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My pet musical peeve
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: MMario Date: 29 Oct 01 - 10:40 AM to be in a venue where "singalong" would be reasonable and expected - and have someone do a familiar tune in such a peculiar version no one else can sing or play along with it. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Trevor Date: 29 Oct 01 - 10:53 AM Singers who think that to be really traditional you have to sound like some octogenarian ploughman with a cold. And have worse diction than Lester Piggot. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GUEST,Scabby Doug at work Date: 29 Oct 01 - 11:01 AM Something that was touched on earlier on: I know this -let's say "person" -who sings at a session I attend. This person regularly sings chorus songs, and encourages the rest of us to sing by calling out the words before each line. I resent the implication that I need that person to tell me words which I can pick up for myself if I'm interested in singing them. I feel "bullied" - and as a result often don't sing along. ALso, same person has terrible diction on many songs. Key phrases are often slurred over. giving the impresssion that person doesn't know the words or can't be bothered to learn them... Cheers Steven |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Gypsy Date: 29 Oct 01 - 11:15 AM Assuming that i will be thrilled by someone hot stealing one of my instruments to play on. People banging on my hammered dulcimer (akin to what any drummer has to live with) |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Jack the Sailor Date: 29 Oct 01 - 11:23 AM Chuck Berry summed up my feelings about Melody in "Roll over Beethoven. It seems that everyone who does the US national anthem nowadays is trying to outdo Jimi. Aren't you supposed to beable to sing along? Thank goodness the Canadian Anthem is too bland to jazz up. My peeve is Guitar Players who have a doobie or to before they set their volumes. Always way too loud and they seem to have a weird timing of their own which I call rubber band time. I can listen to Whitney do that for a song or two but it gets old, quick. I guess my number one peeve is artists who are too much into fake sentimentlity... This is for you daddy... Come on back and talk to Teddy Bear.... I'm in love with CarolC, JenEllen, SharonA, Aine.. IamJohnne etc etc... Lots of sweet women on Mudcat.... |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GUEST,CMiller Date: 29 Oct 01 - 11:40 AM Amen to the audience clapping thing. I don't even like it when I am IN then audience and people seem to think that they have to clap along with the music. I want to hear the performers, not the people around me. People that play in jams and don't bother to tune their instrument before starting. One instrument slightly out of tune can destroy the whole session. Fiddlers that want to play tunes at breakneck speed. They seem to forget that most of those old fiddle tunes are dance tunes and were never intended to be played as fast as they are. Yeah, and Orange Blossom Special IS usually played too fast. The guys that I typically hear playing it are not good enough fiddlers to be playing it that fast. They sound sloppy. They need to slow down and pay more attention to how they are expressing their music. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: M.Ted Date: 29 Oct 01 - 11:51 AM A lot of good peeves--I especially agree with Gypsy on people who snatch your instrument--I stopped going to a certain Balkan music camp because one year my drum was smashed to pieces by person or persons unknown(they put the pieces back in the case!), and someone appropriated my treasured L-4 while I was asleep and proceeded to destroy the top with a by strumming it with a plastic shoehorn! |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Bill D Date: 29 Oct 01 - 11:51 AM well...ok...I gotta say it..instrumentalists ('mostly' guitar or banjo players) who 'noodle' constantly between songs in a group seting...Yeah, I know, tuning has to be checked occasionally, and little runs and phrases are begging to be tested and refined, but PLEASE...don't make the next person wait and/or beg for some quiet to start their contribution? |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Justa Picker Date: 29 Oct 01 - 11:55 AM Taking a cue from Seamus's comment, audiences who clap on 1 + 3. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Mooh Date: 29 Oct 01 - 12:00 PM Quasi R'n'B stylings like Houston and Carrie (sp?) et al. Reducing every song or tune to the same style. I once sat through a whole evening of a popular DJ who also did the "folksinger" act. He didn't do James Taylor well at all but he tried to make everything sound like JT anyway, including Proud Mary. God, it was lousy. "This is from our soon to be released CD..." Oh yeah, right. Prima donna singers who don't acknowledge the band, help carry gear, thank the band, introduce them on stage, contribute to marketing etc etc etc. Employers who short the payment for any excuse whatsoever. Drug use by band members at any time even remotely close to performance. This has ruined many a gig for me over the years, either directly, or because the expectation of problems created anxiety in others which affected their performance too. Anyone who dares to touch an instrument without the owner's permission at that particular instance. "He lets me play it all the time." When you're pissed? "This guitar (or whatever) is so good I only have to tune when I restring." My ass. Bad attempts at duplicating note for note a recorded version of anything. I'd rather hear a bad attempt at an original (and tasteful) version of anything. Mooh.
