Most, if not all, of us have had the situation where while we are playing someone comes up to us and wants to hold a conversation ... well, a good friend of mine - he was the sax player in our band all those years ago - was recently hired to play the cocktail hour for a wedding in NY ... it was a 'Christmas theme' wedding and he was asked to play a lot of "Christmas music" ... on SOLO SAX ... He sent me an e-mail today saying the gig went very well, but as he said in his own words: "NOW......... as I'm playing a tune a woman
comes by and asks ME for a PEN. A PEN !!!
What the ??? I'm playing, doing tunes I
don't usually do, people pushing me, bending
my wireless mic on my horn and people
stepping on my feet. What the ????
Could you imagine how people are so unaware
of what we, as musicians, are doing. What it takes?
I don't get it. So I didn't say anything, AS USUAL, and took my money and went home. Going
home with money in my pocket was the best
part of the night."
So, fellas, it doesn't only happen to KB players but also to sax players while they have a mouthpiece in their mouth!!!
t.




[This message has been edited by tony mads usa (edited 12-12-2010).]

She must have thought he was using one of those new Dj karaoke saxophone units.

She was hitting on him.

That's a riot! I thought I had heard it all until this one. I keep a half-dozen pens on my laptop console, along with a couple dozen business cards, just for advertising purposes. I couldn't count the number of times someone comes up in the middle of a song that I'm playing and singing and asks for a business card. One night, while playing in an upscale Italian Restaurant in Baltimore's Little Italy, an attractive 45-year-old lady came up while I was singing Unchained Melody, asked for a card and I nodded toward the stack of cards on the console. She picked up a card, then picked all 6 pens, put them in her purse, smiled and walked out the door. What a nut case!

The situation I love most is when someone comes up and tries to have a conversation with you while you're playing and singing. Some actually get upset when you don't answer their questions immediately. An old friend, who recently passed away put a sign on his mic stand that said "If you have a question, take a number and I'll get back to you." He had a little post-it-pad with numbers written on each page under the note and an arrow point down to the number pad. He finally took it down because the people ignored it and began asking questions anyway.

Thanks Tony,

Gary 8)

The lines between live performers and DJs is so blurred now that many in today's audiences don't know the difference. Last night three different people came and started talking to me while I was singing. One was so insistent that I had to fade the song out as I totally lost my concentration.

Another party this weekend paid by check and at the bottom they wrote "Christmas DJ". Arrrgh!

Every once in a great while someone will tell me it was nice to see someone actually playing an instrument and singing.

Eddie

Same thing happens on the highway..they have a cell phone glued to thie ear...their agenda is the only thing that matters and they are an accident looking for a place to happen. Mostly women, but some men too.

Her agenda was to get that damm pen no matter what....I'm surprised she didn't grab the Sax from you and say...Hey...I need a pen, arn't you listening!.

Lee S.

That about nails it, Eddie. People are so programmed to believe that music just appears out of the blue now, that nobody actually has to play it. Sad fact is that a lot of today's music is untouched by human hand in production, and subsequently untouched by human brain when being heard.

Usually it's some drunk who insists on chatting merrily away mid-song. Other times, there are those who don't need the excuse of alcohol, they're just plain stooooopid.

The best one I had was in a crowded pub, no stage and the crowd right up against the back of my keyboard. This one fella was swaying and on the backward swing got too close, so, keeping my left hand comping, stretched out my right hand and swayed him back the other way, and just kept right on singing. He never noticed, nor anyone else. I can't believe the coolness of my own actions in that situation. I laugh about it now, but it could have gone south pretty quick.

Can't blame them....there are ten x more Dj's then live musicians at affairs today.
Nobody cares...live with it it's gonna get worse for the unwary. "Mix it up" big time before the DJ Express passes you by..

I have to jump in on this one. Makes me laugh. Whenever I show up for a party someone always says "Oh your the DJ" and I reply no I'm a mjusician who also DJs. Then I look at the setup area and there is always a table set up across the front. I usually turn the table sideways and set my keyboard up facing the dance floor and use the table on the side for my DJ stuff, music , etc.
This week I show up for a party and NO Table! I ask the manager and he says "Oh I heard you were a keyboard player---YEA!!! I still needed a small table for my other stuff and he said I could find one outside -- gee thanks. As for people talking to me while I preform its happened a million times and I just give them the one minute finger (no not that one!) and they usually get the hint

Bill in NJ

I have to jump in here too.

When I'm singing and playing and a person comes up to me to talk I put my hand up indicating to them to way till I'm thru with this song and they usually wait and I talk to them after the song.
If a person is rude and they push themselves onto me or tries to do something else to distract me while I'm singing and playing, that's where it ends for me.

This has happened a few times to me.

I'm doing my thing and a women comes up and stands right in front of me and starts waving her hands like a crazy person....well, I never tollerate that. The dance floor is full, I press the Stop button and I say over the microphone nice and loud, "Lady what do you want that can't wait untill I'm thru with this song. I cannot sing and play and talk to you at the same time." And then I appologize to the audience for the interruption. I tell the people how rude this women is. The audience gives me a round of applause and the women literally crawls back to her table.

This above scenerio usually happens at a condo dance never at an assisted facility or private party.

I've been in this business too long. That's how I deal with a rude person.

I have so been tempted to stop the song and say "Are you that stupid? I am singing, you idiot! Not only am I singing, I am playing. Are you blind or just stupid?" I admit, I have been tempted. Maybe they think we're miming the playing and lip syncing the singing.

