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..

Gerry, thanks for the compliments, my friend - I really appreciate them.

Donny, the only music job I was not asked to return was one at an Italian Restaurant in Baltimore's Little Italy. It was also the only music job I ever auditioned for. The job was Friday and Saturday evenings, 8 till midnight, I had to set my gear up out of sight behind a huge grand piano so it appeared as if I were playing the piano.

The previous entertainer was and is a piano bar player, but since then completely switched gears and is making a good living doing the senior circuit instead of nite clubs and restaurants.

The day I auditioned, the owner had me connect to his sound system, which at best was awful. A 600-watt Peavy powered mixer and a couple 10-inch Peavey speakers hanging on the wall about 8 feet off the floor. His wife was on the phone and she called the shots. She wanted me to sing and play An Evening In Roma by Dean Martin. Fortunately, I could sing this phonetically in Italian and after singing the first verse and playing a short instrumental run, she told her husband to hire me.

The very first night, there was not a single person in the room other than an attractive bar maid behind the bar on the opposite side of the room. She came over, handed me a monster champagne goblet and said this is for tips and placed it on top of the piano. Then she told me that tips are few and far between and the room I was playing in was just the lounge where restaurant customers would wait until they get seated in the main restaurant. She also said that I could order anything on the menu when I wanted to take a supper break, but I never did.

At about 8:15, a half-dozen couples came into the lounge, and I started out by playing some light, background music, some bossanova stuff, mostly instrumental. One of the ladies came up to me and asked if I could perform Unchained Melody, a song I always sang with just a short instrumental interlude. When I fired it up and began singing, everyone in the room turned to look at me and 4 couples immediately got up and began dancing. When I finished, the lady's date came over and dropped a $20 in the tip jar. More people came in when I went into my usual routine, and never went into the restaurant. By the end of the night I had about $200 in the tip jar, plus I had a check for $150 for the night's performance.

When I came back the following night, there were about 40 people in the room when I arrived, the waitress behind the bar had two assistants with her, and by the end of the nite, you couldn't get another person in the room with a shoe horn. I picked up about $300 in tips that night plus my regular paycheck, but the owner came in a couple times and didn't look happy.

The following Friday, I entered into an already packed room, set up my gear, kicked off with my usual routine, the tip jar rapidly filled, there were people dancing in the adjacent hall and about 11 p.m. the owner came up to me and said this would be my last night. I was a bit puzzled when he said this because the crowds seemed to grow every time I was there. Well, turned out, that was the problem. They were coming into the lounge, drinking $2 drafts, $4 mixed drinks, and eating free snacks, but not going into the restaurant. He said I was costing him a fortune, and while he and his wife loved the music I performed, he had to find another background piano player and fired me.

I went back to the senior circuit, made a good living and didn't have to worry about getting mugged in downtown Baltimore leaving the job at midnight and getting home a 1:30 a.m.. Now, I enjoyed performing for a younger, lively crowd, and I know UD does as well, but the senior circuit was just as much fun and the hours were a whole lot better.

All the best,

Gary

Earl, based on a style that Eric B posted this past week about blues played on the Genos, I was able to obtain that Genos style and play it on my S-950 as a modified style. The very first song that came into my aging brain was Horse With No Name when the style was played at default tempo.

This is a song that I have never performed, played or sang, but I kinda liked the way it sounded, so the next step was to download the lyrics with the chords from tabs.ultimate-guitar.com which is a great site. Then I went to You Tube and listened to the song while looking at the lyrics, marked where the vocal harmony came in and went to work on it. That was 2 hours ago. Now I'm going to get some lunch, come back and record it on the S-950 to see how I sound. When I'm done, I'll post the song here.

Gary

Looking forward to your rendition after 2 hours of work.

Earl, I managed to get through this with no supplemental oxygen - too lazy to go upstairs to switch the office O2 line on.

I recorded this as a one-shot deal using the PSR-S950's onboard recorder, Sennheiser E-855 mic, the Genos 70s RockShuffle style, Main intro, D-variation and the onboard vocal harmonizer. While the Harmony-M was a bit cleaner, I couldn't get the highs I wanted for this song. I used Audacity to convert it to an MP3 and normalize the volume setting.

Click here to hear my rendition of Horse With No Name

Time to go cook supper, spaghetti and meatballs and some garlic bread - Gotta' keep that woman happy.

Nice, Gary:

Brought back lots of memories. Now I need to go and look up the name of the song-writer. Thanks for sharing. Enjoyed!

----Dave

"A Horse with No Name" is a song written by Dewey Bunnell, and originally recorded by the folk rock band America. It was the band's first and most successful single, released in late 1971 in Europe and early 1972 in the United States, and topped the charts in Canada, Finland, and the United States. It was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America.