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: M.Ted Date: 29 Oct 01 - 01:01 PM Ditto on the clapping, JP, and Mooh, we must have played in the same band!
Also hate: Bands who play reggae with the beat in the wrong place,, |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Justa Picker Date: 29 Oct 01 - 01:14 PM - Sidemen who show up, a minute and a half before the first set begins. - Hotel staff who tell you how wonderful you (or your band) are, and how much the clients love you ---and then never rebook you. - Agents who book you on a gig out of town, telling you your music is a perfect fit for the clientele, and then you show up, discover it's a heavy metal bar, and there are strippers performing during the band breaks, and you get booed when you go back on following the strippers. - Not being able to fire a weak or lame musician in the band because he happens to own the rehearsal space and p.a. system - people who HATE Martins and claim they don't do a thing for them. They obviously have never played a good one. (To me it's like saying you hate Steinways [and prefer a Mason-Rich apartment sized piano.] This one, I'll never ever figure out, nor would I attempt to. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Don Firth Date: 29 Oct 01 - 01:53 PM 0h, yeah! How much time have you got? As 53 says above, ". . . sometimes to play less is better." One pet peeve that will incite me to the verge of violence is -- Well, let me set this up so you'll know exactly what I mean. The following is an excerpt from something I wrote for the "Tales of Walt Robertson" thread back around the first year, dealing with one of the many things that I learned from Walt. He showed me that less is more in other ways, too. The way he sang Johnny, I Hardly Knew You. It's very much an anti-war song. In some versions it has several angry, almost strident verses. The DT database gives seven verses, and I have often heard it sung this way -- with great energy, almost quick-march, flogging the audience with its already obvious message. Sometimes the audience (the already converted) responded with shouts, whistles, foot stomp-ing, and roars of applause. All hyped up to rush out and fight for Peace.
The first time I heard this song, it was Walt who sang it. But that was not the way he sang it. Now, Walt certainly knew all the other verses, but he chose to sing only these four, at a moderate, conversational tempo, almost like a funeral march, but not too slow: His soft, emotionally restrained delivery paints a simple but graphic picture of intense, personal tragedy. He usually left an audience in a long moment of hushed silence at the end of that song. Message delivered, quietly and without bombast. Power in simplicity. I sing the song the way I learned from Walt. My peeve is this: it frequently happens when I sing this song at a party, hootenanny, or song circle that someone who has more ego than brains and possesses all the musical taste of rusty hinge says, "Hey! You left out three verses!" then he (it's invariable a guy -- women know better) proceeds to sing the three verses! (#!@&%#!!) He has no idea at this point that he is involved in a near death experience. My second pet peeve, running a dead heat with those who insist on clapping along, are -- well, let me put it this way: I'm singing in a coffeehouse. A guy asks me to sing Greensleeves. Then, as I sing it, he tries to accompany me on the bongos. Don Firth |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: M.Ted Date: 29 Oct 01 - 02:05 PM Agents who book your glam metal band for "Conference of Music Industry Professionals" that turns out to be the dinner dance at a Methodist Summer retreat for Organists and Choir Directors--
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GUEST,53/Glenda Date: 29 Oct 01 - 02:07 PM Ooh! Now I am a guilty party! I am JUST learning to play without having to have the book in front of me, but then, I am mainly playing in my own living room! ;) Glenda |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: kendall Date: 29 Oct 01 - 02:09 PM I've been to a few folk clubs where a local performer will show up, do his 3 songs and leave. They are too good to listen to anyone else. These people really fry my arse. