Are you guys talking a band like this group, Ray Charles, Frank Sinatra, Blood Sweat and Tears, Chicago so on and so forth or a combo where the trumpet player tells the alto guy you play C and I'll play E like this TA, TA,TaTa.

Can anyone here on this forum really read music well enough to play in a real band. Com on guys, these folks went to schools of higher learning and studied reading music for years.

Use Elvis' band for an example eh. Ha ha Just had to mention this. It all just struck me funny.

I enjoyed playing with some real guitar players not just strummers. I played with a guitar player that improvised on 4 or 5 choruses of "Everythings Coming Up Roses" and I don't think he hit the same note twice. I didn't realize that the guitar had that many notes. I'll never forget that night. But I remember the bass playing vocalist was a conceited Ass to work with and he was the leader and the worst musician of the bunch. I'm sure you guys remember stuff like that.

I'm a personal friend of Elvis' guitar player and band leader and he doesn't read a note, only chord charts. That's the way every studio musician I know does it.
On the other hand I can read music over well, even though I don't anymore, and I'm a small frog in a medium size puddle.

Don it no reflection on you or Elvis's guitar play. In a 20, 30 piece orchestra you can throw a sheet of intricate chart on a stand that the guy never seen before and get very close to playing it right the first time. They went to school to study this because it's their life's dream like mine was being the best pool hustler in my area of town and Gary's is to sail to Florida every other week. LOL

boo ... could I "really read music well enough to play in a real band" ? ... no, but when we started out as a band in high school we had to read because these are the books we played from:


I've posted this before, but many years ago I saw a rehearsal of Frank Sinatra JUNIOR'S big band at the Steel Pier in Atlantic City ... while I was there the music director handed out charts to a new tune they were going to put in the show ... I was BLOWN AWAY by how these guys sight read and played the tune for the first time, and I was even MOR blown away when Junior - without looking at the score - asked the sax section to play a Bb in a certain measure instead of a B !!!

BTW ... the name of the tune was "Up, Up, and Away" by The Fifth Dimension ...



"But I remember the bass playing vocalist was a conceited Ass to work with and he was the leader and the worst musician of the bunch. I'm sure you guys remember stuff like that."

As I've said, fortunately, I never had to put up with stuff like that ...

Tony what almost made me quit before I even made a good start was when I found out that there was a clarinet player in high school that could play intricate classical sheet music that he'd never heard of on the first try. I couldn't do that in a million years. That peeved me off. Not Juilliard School of Music but Behrman High School in Algiers.

By the way Pete Fountain couldn't read music but Al Hirt I was told would sit in with the Philadelphia or one of those big time symphonies up by Dave and DNJ just when he was passing through.

Some guys can do it and some can't. My consolation was I'd always think well they can't lay brick, like they would want to. Ha ha.

I don't have the patience to sit there and count 12 bars before I'm allowed to play an 8 note phrase.

You got it tony

I do film sessions from 5:00 PM Sunday until about 6:00 PM on Monday when I'm in town. Actually, the work is in Louisville, about 90 miles away. I leave about 6:00 for an 8:00 PM job back in Lexington.

I guess it could be dome by ear, but the basic track is charted. from there, it's watching the screen and playing to the action...almost like the silent music, I'd guess. The ability to read the lead line and changes speeds up the process, and the ability to write out an improvisational passage is critical.

I didn't learn to read until I got into regular studio production, but it';s been a lifesaver.

What Boo is talking about, though is a whole different thing....site reading in real time is a killer, especially on intricate pieces.

Old time section players were amazing.


Russ

boo ... my 9-5 was primarily working with computers, so I felt I had that over a lot of people ...

When I was studying accordion we had an accordion orchestra that played full symphony scores ... many times I had to count far more than 12 bars to play an 8 note phrase ...

back atcha ...

Hi Tony. First let me say Merry Christmas to you and your family and good wishes for a happy, HEALTHY, and prosperous New Year. What I have to say here has no musical significance and is merely a difference of opinion on one specific issue. As you know, except for political affiliations, I'm usually in lockstep with you and always admired the conciliatory tone and practicality you bring to most discussions. It is in that spirit that I present an opposing point of view to your above quote.

For about ten years I was a volunteer counselor in a program called Thresholds that taught a course in decision making to inmates in county and state prisons. The program operated on the premise that most inmates were in their current situations as a result of poor decision making skills. That when in situations that could land them in trouble, they were more likely to REACT rather than DECIDE. We defined 'reacting' as choosing from a list of ONE possibilities and 'deciding' as looking at multiple possibilities (the more the better) and (after careful evaluation of each one) choosing the one that was most likely to produce the desired outcome. We heavily emphasized that the outcome was irrelevant (since there was little we could do to guarantee it) and that what was important was the quality of the DECISIONAL PROCESS. For instance, if you had hungry kids at home and only five bucks to your name, and you bought a lottery ticket and WON; was that a good decision? A great outcome, sure, but was it good DECISION (think about the odds of actually hitting the lottery)?

This concept was hard for the prisoners to understand and accept but after 12 weeks of one-on-one counseling combined with experiential workshops, it started to sink in. Suddenly, hitting a guard because he may have verbally abused you, didn't make much sense when all he ended up with was a sore jaw for a coupe of hours and you spent the next 3 months in solitary confinement with a year added onto your sentence. Most of us go through this process automatically, which is why we're on the outside. Most of the inmates never learned or developed this skill set (decision making).

So with all due respect, I can't agree with you that we can judge a decision by it's outcome.

Luv you anyway though, Tony.

Chas

BTW, enjoyed that duo you did with your old guitarist. That sort of thing certainly brings back some of our fondest memories.

I was in a college level big-band back in the 80's. We sometimes had rehearsals which were solely sight reading practice. The director would hand out a chart and we would play it once and then give it back to him, never to see it again. This would go on for two or three hours at a stretch. Sight reading is a skill like any other, and gets better with practice.

I couldn't sight read my way out of a paper bag now. I'm quite out of practice.

For what it's worth, I miss playing in a band with real players.

I also consider the bands. Blood Sweat Tears, Chicago, all of the best, they eventually break up with hard feelings. Did all of the Beatles stay friends? I don't know. The horn players where I lived were not crazy about the Beatles. They put us out of work.

How log were the other two groups I mention here last. There's no longevity in it is what I think most of us OMB guys consider. We can play what we want where we want and when we want. I was called a few times to play a gig the morning of the day of the gig because the drummer for the band got sick.

Geez was he the only drummer in town that could hit the 6 licks that the guitar player knew. Do you think the whole band with Les Paul stuck together for all of the folks that they worked with over the years. It's just a big task to make it all work with a bunch of cry babies. LOL! Tony if you guys lasted 20 years, you were the exception and not the rule friend.