[Dixielandjazz] Re: DJML

[TCASHWIGG at aol.com]

HI Dan and All

My file cabinet is not quite that diversified, but only because I have been 
fortunate enough to have lived and participated in a lot of it, and when the 
subject is on a topic I have already acquired a substantial amount of 
information or experience with I will only save the post if it has pertinent information 
that I did not already know or had experienced in this never ending quest for 
success in this most difficult business.

I do have a folder however that is titled School lessons in which I save many 
pertinent posts from this list that I sincerely hope to be able to use in the 
future when I am too old and or weary to tour and play at the level I do now. 
 Music has been and will always be my life Win Lose or Draw, and like the 
Gambler in the Kenny Rogers song, I just hope to break even somewhere in the 
dark, and if it's on a stage doing what I love the most when the lights go out so 
be it.  For me and others like me it has already been a Wonderful World.

I am breaking in a new computer right now because I have overloaded at least 
two others in saved files and information that I may find useful someday.

It is indeed a pleasure to hear that others such as yourself have actually 
benefited or may possible benefit from my rankings from time to time about such 
important items that lead to the eventual success of any group no matter what 
the genre of music may be.

Many of our esteemed friends on this list have simply given up and or are 
actually afraid of success in this cockamamie business.  Others are simply happy 
with their position in the industry being fun loving part time playing folks 
with no real desire or commitment to being a real professional and competing on 
a multi quality level for the really important career building and 
advancement gigs that can and will make their dreams come true rather than all becoming 
nightmares.

Most of the Dues paid in this business are Self Inflicted.

They don't give you a license to do Brain Surgery because you go buy the 
scalpel do they?

No indeed you have to prove that you can actually do it and you have to have 
the experience and training to do it as well, and keep searching for others 
with a like attitude and experience to make that successful unit that can and 
usually will achieve the lifetime commitment fulfillment that it takes to get 
there.  Some make it and some unfortunately do not get all the way to the golden 
ring. 

But it is always better to have tried and failed than to never have tried at 
all.

I takes many years of experience to be able to recognize the difference 
between good gigs and bad gigs, and I will settle for this gigs because I need the 
rehearsal and or I need to try out these new players. Etc. 

The bottom line is that we have produced far more people with limited musical 
skills than there is a marketplace to employ them, and at the same time 
nobody ever taught them how to develop their own marketplace at their skill level 
so they all compete for the common denominator  The highest paying gig even if 
they are not worth the money of a more established professional act that has 
worked years to hone their style and quality level to meet the expectations of 
the buyer.

Instead the buyers of live talent have become far less sophisticated and 
knowledgeable about the real quality of a group, and believed what every 
bandleader in desperation for a booking said about his group being able to perform 
whatever the client asked for.

This resulted in chaos and the incursion of the DJ who promised to actually p
lay the music they client wanted to hear, but we all know they only play what 
they have in their library, (Something they no doubt learned from watching 
musicians).  Now -a -Days most of them have a box full of Rap and a few Disco CDs 
and their Hip Hop favorites, because that is what they have all grown up on 
and listened to because guys of our generation and the one before us dropped 
the ball, rolled over and played dead when the talent buyers said our music was 
too old and outdated.

Sheesh I am ranting again, enough already.  

Cheers,

Tom Wiggins
Saint Gabriel's Celestial Brass Band