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GUEST,Kim C no cookie Date: 29 Oct 01 - 03:41 PM I know I can't do anything about this one, but I'm going to throw it in anyway... people who request modern songs when you are playing in a historical context. I actually had someone ask me, at an 1850s event, if I knew Orange Blossom Special. Oh, and this one... we were at an 18th century event where one of the PARTICIPANTS insisted on playing modern bluegrass tunes (they are old-timey, after all), and didn't seem to understand the concept of taking turns. At this same event, after I did what I like to call "the bagpipe trick" on my fiddle, some guy says, oh, you didn't play such and such note. I said, here, you play it then. He backed off. The other one is people who sing along loudly and either don't know the words or can't sing at all. People who just assume we will play for free. Now, really, a lot of times we do, for local events. But we have been to events where other people were getting paid, and I sorta feel like, well, if you can pay them, then you can pay us too. Someone already mentioned those people who tell you how much they enjoy your show, then never call you. But to be fair... there are moments that make all the BS worthwhile. :-) |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Bat Goddess Date: 29 Oct 01 - 03:55 PM Instrumentalists who "noodle" in between songs/tunes at asession so that other musicians can't start a tune or singers find a note, etc. Bat Goddess |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Liz the Squeak Date: 29 Oct 01 - 04:04 PM 'Hands only' instrument players who play tunes so fast that us poor wind instrumentalists are hyperventillating, wheezing and blue or just plain suffocating by the end..... LTS |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GUEST Date: 29 Oct 01 - 06:35 PM How about when people who can't sing insist on screeching out songs to the whole neighborhood? We onece rented to someone who would sing along to the radio at the top of her lungs, no matter when it was. Not only was she nowhere near being on key, she thought she was a soprano, despite all evidence to the contrary. We actually had people come to the house one day asking what was wrong, they'd this terrible noise. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: 53 Date: 29 Oct 01 - 06:51 PM ho ho ho BOB |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: kendall Date: 29 Oct 01 - 07:46 PM You've heard of people who dont know nothin? well, there are those who dont even SUSPECT anything. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: 53 Date: 29 Oct 01 - 10:55 PM that is so very true, and there are those who'll never suspect nothing. BOB |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Dead Horse Date: 30 Oct 01 - 04:13 AM Singers who forget next line, try to find it in some inner recess of brain, start verse again, long pause, "No, lost it again" Then decides to start at very beginning of song, still loses it. Sings something else instead. All this can take what seems like half an hour. Shanties sung too fast. Shanties sung too slow. Shanties sung with no feeling. Drunks who ask for "That Irish one you do" Audiences that don't wait to hear what chorus YOU are doing, before singing their own. Joining in on last line of verse, rather than on chorus. People who ask what my pet hates are............ I could go on, but I don't want to sound opinionated ;-) |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Trevor Date: 30 Oct 01 - 04:35 AM How about "Yeah, that was alright but will you do one we can all join in with now? Do you know 'The Wild Rover' or 'Streets of London'? Do you know any Wham?" Honest! |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: RangerSteve Date: 30 Oct 01 - 07:41 AM People who yell, rather than sing, the lyrics, in an attempt to show how meaningful their lyrics are. Old Time and Bluegrass folks who play and sing too fast. The instrumentals are mostly dance music, and dancing is not a speed contest. Playing a song too fast is pointless, since the audience is going to miss a lot of the lyrics, and doesn't have the chance to ask you to repeat yourself. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GUEST,KB with cookie missing Date: 30 Oct 01 - 09:05 AM Well I'm guilty of about 3 of the things mentioned - but I'm not admitting to which they are.. What I hate is someone shouting out 'lets have something cheerful now' just as I go up to do my spot - for which I've practiced something all intense and mournful and meaningful (which is probably about to irritate the hell out of someone anyway....) And noodlers are the very devil aren't they? Don't they realise that the next person can't start til they stop - so hence they are extending the gap not filling it. Kris |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GUEST,MMario Date: 30 Oct 01 - 09:12 AM Dead Horse - remind me never to sing for you...*grin* - and I'll try to behave if you are performing. MMario-guiltyoffartoomanyofthemoribundequinespeeves
