You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - What WE Play On Long Gigs

Episode Date: December 14, 2023

We've all been there. Playing a super long gig can be challenging! In this episode, Adam and Peter offer some tips to get some extra mileage out of your tunes and have more fun during those long stretches. ↓ Links from the pod ↓Open Studio Pro | GATELISTHave a question for us? Leave us a SpeakPipeCheckout courses from Adam, Peter and more at Open Studio🎹 Head over to our YouTube channel for a better look 👀.Follow us on Instagram

Hey, Peter. Hey, Adam. You know, these episodes, they're supposed to be 20 to 30 minutes long, and sometimes they feel like they're two or three hours long, and I'm just wondering, what do we do? Yes, I can tell you exactly what that is, Adam. Yeah, your incessant need for perfection. Oh, that's what's causing this to happen, sir.

Yeah, that's true. Oh, by the way, Merry Christmas. Merry Christmas. Hi, I'm Adam Annis. And I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to The You'll Hear a podcast. Chast talk. Chast talk.

Just talk. Question for you. Yes. Right out the gate. Okay. Do you know what vlog miss is? Have you ever heard of that? Excuse you?

What? Vlogmas. Say it again? V-L-O-G-M-A-S? Vlogmas. Oh, is it like a Merry Christmas vlog? Is it like a Christmas? But did you know that?

Are you just guessing? No, I just guessed. Okay. It's a thing. Go on YouTube. Some of my favorite shout out some of my favorite YouTubers. What's, I forget their names. But there's a bunch of them.

They're your favorites. No, once you watch one vlog miss, YouTube will serve you up on another. What the hell is that, though? It's like you're starting on December 1st and you vlog every day all the way up to Christmas. Vlogmas. Vlogness. It's like an advent calendar for vlogs. Exactly.

And what's funny is some of my favorite YouTubers are actually, as part of their vlogmas, they're opening up an Advent calendar every day. Well, yeah, that would be like a perfect thing. It's like a hat on a hat within a hat. Within a hat. Yeah. How many hats you got to have on Christmas? You got a Santa hat. You got a beanie.

I can tell you one thing. You know what one of my favorite hats, I was, is our, what? I'm a little nervous because you force us through 37 takes of this episode. Sorry. Okay, just, we're going to give people a little bit of premonition as to what's to come, because this is actually very exciting. The reason we did 37 takes is we have a very exciting episode that's going to be forthcoming if we can ever get through it.

It's not this one. Yeah. This one's going to be great, too. It has to do with an influence on Keith Jarrett. Yes, and it's super excited, but we're so nervous because Keith is so great that we don't want to screw it up. And we assume he watches. As much as every episode.

Exactly. We know we do. No, but I was going to say, one of my favorite hats is a little thing called Open Studio Pro, which is not only is it a hat, it's a feather in your cap. It's a feather. It's a cap that comes with a feather. And it's also a feathered boa that's around you as you perform. We do get fancy occasionally.

Yeah. So tell us what's happening over at Open Studio Pro. Man, over to Open Studio Pro, we have an amazing lineup of instructors. And we also have an incredible community. And this community got a lot larger. We opened the gate for the first time in a couple of months. Come on in! Now get back out!

It was amazing how many people joined. And so we just have the best time over there every day, multiple times a day. We've got classes hosted by myself. You, the great Chris Parks from the things I learned from Barry Harris YouTube channel. The great Jeremy Siskin from his own YouTube channel and his amazing books. We've got John O'Leary. We've got Bob DeBoo. It's just an incredible group of instructors over there.