Gary

👍👌😎💎🍺⭐🎉

I have more than 2500 songs in the song folder I use. They are all on the laptop, just lyrics with chord changes. They are also on my keyboard. I probably could do a thousand of them without looking at words, not sure. When you play four hours a night, five or six nights a week, and for many of the same people, you have to keep it fresh. 30 songs won't do it.
One great thing about having them on the arranger, is that the audience can't tell you are looking at them. Most of the time all I have to do is glance at the words occasionally anyway.
One of the things I did right over the years is to write down the words and chords of EVERY song I've learned. At first I typed them, and accumulated hundreds, soon filling up several loose-leaf binders. When computers came along, I re-typed every one into a word processor.
For the past 25 or 30 years I've done them all that way.
In the past, you had to record the song, listen to it, write down the words, get a guitar or keyboard and play along with so you could figure out the chords, the key you want to do it in, etc. By the time you did all this you had pretty much learned the song.
Now it's much easier. Just pull it up on YouTube, Google the chords and lyrics, copy and paste, to make a chart, find a suitable style and go. Of course you have to make sure the words and chords are correct. Now I usually also enter the new song into the arranger as a Songbook or Registration entry. Then press one button and everything is ready to go.
To make a suitable repertoire is not a quick and easy thing.
I think it would be much easier if a person specialized in one genre, say Jazz, or Classic Rock, or Standards, or Blues or Country. I have to some of all of it.
Don't know if this is encouraging, but I hope it helps.

Good points, Don. I always figured on 20 to 30 songs per hour, which translates into somewhere between 80 and 120 songs for a 4-hour performance.

When I quit the nite-club/restaurant scene and went strictly to the senior circuit, it was for a couple reasons. First and foremost, the hourly rate was much higher than the bars and restaurants ever paid. Bars and restaurants in Baltimore and the surrounding counties pay an average of $100 per four hour performance for weeknights and $150 for Friday and Saturday. Most do not have music on Sundays, unless it's for a special event.

Additionally, the hours for the senior circuit were far better. Most of the jobs were in the middle of the day, I no longer had to drive in rush hour traffic jams and the vast majority of the jobs were situated just 15 to 20 minutes drive time from home. Gotta love it!

When it comes to tips, I quickly discovered that the locals rarely drop anything in a tip jar. However, if you get lots of tourists from out of town, they tend to be good tippers. That was the nice part about working in Little Italy - lots of out of town folks coming to the baseball and football games at both stadiums, which are relatively close to Little Italy. I'm sure DonM has a fair number of out of towners in his audiences as well at Ernest's Restaurant.

Like DonM, in my song collection, I also have a lot of variety, songs from just about every style category on the keyboard. You never know what will please certain audience members, so you really have to cover all the bases. I can clearly recall when I was filling in for a friend at The Raven Inn in Towson, Maryland one evening and decided to play and sing Black Velvet. An 85-year-old lady in the audience grabbed a 50-year-old man, dragged him out on the dancefloor and did some real close and personal dancing with him. When I finished the song, she walked over to me and said "How did you know that was my favorite song?" Then she gave be a hug and kiss, a big smile and went back to her table. What a night that was. Last time I saw the guy, he was headed for the rest room in a cold sweat.

Gary

Again, thanks to both of you for your input. I know when I was gigging 30 years ago on organ I was able to do 5-6 hours 4-5 nighta week and not repeat a single tune. I used cheat cards (5x8) for every tune. Unfortunately I can't find those cards now. So, starting all over. Problem is now I can't see the cards and lyrics/chords all that well. So... I'm in the process of learning many of those tunes as well as new ones at the same time.

Gary, Nice job on the tune. I enjoyed it and may have to add it to my book.

Don. Is there any way to get a copy of that file with the 2500 tunes in it?

Thanks Earl - I know it's not my best work, but I think I did OK for an old fart living on less than 20 percent of his lung capacity and shaky hands.

Merry Christmas,

Gary

Morning, Earl, Gary, Donny and Don:

Interesting reading and listening to a guy who never performs. Donny's point about smiling while playing has to be a really key ingredient. Of course, without real talent, all the smiles in the world will not bring an audience into the realm of the song being played.

Don, I was impressed with your work ethic... getting all those lyrics written down... and then wearing out your fingers getting them into a word processor. I hope you have access to a database for sorting them in just about any way you prefer... assuming you set up "targets" on each Lyric Page for the DB to use in sorting.

Gary, most of us remember your fantastic vocal delivery and KB work from years past. Life isn't fair... but you've never let it hold you back. You are an inspiration to us all.

Earl... I know you've tapped into a rich resource for advice with these three stalwarts of the "Zone"... and I wish you success as you pursue being a KB performer/artist.

Merry Christmas, All... ----Dave

Dave, they are just in a word processor, like MS Word. Now Libre.
I can sort by name, artist, genre...
I actually have two sets. One is in .doc format, the other in .txt format. I use the text files on the arrangers, since they won't read .doc. Can't sort on the arranger, but you can make various folders, like Christmas, Oldies, Standards, etc., if you want.
It has taken me about 50 years to build all this. It would be much easier to do it now.
Not sure I'm ready to share the entire thing, but I will gladly share individual songs.

I feel the same way Don...
You have to do your own music homework lots of time and efforts are a personal thing not easily shared.