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GUEST Date: 30 Oct 01 - 09:19 AM Well, I certainly can't say that I've ever *enjoyed* the Star Spangled Banner, as I hate the song (and all nationalist anthems like it). But that said, the Hendrix version was a masterpiece of anti-war instrumental playing. As to Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston versions--I've never heard Mariah sing it. Whitney Houston's version is pretty much a gospel song rather than an anthem. Hence the wobbly and garbly sound to many white folks' ears. I think Whitney may have based her version on one Mahalia Jackson used to sing (though its been a long time since I've heard either versions). I once heard Mariah and Whitney sing together. It became quickly apparent (not to mention painfully obvious) that Mariah can't sing, and Whitney can. Righteously. I think she is an extremely gifted singer, sadly travelling through life in the fast lane, where she is bound to lose it eventually. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GUEST,Kim C still no cookie Date: 30 Oct 01 - 09:51 AM I am guilty of playing too fast - not usually on purpose though! It's one of my foibles I have to work at. When I was a young lassie taking classical piano lessons, family members would invariably ask me at family gatherings to play something for them. So I would. Usually it was something I was working on, some Chopin or Brahms or something... and then they'd pull that, oh that was real fine, now play something we know. So I just stopped playing for them since they didn't know how to appreciate it. Hmpf. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: DougR Date: 30 Oct 01 - 12:05 PM Several people have mentioned noodling between songs is a pain in the butt. Would it be considered bad manners for a group to set some rules before the session ...one of them being cut out the f--king noodling?!!! DougR |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: kendall Date: 30 Oct 01 - 03:39 PM If the noodlers had a clue about manners, it wouldn't be necessary to mention it. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: DougR Date: 30 Oct 01 - 09:20 PM Yeah, I realize that, Kendall, but folks have already pointed out they are ...noodlers! :>) DougR |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GutBucketeer Date: 30 Oct 01 - 11:07 PM Growing smaller and smaller with each new post to this thread. As a relatively new singer and instrumentalist, I would certainly appreciate being quietly, nudge, told, or somehow informed when/if I'm doing any of the above. I'll retreat back to my basement and come out again next February. Now, my pet peeve is going to a performance by a "folk legend" who you truly idolize, and who is supposed to be a professional, and find they have not taken the time to go over their set, practice, make sure they know the songs they are trying to sing. Instead, of a concert you get a rambling discourse of past "great folk events", half completed songs, and self discussion on what to sing next. While I may be learning how to perform and often forget/stumble due to anxiety, they are supposed to know better. Sheeplishly retreating now to practice some more. JAB
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: DougR Date: 30 Oct 01 - 11:14 PM JAB: In my opinion, a professional who does that is only half professional. Don't retreat too far. DougR |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Liz the Squeak Date: 31 Oct 01 - 12:56 AM Hey GutBucketeer, even worse is the professional who treats her audience like shit - leaving them standing outside in the rain because she couldn't turn up on time for the sound check, or being rude to them if they wander in by mistake or to just enquire about how long it will be.... whose musicians demand the very best (to the extent of turning down a newly tuned Steinway grand piano), but who then play like it was their first lesson at Kindergarten.... whose 'Green Room' requirements cost almost as much as their fee and then they leave most of it, complaining about it..... I could go on for ages (and still be talking about only one person!!)! LTS |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: guinnesschik Date: 31 Oct 01 - 09:33 AM Audience members who want you to sound just like someone else, as in "Wow. That was interesting. So-and-so doesn't do it that way." I usually respond with..."Well, we're not so-and-so." And, all of the above.