And just to be clear, when you should be sure, when you should be sure, we're just say several lessons a day. We were talking about live lessons via Zoom with folks on there in real time from around the world. That's right. It started during the pandemic, March 2020, I just started going live on Zoom every day at noon. Yeah. And that group ballooned to such a big group. Everyone was just me and you. That was weird. That was weird. That's where it started. I was like, why does Peter want to watch me practice? This is strange. No, but it got to be such a huge part of our daily lives when there's nothing else going on that it turned into this incredible experience. And I say it all the time, but it's like, we accidentally stumbled upon the thing that

was missing from online jazz education and is the community, right? It is the people that are there. So go check out Open Studio Pro. Sign up for the next time the gate opens up. You don't want to miss it. You got to be on the wait list. So go to Open StudioJazz.com slash pro, because that's the only way to get on the gate list. Gate list. We just, that's what it's called from now. That's what is. Right. It'll write it down. Gate list. It's the gate list. Okay. So today, we are going to revisit it are wonderful viewers and listeners and some questions that they have. You can go to you'll hear at dot com and leave a question with your voice at any point. We call it a speak pipe because that's what the company that provides us the service calls it.

So we're very inventive. But this is from Elaine. Can we just give a listen and give a gander? Yeah. Are you sure you don't want to play a little bit before? No, okay. Let's listen. The question from Elaine is, can you guys play like Keith Jarrett if he was drunk on Bourbon

Street? Mission accomplished. But I have the feeling that's a different question. Let's hear it. Hello. My name's Elaine. I just wanted to say thank you for the Open Studio courses. I've really been getting a lot out of them.

As someone who grew up, not being able to afford piano lessons, this has been such a blessing in my life. And I just want to say thank you. Also wanted to ask about, long gigs. I recently played a two-hour set at a restaurant, a solo piano set. I'm usually accompanying piano with my own singing, but I found that hard to do for two hours. And they wanted to keep hiring me every month for three hours. Nice. Every night. And I wanted to know what the heck do you play. Yeah, how do you stretch that time without everything sounding the same?

Thanks. Thank you, Elaine. That's a great question, Elaine. I can first of all tell you what not to do. Yes. And that is go check out the cozy corner jazz cafe. Because that'll be playing the same thing yet stretching out time interminably. For 11 hours.

Yeah, don't do that. Sounds like Elaine is going to have to expand her repertoire a little bit. Well, I think so. but I'm just wondering if the one thing, this is a little bit maybe simplistic, but I think I was putting myself in that situation. I've actually been in that situation that I can remember.

Take a break. Like that, like a two hour set straight through is too much for a player or for a listener. Even I'm trying to think like, what's the longest like Brookner or Mahler symphony? I don't think it ever gets to two hours.

Hour and 37 or 40 or something like that? And isn't there using an intermission taken or is that straight through? I think it's straight through. But it's still like movements. So there's a little bit of brief. And that's long. But, I mean, you're talking about two hours of playing.

It's just too much, I think. I mean, not to say that you or I or probably you, Elaine, where you're doing it. And many could sit down and do it. But in terms of, like, really being effective, how do we optimize that time? Now, sometimes the restaurateur or whatever, be like, we want music constantly. So you might have to do a little bit of finagland and explain that even a five-minute break or a seven-minute break. It's just like meetings. Like, is there ever been a two-hour meeting where there was no break?

where it was effective for two hours? No, no, no. I think it's pretty standard that after an hour there's at least a 15-minute break and then another 15-minute break every hour you play. If I'm doing two hours,

I'll take- Call that a union gig, sir. Yeah, if I'm doing two hours, if I have a two-hour restaurant gig, let's say, I'm definitely taking a break at the 50-minute mark and coming back at the 10-after mark and then playing basically

two 50-minute sets with a 20-minute break. You're like a train conductor. Yeah, no, I mean, just in general, that's what I'm thinking. If it's a three-hour gig, I'll break at maybe the hour, for 20 minutes, come back and play, you know, a 45-minute set, take another break for 10 or 15 minutes,

come back and play a short set at the end or something. And I think the way to frame this, if you're getting pushed back from, you know, management or whatever, is that this is really what is best for the listener too. It's kind of like if you go eat at a restaurant and they're like, we're going to give you a seven-course meal and it's just they're serving the food continuously and there's no like time for digestion in between

or some kind of break, it takes away from what's happening. So, you know, that you could kind of frame it along those lines. And also just a very short break when you're, but you got to get up. It has to be, even if it's three minutes, if you get up and pace or go to the go outside, something. It's good for the people listening too. It's good for the people listening. Yeah.

