Perceptions

I'm sitting here reflecting on my emotional reactions to how some of my recent gigs have gone. First off, I'm excluding the ones where I say to myself, "Man, that really sucked." or "Shit, that was unbelieveable!". Fortunately, I can't really remember the last time I said the former, though I've had my share, and one that definitely falls into the latter category was the show featuring Chucho Valdes at Banff.

It's the ones that fall in between these two poles, especially when I have some sort of personal interest in the outcome. So that eliminates the more commercial ones like the fundraiser I played last week. I go into every gig with the aim of playing as best I can and at fulfilling my designated role for the evening. For the fundraiser, we were background music, and we did a fine job of being wallpaper. That's all there is to that sort of gig.

Rather, I am thinking about my other three most recent gigs, one with the Silent Summer Nights Monster Orchestra, a restaurant gig with Wanda, and the ion Zoo set last night at the Cellar. I think they were all good gigs, at least in terms of audience satisfaction. How they merited musically is where I get hung up.

The only way one could tell if the Monster Orchestra show had any merit would have been to be part of the audience. Keeping my focus on three conductors, and being in the back of the orchestra where the sound was sketchy, there was no way that I could really hear everything that was going on. The energy felt good and there was a large range of sounds and textures that seemed appropriate to the movie. The audience seemed to really like it, mind you quite a few of them were pretty stoned. I had fun playing, and that was really why I came away from that gig feeling like it went well.

I know the audience really liked us at Wanda's gig on Saturday. Seb's is a fairly small room and we got immediate feedback from the patrons. They came up and complimented us and bought cds from us, so we knew we did our job as far as providing an evening's entertainment. Plus, we can make objective assessments of how well we played technically - how well we blended as a group, kept the time and the feel, played over the changes, tuning, etc. A recording of the night would have provided a way for us to go back an mark how we did. I fear that I would have to take a few marks off for showboating a couple of times when I soloed, getting a little too big for my own britches. It happens with this group when things go well and I'm having fun. Another measure of how we did on the night is if we get booked again. In that regard, this group is generally quite successful. We bring in people, the rooms are usually full, we start and finish when we're supposed to, take reasonable break time, look good and play not too loud - all the things that a manager is looking for. It's why this group works so frequently.

ion Zoo is much harder to evaluate. In free playing, many of the familiar measuring sticks are thrown out the window. There are certainly no chord changes to play over and we generally avoid groove. We have a passing acquaintance with tonality, which we may choose to work with or not. Form? Pretty amorphous. So what is left are often much more fundamental questions: Was that musical? Did we connect and communicate as a group? Was it original? Did we connect with the audience? This sort of questioning is one reason why I am so attracted to this form of music.

There is a variety of opinions in improvised music circles as to whether or not connection with the audience is important. I believe it's crucial, otherwise you're better off wanking off in the practice room. It does have a bearing as to the choices I make in the moment, as I believe I have a responsibility to the audience. As I've mentioned in previous postings, I also believe that having a singer in the group provides the most direct connection with the audience. Carol Sawyer is tremendously talented and has a knack for improvising stories and songs based on her life experience, often in a very funny and engaging way. We do strive to connect with our listeners.

<- ion Zoo sound check at the Cellar

So was the Cellar gig last night any good? I think so. We had a reasonably good-sized audience. We kept them in their seats through our set and they listened to what we were doing. (It's never good when they start streaming through the exits!) I always take it as a good sign when we can quiet a large room, as Wanda can also do when she nails a ballad. We had a few of those intuitive group moments when we all started shifting together. We also came up with some interesting spontaneous compositions, where it sounded like it had been written. Some of the moods we created were also new for us, somewhat on the dark side. Maybe it had something to do with being the 11th of September, I don't know. (I hate what I call the numericization of the English language, like 9/11, 24/7, "get the 411" or even "that's a big 10-4", but that's a topic of for another rant.)

The only real way to evaluate this particular gig will be to listen to the recording of the night, preferably a few weeks down the road. Our track record is that almost always we have created some good and interesting music. Perhaps I am too analytical of what's going on during the performance, that I can't step back and be objective. But I need to be involved in order to make what I trust are musical decisions. And I want to be playing from my emotional core.

We've had a few gigs where things have been transcendant, and if we have anything less, I'm a bit let down. That's a pretty big burden to put on one's self, and a nice way to undermine all of the good things that happened at a gig. It's those damned expectations again.

As for the audience, I'm sure that there were as many reactions as there were listeners, ranging from "Oh, wow" to "That really blew" to "Oh man, Bagnell's stealing my shit again!"

Another very sure yardstick for the success of a gig is if the leader, in this case me, forgets the cheque for the band at the bar. Which makes me yet again a loser.