by the dozen as a sort of joke and it became his most popular song. He seemed loath to sing it, but honestly, it sold tons of his CDs at the time. He has officially laid the song to rest: http://www.chrisrice.com/articles.php?id=11

-Scott

It isn't just about bands playing cover music. It's the ones who say ridiculous things like "That's not how the solo goes". Not how the solo goes? Isn't the solo section where a musician can express himself? There is one popular trib band here who passed on a great drummer who, at his audition, "hit the wrong cymbal". Huh? You have to cover so close that you care what cymbal the guy hit? That is like firing a sax player because the guy in the band they are copying plays Rico reeds and your sax player plays La Voz.

Now, if you are playing Yakkety Sax, of course there is a melody to that instrumental and you need to follow it, but to force a player to completely ape a solo.... that's where the difference is between someone who can repeat and someone who can create. That is the reason I have never and will never see a "tribute band". That is just another word for "copy band". A copy band that only copies one act maybe, but still a copy band.

IF you have to cover, make the songs your own. I can't stand the jukebox mentality.

I had a horn player once tell me "They play 2 1/8th notes there and we are only playing one!" And I am trying to picture some drunken fool in a bar saying "I am NEVER coming to see you again!!! There are supposed to be TWO 1/8th notes there and you only played ONE!!!" Yet how many bands actually waste rehearsal time over silly crap like that?

Answer: every copy band everywhere.

Now, comparing Sinatra singing a Cole Porter song to a cover band playing whatever 40 pieces of crap they can wing without rehearsal is ridiculous and you know it is. The point is not what comes out of their mouths. The point is the willingness to and ability to take those 12 notes and tell your own story, not someone else's. If that doesn't matter to you, so be it. I cook too, but I rarely use a recipe. I don't want to cook Emeril's dishes. I want to cook my dishes. I don't open up Word and type Moby Dick. That's been done. I want to write MY book.

Once again, that's just me and mileage may vary.