Great audience response

[rpjazzguitar]

I'd been fretting over audience response to our usual Brazilian jazz and, yesterday, this happened.

My regular band took a gig that was mostly a rock gig. Hall and Oates, Steve Wonder, Thin Lizzie, Bill Withers, Leslie Gore etc. Older crowd, older music. We approached it like the jazz nerds we are. Charts, all the hits written in, main parts copied from the original recordings, like that.

Audience went wild, well, relative to when we play our usual music.

Not a surprise, but it's one thing to consider it in the abstract and another thing to feel it.

I was already trying to play groove based jazz and it makes me want to go further in that direction. But, that doesn't solve the problem of unfamiliarity. People love hearing familiar music.

[Doublea A]

I'd been fretting over audience response to our usual Brazilian jazz and, yesterday, this happened.

My regular band took a gig that was mostly a rock gig. Hall and Oates, Steve Wonder, Thin Lizzie, Bill Withers, Leslie Gore etc. Older crowd, older music. We approached it like the jazz nerds we are. Charts, all the hits written in, main parts copied from the original recordings, like that.

Audience went wild, well, relative to when we play our usual music.

Not a surprise, but it's one thing to consider it in the abstract and another thing to feel it.

I was already trying to play groove based jazz and it makes me want to go further in that direction. But, that doesn't solve the problem of unfamiliarity. People love hearing familiar music.

I hear that. I play mostly standards at restaurants, corporate events and weddings etc. We always get a greater reaction to “Isn’t She Lovely” by Stevie Wonder or “Moondance” by Van Morrison or a Beatles tune than we do from “All the Things you are”.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Tim Clark]

Someone on this forum said it before I did: "People don't know what they like, they like what they know."

[AllanAllen]

I hear that. I play mostly standards at restaurants, corporate events and weddings etc. We always get a greater reaction to “Isn’t She Lovely” by Stevie Wonder or “Moondance” by Van Morrison or a Beatles tune than we do from “All the Things you are”.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Yeah but what about upbeat standards like St Thomas or Billie’s Bounce? ATTYA is beautiful, but it plods along compared to the other three songs you listed.

[RJVB]

Head 'em up!

[Doublea A]

Yeah but what about upbeat standards like St Thomas or Billie’s Bounce? ATTYA is beautiful, but it plods along compared to the other three songs you listed.

I will still say that “Moondance” gets me Mr more tip$ than St Thomas.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[AllanAllen]

I will still say that “Moondance” gets me Mr more tip$ than St Thomas.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Here’s my experience with Moondance.


Me: ”Let’s play Moonglow, it’s a slow dance tune”

no man, moon dance is faster

”I said Moonglow, it’s not the Van Morrison song”

yeah, I love Van Morrison *starts Moondance, which I don’t know.

[pamosmusic]

Here’s my experience with Moondance.


Me: ”Let’s play Moonglow, it’s a slow dance tune”

no man, moon dance is faster

”I said Moonglow, it’s not the Van Morrison song”

yeah, I love Van Morrison *starts Moondance, which I don’t know.

Im skeptical that 55-yo tunes do better with the average restaurant crowd than 70-yo tunes anyway.

I’m sure there’s some benefit to playing tunes people know, but I think in general we need to kind of accept that we’ll be introducing people to something new and try to do a good job of that.

(or accept that we’re atmosphere and the specifics don’t matter … I’m also pretty okay with that)

[RJVB]

I will still say that “Moondance” gets me Mr more tip$ than St Thomas.

Im skeptical

Really? I think we don't have to be incredulous here

[Christian Miller]

For live music if the vibe is good people will enjoy stuff they’d never listen to at home.

But chuck in a Mas Que Nada or something near the end and you’re golden…

Obviously a covers band has an advantage. But that’s the same for someone playing original pop/rock material.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[GuyBoden]

For the quiet mid-week pub audience in the UK, in a non Jazz band, I'd play a few Bill Withers songs: "Ain't no Sunshine" and "Lovely Day".

These two Bill Withers songs might work for Jazz too.

[nevershouldhavesoldit]

or accept that we’re atmosphere and the specifics don’t matter … I’m also pretty okay with that

That’s one of the best things about restaurant gigs. I get to play whatever I want to play however I want to play it. Someone responds to almost every tune - and by the end of the show, I’ve interacted with many of the patrons. I just play whatever pops into my mind next, so I go from pop to bebop to funk to ballad to bossa. Stevie Wonder follows Brubeck who followed Gershwin after Debussy and Muddy.

