#6 The Day the Music Died

[Blame it on the Pujas! The various sounds coming from the Pandals.  And lots of house-arrest, time to write.  So here goes my thoughts on music, singing and modern instruments.]

No American Pie, this

Sincere apologies to those who thought this might be about Don McLean, Buddy Holly, Richie Valens and the team. But the music died several times since then, in my opinion.  So this is about events in my life that make me think, and sing.  What are the events that could have kicked this off?

A party at home, several good friends who are close to over the proverbial hill, a couple of amazing singers and pianists in the house and, lubricated by spirits that raise the spirits, the party becomes a "jam".  That's event #1.

A query by a lady friend to my wife, "How does he remember all the words of every song?" - in response to my grabbing a microphone and letting rip somewhere around the right note, that too on a public stage. That's event #2.

A drop-in at the pub to see a bunch of people on stage, not an instrument in sight, all of them staring down at precariously perched iPads, and music belting out of the hi-powered sound system. That's event #3.

The words don't mean a thing

One of my major cribs these days is, despite a band on stage, the singer has either a voluminous tome on a music stand, eclipsing most of the action, or at best an iPad at which she/he stares continuously throughout the song.  It's now "how" they remember the words, it's "why" they cannot remember the words.  So we began discussing this trend at a point when one PYT at the party pulled out a phone, googled the lyrics and started singing - of course, the inebriated masses knew the words anyway, and the ones they didn't quite get, they invented on the spot.  One theory put forward was the fact that with our vinyls and later cassette players, we had to learn the words by a long-lost skill called "Listening" - and we had to listen over and over again trying to make sense of near-Cockney of the Beatles, and the pure American of most of the others.  Listening helped us learn the lyrics pretty well.  If we wanted to sing stuff from earlier, it was a no-brainer -- Ella, Nat and Tony Bennett actually pronounced their words fit enough for an audio dictionary.  

I remember the  band rehearsing a rock piece "Are you ready?" by Grand Funk Railroad when my sister burst into the room and said, "Why not Homeopathic?  Why only Ayurvedic?"  -- so much for pronunciation.

Today learning the words is one step below a no-brainer, unless you are reading them off those books from Hong Kong, where "I think I'm gonna be sad ..." became "Dim Dom gonna be sad".  You get them off the "official lyrics" site on the net -- if you had a classical training, you can even get them with the notation attached.  So, I ask several singers, if you get the words for free, why on earth can't you learn them?  After all, it's all you do.  Public performances are meant for people to look at the performers, establish eye contact once in a way, ogle the singers or whatever other reason they are there.  The ugly music stands vie with their I-contact with the eye-Pad and the connect with the audience suffers.  The unkindest cut, of course, is when the whole bunch of dancers on the floor know the words and the singer has to peer at the Pad.

In search of the lost chord

We remarked that cassettes were the worst for learning a song -- rewind to an approximate point, listen, argue, write, re-rewind, the loop continued.   While the singers did their bit, the guitarists listened to the chords and tried them out one by painfully one.  You must remember we didn't have the internet, the music shops did not stock current pop, and the concept of digital instrument tuners was unheard of.  My dad, God rest his soul, would often tell us that we were not playing in the pitch of the cassette, "You fellows are playing in the cracks!" - a reference to the gaps between piano keys, and of course the gap between a tuned guitar and a cassette player running at its own speed.  Generally the guy in whose house we rehearsed won the battle between using an F#m and a D Major.

Multitasking without Computers

So, it's really a joy to see a band play their hearts out without having to check the music, read the chords off from the pianist's left hand or call the chords out over the singer's head - though we have done all that too.  As a one-time stage performer, I realized that there was a trade secret that seems to have escaped many of the performers today -- rehearsal.  If we rehearse long and loud enough, if we stop and redo a line because everyone's not together, if we listen to each other regularly, then the music's going to get better - and the singers will have no option but to remember the words!  My dad had another trade secret of getting into the music.  He had played the violin in night clubs, he told us.  Of course, for dancing the main instrument was the drums, timing was everything.  So when the established drummer, who had bummed a few extra drinks, slipped peacefully off the drumstool and collapsed behind the stage, the violinist would take to the drums.  And once in a way, when the pianist went to say hello to the President of the club, earning a few tips on the way, the violinist could hold a few chords on the piano.  I think this interchangeability of instrument needs a separate article dedicated to the one-man-bands of my college days.

Disband and Pad Up

With the advent of Karaoke, everyone's a singer - the words onscreen, the bouncing ball informing you when to sing what, the backing vocals to help you along, all ensure that if you get your pitch right you can sound professional.  This led, automatically, to singers deciding that the Band is the problem.  Download your own band, affectionately known as Minus One (You're the One), and go onstage as a performer.  I have nothing against these performers, some of them are my best friends and some are a joy to listen to.  And at least one of them is a multi-tracker, who plays one instrument on stage and all the other instruments on multiple tracks as a backing - he's in another league.  The quality of many of the others can range from sublime to ridiculous, from uplifting to flat, from engagement to divorce!

My feeling is that watching a band perform is only part of the story.  The canned backing tracks don't allow any flexibility onstage.  A missed cue when singing can't be covered up by a hastily and cleverly inserted extra bar - the music goes on.  The good guys rehearse a lot, they can't afford to miss a cue.  Again, when you have a crowd intoxicated by dancing and other substances, they sometimes want the vibe to continue past the pre-recorded last bar, something we used to do with the rock-n-roll sessions in 12 Bar cycles.  A few extra lead cycles with different instruments pitching in on the spot, made the music so much more credible.  Even someone calling out a special request from the floor did not have engineers hastily scrambling for playlists - it just meant the band leader yelling out the name of the piece and maybe a key chord.  Very difficult with those luscious, user-friendly laptops of today, which in my day meant something susceptible to #MeToo movements.

Given the option, I would listen and dance to Blue Mist, Crest, Krosswindz, Hereafter, Orchids, Urban Monkz, and any band where a team of musicians needs to work together, create chemistry onstage and make music.  Or just sit at home at a party where a couple of musicians get up and start a jam which continues beyond midnight because everyone's enjoying themselves.

Sorry about anyone I might have left out and sorry to the iPad driven musicians who might feel differently - I'm sure there's space for all of us.