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GUEST,MMario Date: 31 Oct 01 - 09:51 AM guinesschik - on the other hand - it was really great to hear "you guys" do some of my favorites - in what was to me new and exciting renditions. Sometimes - though you may love a song - hearing it for the umpteenth time in exactly the same style just doesn't cut it any more. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: artbrooks Date: 31 Oct 01 - 10:44 AM People at songcircles who insist on singing ONLY out of RUS, and start something else if somebody begins an alien song. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: guinnesschik Date: 31 Oct 01 - 11:08 AM *blush* Thanks, MMario. Nice to know our efforts don't always go unappreciated. Maybe we should relocate.... |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GUEST,Les B Date: 31 Oct 01 - 11:42 AM Since it's kind of a blah day here, I'm feeling more "peevish" than yesterday when I perused this thread. Here's mine - A person I've played with for years has a different sense of timing on coming in after an instrumental break. Someone can play a great fiddle, or mando, or banjo break on a song this person is leading, and then the person will "hold" for what seems like an eternity before starting the next verse, making it seem like the instrumentalist has stopped too early. This person's overall timing is good, it's just that maddening delay. I've finally started playing "filler" riffs into the next measure whenever this person sings. Different strokes for different folks, I guess. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: GUEST, a mudcatter minus cookie Date: 31 Oct 01 - 12:48 PM Sorry, although I'm a regular Mudcatter, I had to toss my cookie for this one, in case the person in question reads this: A band member who regularly tries to out-argue her fellow band members on every matter of taste and judgment that comes up. Apparently because she is the only one in the band with a music degree and knows lots of music theory and history, she thinks her opinion should carry more weight than anyone else's. She always knows, or thinks she knows, what chord goes where, whether a certain grace note should be played or not, and which of two versions of a tune is more authentic. Nothing is ever just a matter of opinion to her. Every opinion is either correct or incorrect, and hers is the correct one, and she is more than happy to educate you by explaining why. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Kim C Date: 31 Oct 01 - 01:01 PM Ooooh! Minus! My old singing mate who said "acapello" was like that ----- except she didn't have any musical education! She was insistent that a song be sung EXACTLY as it was written, with no small stylish variations of melody whatsoever. Now of course you don't want to rewrite someone's song, but there is that thing called Style that keeps us all from sounding the same. In that interesting situation, I was the one with all the formal training, and my educated opinion carried No Weight Whatsoever. Miss Thang made all the decisions. but like I said before... gee... where is she now? mwahahahaha |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Harry Basnett Date: 31 Oct 01 - 06:56 PM I've only been back on the folk scene for about twelve months after a considerable lay off....somebody please tell me when it became the practice to bring along dirty great folders full of songs to singarounds and sing from them every bloody week and NEVER take the trouble to learn the words? What's the point? Why?!?! That's my peeve and that is the end of it.... Harry. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Bill D Date: 31 Oct 01 - 07:53 PM hmmmm...well, some people genuinely can't memorize well...(sort of like dyslexia...brain wiring)...but can sing and/or play wonderfully WITH the visual help...I will forgive and enjoy these...I will NOT forgive the ones who can't follow the tune OR words with it right in front of them. That's what 'making a request' is for...maybe someone else there does know the song! |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Tattie Bogle Date: 31 Oct 01 - 07:57 PM People who ask you to sing then talk right through your song: people who stamp on the floor to try to turn your nice lyrical song into the up-tempo karaoke/disco version of it, the latter crime being the ruder of the two, and one young "lady" will never know how nearly she got her feet stamped on - unless she does it again! Tattie B |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: kendall Date: 31 Oct 01 - 08:11 PM All of those things bug me, but, I think the noodlers take the cake. Seems to me that it's always pickers, not singers who do this.You never hear a singer humming like pickers noodle. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Midchuck Date: 31 Oct 01 - 10:03 PM Spoons/bones players, particularly those who bang along on every song, no matter how slow or quiet. Peter. |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: 53 Date: 31 Oct 01 - 10:20 PM what type of band has spoons, and bones players? BOB |
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Subject: RE: BS: My pet musical peeve From: Sorcha Date: 31 Oct 01 - 10:35 PM Bob, old time bands, jug bands, skiffle bands...sometimes bluegrass bands and Irish bands. My bunch even has a jawbone we take along for special effects. |
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