Don't you see whats happening they are blind to what your playing live or otherwise....."DJ mentality" has taken over everyone and they just hear music and to them how it's done means nothing......you can just walk over to any so called DJ at a club or affair and give them requests and that's what they are doing 99% of the time blind to reality. .....being the minority as a musician little by little your invisible to the audience. Stopping a song in mid-flight is unprofessional and ruins the energy in the room and deprives the dance floor of a good time because of your so called "bravadoism" and you just made an enemy & could get your ass kicked in the parking lot by the husband or boyfriend who's drunk and doesn't like the way you disrespected his lady...no body cares.

Donny...after reading your posts and the whole "negativity" thing about performing live...it completely ignores the fact that some venues absolutely do not want a KJ or DJ. I play a couple of them-where putting on an MP3 is considered a cop out.

I am not blind to the DJ thing, and in fact, offer digital dj service when appropriate. I do a several "combo" (live and DJ) jobs.

The point us MUSICIANS are making is that people should know better than to try to engage a MUSICIAN in a conversation while he is playing and singing. But, they don't.
As I said before...the lines are blurred.

Ol' Blue Eyes would probably have had that person whacked.

Eddie

Eddie that's my point even when your playing an instrument as a OMB they think DJ it doesn't matter....the DJ damage train of thought has been planted...........people are paying upwards of $10,000+ for DJ's at wedding gigs today ...you have to face reality.Find your OWN musical niche and go with it.
It's only getting worse. Why I'm pretty successful is because I'm NOT a DJ even though people sometimes think I am....why? because they are ignorant to the facts & they know not of what we do......can't blame them, why should they know anyway?
The DJ title umbrella has covered us all for the last 30 years. OMB players are alone out there on stage ....the audience hears a Full Band,....in their minds "DJ"



[This message has been edited by Dnj (edited 12-13-2010).]

I was in a "discussion group" a few weeks back. The usual happened. Half of the people in the group start talking and forget to stop. They don't hear YOU when you talk. They interrupt and start their own spiel again. I have to raise my voice every so often, take the speaker's role and remind them it's a "discussion group" and not a "monologue group."

Afterwards, I had a word with the moderator and told him he should be stronger in his moderation as I'm wearing myself out trying to talk over everyone. His answer: "People are undisciplined nowadays!"

I never looked at it that way...rude, arrogant, obnoxious, yes. UNDISCIPLINED...that says it all! Just those four words alone helps me to understand better what I'm up against both on and off stage!

Reading your comments above also helped a lot. It seems I'm not alone in dealing with these brain-dead people.

Lucky

Audience ignorance always makes me think of this clip "A Night In The Life Of A Cover Band".

Be warned bad language is used !!! But it is very appropriate in the situation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24_tiGZgPP4&feature=related

The audience is so used to canned presentations that every once in a while, some one asks, "excuse me, do you have (whatever tune)?".


As someone who never uses sequences, MP-3's...nothing pre-recorded, that burns me up!

Sometimes, it's not worth the effort.

But then there are the B-3 nights!


YEA!

Russ

WOW! $10,000 for a DJ--not in my part of the world. $600 to $1,200 is the wedding rate here, at least for the couple dozen DJs I know. And, these guys are also working the bars and animal clubs for $150 a night, working 4 to 5 hours, putting up with drunks and crazies, plus getting home at 2 a.m..

At the weddings they work three to four hours, have to put up with drunken kids who trash their equipment, drunken adults who want songs that no one want to hear, such as Piano Man, put up with drunken, inconsiderate bridal parties, you name it and they have to put up with it. Sure makes me glad I'm a musician/entertainer instead of a DJ.

Gary

Gary believe me in downtown Baltimore at the Best wedding halls they are paying between 5k-10k for DJ's package shows. Which not only include 3 or 4 DJs, a few dancers, Hugh light show, 3 or 4 giant LED large screen monitors,confetti cannons, setup crew, & every other thing you can imagine.
With weddings costing upwards of 25k to 100k+.......10k for the entertainment is nothing today.
http://www.platinumweddingdj.com/index2.php



[This message has been edited by Dnj (edited 12-13-2010).]

I would go along with the DJ excuse, EXCEPT that was happening to me many years ago, back before DJs, when I was playing organ.
I don't think they MEAN to be rude; they are just a little self-absorbed and/or drunk.
There have been times when I have had to just stop in the middle of song to keep them from climbing all over my gear. Of course there WAS a time when I didn't mind some of them climbing all over my gear.
On a similar "note", I had a guy come up last week when I was right in the middle of a song and ask "Can I sing?" Between lines, I said "sure, go ahead", and I went back to singing the song. He looked at me like I was the stupid one, but he went back to the table.
I remember another occasion a few years ago when a woman came up and started talking to me. I turned to her and said "sorry I can't stop this thing in the middle of a song". THAT she believed!
I believe that these days, it's more the Karaoke thing that has people confused. They are used to the Karaoke guy singing when nobody else has their name in, and they think it's fine to step up and volunteer to finish the song for him.
I haven't yet been in a situation that made me want to quit what I do and start getting up at daylight and sitting at a desk from 8-5!
DonM

Yeah Don...I remember it happening back when I was playing with 4-7 pc groups in the 70's and 80's A lady...er woman...approached the bass player as he was playing and singing and tried to get his attention. He ignorned her at first...but she was persistant...and he tried waving her off.

Then...the unthinkable happened. She grabbed him by the ear and pulled him away from the mic. We finished the song without the bass player, who by this time was livid and wanted to plant his Fender bass on her skull. He wasn't right the rest of the night.

Eddie

[This message has been edited by btweengigs (edited 12-13-2010).]