Another thing you might think of, Elaine, is if you're doing a two hour sets, right, with two different sets, you should have, I would think as a singer who is accompanying themselves on piano, you should have a full hour of just piano. Yeah. Like a full hour and maybe not in a row. And that's a good way to kind of set up the two sets and differentiate. Right. But say if you're singing for like, this is special.

This is something that's featured. And then use the solo piano texture as sort of the bedrock of what you're doing. And then when you start singing, it's like this. Oh my goodness. Like she started singing. It sounds amazing. Yeah. I didn't realize this.

I thought it was just a solo piano. Because it's such a dramatic flare to the listener when you bring in vocals or take them away. In fact, there's nothing more, even like bringing in drums or something. Something. But the voice coming in and out is that's always going to be a nice, dramatic turn of events. Yeah, so see if you can get, you know, your solo piano set together. Yeah.

You just have an hour of solo piano music and maybe you have an hour of tunes that have vocals. Yeah. So this is just kind of random rapid fire order, but I'm thinking like... Rhythm Frient five. 57 greatest jazz standards. That's right. Yeah, 57. Yeah.

But I think, you know, you can Keith Jared it a little bit. You know, a little bit of a vamp can be put in anywhere. And I think the trick to this is to do it where it feels right. So this is hard because it's like, I know it's easier as if we tell you at 44 minutes into the first set, Keith Jared it. And by Keith Jared, I mean like, whatever the groove of what you're playing is like to go into a vamp, right? It can be anything. Yeah. And it doesn't have to be exactly, you know, one, four.

five, you know, four minor, whatever. Whatever you want to do. A pedal is really nice because you can do whatever you want. And I think the trick is like to find a place where it feels right to you. I know. Is that Keith Jared? Man, Keychard, John Coates, Vince Goralty. We're going to get into all that.

Yeah. Yeah, pick a pedal point and start a vamp. And you can get a good 10 minutes out of that. So, like, so, for instance. No, nice. You've improvised, you played the tune and then. This is on Green Dolphin Street, by the way, if you don't know. You get several minutes out of this.

Ah. Go wherever you want. One for this, like going up to the four minor. Especially like a ballad. So like if you're coming out of, you know, I like this is a ballad. You might be like, well, what do I do? Of course you can do any of that kind of stuff.

But you can also be like, Go back in the time. Smooth jazzy, baby. You know what I like on this? So if I would do this... E major 7 to A flat minor. You could also alternate... Alternation in the house.

Raise your hands if you like altered chords. I do it. High ridge shuffle. Yeah. And then that becomes its own groove and an old little tune. It's so atmospheric and fun. Look at him.

Got a smile back on his... I can't help it. Yeah. I mean, so many just different grooves. So I think thinking, especially if you're playing some complex tunes, like some standards, for sure, a little lush life, something like if you're really playing some cool stuff, it's like go simple when they, when you get into these like break points. Totally. Like the in between because if you want to kind of play continuously, like let the, let the whole, we talk about letting a tune or a solo breathe, let the whole set breathe.

Let it. Let it ebb and flow. Don't be afraid. Like, don't move off that vamp until you're tired of it because believe me, the listener is way behind you. Yeah, you can damp with your voice too. Yeah. You know, practice your 100%. 100%. One, baby, bam, baby, baby.

Not like that. Elaine, great question. If you'd like to send us a question, go to you'll hear it.com and leave us to speak pipe. Speak into the pipe. Let's talk about one more thing. Okay. Gala.

What does that mean to you? Tell me. The gentleman and ladies agreement. This is an agreement that is, well, it's free. Well, and they've already entered into it. You're already, if you're listening to this or watching this, you are part of it already. It's like, you know, when you go to park and they give you a little ticket. And as you're walking away from the parking lot,

you read on the back, we are not responsible for anything. You have answered that agreement. So you are responsible for adhering to the gentlemen's and ladies agreement. For sure. And what is it? It means that you have to like, subscribe, and leave a comment on the YouTube video at you'll hear it. Gala, Gala times 10? Maybe gala times 100? Gala times 100 for this video. Oh, I like it. We want to see Gala times 100 for this video. That's awesome. Until next time. You'll hear it.