...and they are ALL readily available on line. You have to personalize the chords and lyrics, but you would have to do that with mine anyway.
Just Google "Song Name Lyrics Chords".

I posted this recently, but here is a WORLD of great charts.
https://www.ozbcoz.com/Songs/index.php?instr=guitar

Hi Don & Donny:

I hope you did not think I was asking for anything song lyric related. LOL! I was thinking of Earl's question to Don and simply "chimed-in" to be of assistance in offering ways to accomplish what Earl needs... if anyone volunteered. My mistake! (Please read my "credo" below!) Seems like I'm developing "Hoof and Mouth" disease here at the "Zone!" Sorry!

Your work in collecting and cataloging all those songs is a lifetime of work and I know and appreciate that. I've spent what seems like a lifetime developing more than a thousand of my own originals. The cataloging process (plus baggage that goes with it... such as dealing with ASCAP and the Copyright Office) takes more time than the song-writing and recording.

I am proceeding to the chalk-board now and will begin writing, "I promise to keep my big mouth shut!" at least 100 times." LOL!

On a brighter note, I'm sure happy for the LSU Quarterback getting the Heisman. (SP?)

----Dave

Dave, here's one of my files, about 650 to 700 songs in this one, mostly lyrics, but some with chords over the words. Free for to anyone that wants them. https://app.box.com/s/8bwjhtworydlzehmynry06tut0wsfta9 About 30 years of work, pretty much the same way DonM did it. I began with a bunch of 3-inch looseleaf binders, then transcribed all these into Word Perfect, then later converted them to MS Word. If you open them in Word Pad, they will open as a text file if you designate this. Made life so easy when I was on stage.

Gary

Thanks. This is awesome!

Thank you all. I especially appreciate the link to Jims songbook. I have also been using https://www.classic-country-song-lyrics.com// Don't remember who turned me onto that site but it has been really good for me finding the old gems.

Thanks, Gary:

I'm hoping Earl will be able to make good use of them. I don't often do "covers" but will probably copy the file onto a memory stick in case I need one in the future. That way, you'll also have a back-up source.

Thanks, ----Dave

Truth is Gary's list isn't going to do me that much good as I need both the lyics and chords. Fact is he sent me this years ago and I wasn't able to use it then either. No problem. There is enough resources on the web to satisfy my needs. Thanks to all, I was looking for a cheat way out.

It even lets you transpose the key!

Takes some effort but easiest way is the memorize
all your songs and lyrics..

Fake books baby, fake books for me....

No it's not the easiest way! Just memorizing one song takes a while. Last night I had a request for a song I hadn't done in probably 25 years. I was able to pull up the chords and lyrics, grab a style and do it. $20. for the effort.
Maybe you can remember a thousand or so songs, but it will never be all of them.

Everyone does it different...
I could see a few songs but the bulk of your repertoire should be memorized..at least the music.......
the lyrics is another story if your a singer...
which many aren't and just play instrumentally.
Do what works for you.Good Luck. 👍

At one point, I had more than 3,000 songs in my repertoire - no way possible to remember all those lyrics. Yes, a lot of them were in my aging brain, but sometimes, ya just need help. I seriously doubt that Sinatra could remember all the words to ALL the songs he performed over the years, even those that were top hits and he performed thousands of times. I can clearly remember the last time he did My Way and blew the lyrics, but managed to muddle his way through the show with a standing ovation.

As for the songs, well, I'm just an old country boy, so more than 3 chords was pretty much unusual, but sometimes I had to use up to 4 or more - Scary!

Gary

+1 on that site ... Very easy to transpose into the key you want ...

I saw Sinatra at the Providence Civic Center 35 years ago, 'in the round' ... Second row seats ... I could see his monitors that had the lyrics to every song scrolling - including the so called 'ad-libs' he would throw in ...
On occasion during a music awards show, I've even caught a glimpse of a lyric monitor for a pop star singing their latest hit ...

How many actually sing and play here?

That's all I ever did - play and sing, including way back when I was playing guitar in smoke-filled Baltimore bars. Back then, though, I had other forms of employment, otherwise we would have starved to death.

Gary

Almost always, but I do have enough material to do all instrumental if necessary.

99.9% of the time ...

As for memorizing tunes, try to recognize patterns such as "stock" chord progressions like (I vi ii V) . You should have a good understand the relationship between the melody and how it relates to the chord. Basic music theory can get you pretty far!

Also this might be too obvious, but rehearse for your gigs! You may have over 3000 songs in your book, but your not going play them all at one gig. Try to figure what your client wants and focus your practice on the tunes that fit for the event.

Paul, I agree, wholeheartedly. However, I've always believed that you have to be extremely versatile and be able to provide a wide variety of songs for your audiences, thus the need for thousands of songs from every genre. Additionally, you must be able to look in the crowd and have the ability to read the audience. Unfortunately, not many entertainers can do this, and I've seen this first hand at many events. More often than not, those that cannot read the audience and get a good response from what they're playing, tend to crank up the volume to ear bleed levels, mistakenly believing that the louder they play, the more response they'll get.

Cheers,

Gary