For the quiet mid-week pub audience in the UK, in a non Jazz band, I'd play a few Bill Withers songs: "Ain't no Sunshine" and "Lovely Day". These two Bill Withers songs might work for Jazz too.

Everything works for jazz!

[Doublea A]

Im skeptical that 55-yo tunes do better with the average restaurant crowd than 70-yo tunes anyway.

I’m sure there’s some benefit to playing tunes people know, but I think in general we need to kind of accept that we’ll be introducing people to something new and try to do a good job of that.

(or accept that we’re atmosphere and the specifics don’t matter … I’m also pretty okay with that)

I would say within a set of about 12 tunes. 1 or 2 would be “Pop” tunes.

Let me say that I prefer to play Jazz Standards. I believe that the chord progressions of Jazz Standards are much better suited for improvisation. However, I seem to receive a much bigger response (both monetarily and through applause) when I perform a Beatles tune or a some other “Pop” song.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Mick-7]

Im skeptical that 55-yo tunes do better with the average restaurant crowd than 70-yo tunes anyway.

I’m sure there’s some benefit to playing tunes people know, but I think in general we need to kind of accept that we’ll be introducing people to something new and try to do a good job of that.

(or accept that we’re atmosphere and the specifics don’t matter … I’m also pretty okay with that)

There are many streaming radio stations that play "pop oldies" or "classic rock," but they don't normally play anything older than the late 50's - Chuck Berry, etc. You'll have to listen to a jazz station to hear most of the tunes we play, and that's a much smaller audience.

[AllanAllen]

I would say within a set of about 12 tunes. 1 or 2 would be “Pop” tunes.

Let me say that I prefer to play Jazz Standards. I believe that the chord progressions of Jazz Standards are much better suited for improvisation. However, I seem to receive a much bigger response (both monetarily and through applause) when I perform a Beatles tune or a some other “Pop” song.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

There’s a group by me that’s milking this for all it’s worth. Piano, sax and drum trio that does 1 standard every 10 pop tunes. They’re all so good you can easily forget it’s Werewolves of London.

I was talking to the piano player and he said sometimes he hits a chord without looking at his keyboard to challenge himself to fix it back into the tune, but they never sound outside or too hip for casual ears.

So, I’m saying, this can work, I’m just not good enough to pull it off… yet.

[Stringswinger]

Let's remember that a lot of jazz standards were show tunes written after the late 50's (Day's of Wine and Roses, Moon River, Watch What Happens, etc.). But the rock tunes of that same era (Beatles, Stones etc.) still brings a greater response on my gigs from patrons of all ages.

And I get a better response from jazz standards that were show tunes than I do jazz tunes (many of which are contrafacts written to the harmony of earlier show tunes). " Indiana" gets me a better response than "Donna Lee".

That said, people seem to love the blues. When I play "Back at the Chicken shack", audiences of all ages react very well. A good melody, an understandable harmony (can we call that a "Harmonious harmony"? ) and "Groove" all combine to get the audience connecting with you.

Having played everything from concerts with hundreds of people hanging on every note to Corporate gigs where the music is almost completely ignored ("can you guys turn down a bit? We want to see you, but we really don't want to hear you"), I find it more rewarding (and inspiring) to play to a connected audience. YMMV

[Doublea A]

Let's remember that a lot of jazz standards were show tunes written after the late 50's (Day's of Wine and Roses, Moon River, Watch What Happens, etc.). But the rock tunes of that same era (Beatles, Stones etc.) still brings a greater response on my gigs from patrons of all ages.

And I get a better response from jazz standards that were show tunes than I do jazz tunes (many of which are contrafacts written to the harmony of earlier show tunes). " Indiana" gets me a better response than "Donna Lee".

That said, people seem to love the blues. When I play "Back at the Chicken shack", audiences of all ages react very well. A good melody, an understandable harmony (can we call that a "Harmonious harmony"? ) and "Groove" all combine to get the audience connecting with you.

Having played everything from concerts with hundreds of people hanging on every note to Corporate gigs where the music is almost completely ignored ("can you guys turn down a bit? We want to see you, but we really don't want to hear you"), I find it more rewarding (and inspiring) to play to a connected audience. YMMV

Well said


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Mick-7]

Of course old standards can be reinvented, here's an extreme example of that:

[rpjazzguitar]

We played Lovely Day as our first tune. People seemed to like it.

A little later, we played Private Eyes and Sunny. People were dancing.

Then we played Mas Que Nada, which is in our usual repertoire (since we're a Brazilian jazz band) and I saw the dancers get confused by the samba beat. I heard Sergio Mendes play it live two years ago and he had the crowd on its feet and screaming. Our crowd, not so much, even though we do a very energetic version.

The client wanted some Brazilian music and we tried to keep it familiar (Ipanema, Mas Que Nada, Aquarela Do Brazil) but I don't think the crowd related to it all that well.

The crowd probably had an average age in the 60s. So, they related well to tunes they heard in their teen years. That would have included songs that came out contemporaneously and also songs that were still on the radio from a few years before.

So, they liked Maneater, Private Eyes, Just The Way You Are, Isn't She Lovely. Mas Que Nada strikes me as a tune that sounds somewhat familiar to people that age but isn't beloved.

They'd also have grown up hearing some of their parents' music, so they responded, although less intensely, to Ain't Misbehaving and Ipanema.

Overall, the songs that were most readily danceable went over best, even though only a minority actually danced. I think non-dancers like seeing dancers.

Our usual gigs are at eating/drinking places of various descriptions playing Brazilian jazz. This was our first pure party gig with this band. So, that's also different. For the restaurant gigs, I'm planning on sticking with our selection of Brazilian tunes (I've posted a bunch in the Showcase section of this forum) and also introducing some standards with good lyrics.

We were reluctant to become a rock band for a party, but I'm glad we did. It was a fun gig.

[AllanAllen]

Did you play the party songs in a Brazilian style? Or did you play 80s covers with Brazilian jazz mixed in?

[rpjazzguitar]

Did you play the party songs in a Brazilian style? Or did you play 80s covers with Brazilian jazz mixed in?

We didn't let the string beans touch the mashed potatoes.

We did kept as faithful as we could to the recordings on the covers (more 60s and 70s actually), so, no Brazilian influence there. Then, separately, we played a handful of Brazilian songs that we thought the audience might recognize.

We have a terrific slow, smoky arrangement of Ipanema, but we went with the Real Book version, just to keep it familiar. Mas Que Nada. Aquarela Do Brasil (which is the tune most Americans know as "Brazil" although Americans don't seem to know all the sections).

We had Oye Como Va (not Brazilian, of course) on the setlist, but, somehow, we never played it. A shame. I'm a fan of both Santana and Tito Puente and I found a Boogie-like overdriven sound in my ME70 pedalboard. I was all ready to lose control of myself - when the leader skipped over the tune. Maybe he was prescient. Or maybe we had penciled in too many alterations in the chart and he wisely avoided a train wreck.

[AllanAllen]

Maybe the people couldn't keep up with the eclecticism. I can see it being jarring going from a faithful rendition of Private Eyes into a vanilla Ipanema.

[rpjazzguitar]

Maybe the people couldn't keep up with the eclecticism. I can see it being jarring going from a faithful rendition of Private Eyes into a vanilla Ipanema.

Interesting point. We started with Lovely Day and did Ipanema second. So maybe that wasn't so bad.

But, later, we did Maneater, Ain't Misbehavin' and Aquarela Do Brasil in that order. Jarring? Certainly seems possible.

My impression of the reaction was that the dancers were fine with the first two and were confused by the samba groove on the third. It also occurred to me that despite a lot of effort to master samba, we might still be better with the music we grew up with.

I didn't do the set list on this gig. It was one of those things that evolved in a series of discussions. The bandleader on this gig tried to turn it down saying that we're a Brazilian jazz band and wouldn't be appropriate for the party, but it was a connection through a friend and the client was insistent. I want you! I'm happy to say that he had heard us before.

So, the first idea was to play half Brazilian jazz, but the leader asked the client what he wanted and the client responded with a song list. That then got filtered through our vocalist and revised again.

My only concern was that the charts had convoluted roadmaps. We went over them carefully and still screwed one up that had, somehow, a coda which led to a third ending and then to a double coda/segno.

Big band charts never have difficult roadmaps. Even when they were being copied by hand, they often read top left to bottom right - no repeats, no nothing. Some would have DS and a coda, but rarely anything more than that.

The music could be really tough to read, but they knew to keep the roadmaps simple.

[nevershouldhavesoldit]

Interesting point. We started with Lovely Day and did Ipanema second. So maybe that wasn't so bad.

The same rule applies to both your instruments and your repertoire. It ain't what you play, it's how you play it.

There's an old story about a young future superstar (Clapton, IIRC) who was describing his severe frustration to an equally promising contemporary. He'd been on the bill with a few others for a concert that featured BB King. He played his heart out and thought he'd done it well. Then BB came out, "...played one note, and got a standing ovation".

[rpjazzguitar]

I heard a similar story about a BB King show in Reno.

He hit a high note and held it. Kept shaking it to keep it sustaining. One chorus, two choruses. At the start of the third chorus the crowd started screaming. One note.