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Arlen's "Lydia" would make a fine overture for my "Tattooed Bride" story:

"On her back is the battle of Waterloo . . ."

Wow, Jeff, you have a black belt in Arlen. Well done. He is one of my favorites.

That sounds like a the wording for a sign sign that you might display on your piano. "800" is a little steep though, especially in Euros, but hey, whatever the market will bear...

Before I joined our old wedding band, they had a singer who actually got into a fistfight with someone in the bridal party, right at the end of the reception. Among other things, he had reportedly told someone who had a song request to "write it on the back of a twenty". Talk about Jeopardy.

I've never had the pleasure of hearing "Lydia," but how can you go wrong with Arlen. I'd take my chances. It turned out that I did know "Radetsky March." The Karajin 100-best sampler I have is heavy on strings and saves the brass for the highlights, but I think doing it in one breath is still pretty impressive (even for a joke). My grandmother had a Leroy Anderson album that featured it.

Ok, down to brass tacks. I feel a little guilty posting this, but I want to get it off my desk. Other tasks are, well, you know. Much more could be mined from these Jeopardy topics, but someone else can do it.

And the categories are (these are the Second Runners-Up):

Marry in Haste, Repent at Port-au-Prince
Roller-Arena Reception and Other Unusual Unions
Without Benefit of Clergy
Speak Now or Forever Hold Your Piece
Bridegrooms Behind Bars: Nuptials of the Notorious
Unseemly Haste
When Brides Go Bad (with the Best Man)
Obnoxious Music Requests of Well-Oiled Guests
Mass Marriages and Tainted Tele-Evangelists

Finalists:

Famous Elopements
Betrothals Between Book-Covers
Self-Penned Vows, the Nuptial Nemesis
Bachelor Parties That Went a Little Too Far
Blue Hawaiian Blues: the Curaçao Catastrophe
Veiled Contempt: Bridezillamaid’s Dress
I Told My Mother-In-Law the Wrong Church
Nervous Breakdown in the Nave
We’re Registered at Wal-Mart


And the Winner Is:

Wedding Ringers
Play "Love Shack" for Me
Serial Monogramogamy
Chucked in the Chancel: Cold Feet Run Fast
Niagara Fallout
Planet of the Wedding Planners
Married by an Elvis Impersonator
Dial “M” for Matrimony
Miss Manners’ Jaw Dropped
The Twelfth Root of Two
Write it on the Back of a Twenty
Egregious Engravers' Errors
Ann Landers Talks to Virgins about Viagra
The Pre-Nup that Ate Philadelphia
It Came from Las Vegas
Hangover Moon
Dear Dowry
Thank You for the Lovely Gravy Boat
Tattooed Temptresses
Music to Marry By
Perry Mason and the Case of the Bibulous Bride

Well. What can I possibly say in response to Clef's brilliant post? In addition to Jeopardy categories, these could also be the chapter headings for the Let's Talk Weddings Piano World Semi-Official Guide to Wedding Music (Volume 1) book. Or maybe one or two of them could be subtitles.

The Twelfth Root of Two is my personal favorite, although I very much like Nervous Breakdown in the Nave.

I have a story to tell, but I have to go to Paris this weekend (sounds exotic but it's only 4 hours from where I live) and I still need time to process what happened before I put it in writing. I will be checking in from the Marais. xoxo

That's a slightly obscure one. Most people don't bandy about the mathematics of Equal Temperament at weddings, at least the ones I've been to.

And really, whoever developed it gave us poor keyboard players a raw deal. Imagine a world in which a singer could never deem "G" too high a key and "F" too low. "Come back when you develop a vocal range", we'd say. "Next!" Instead we sigh and capitulate.

"You need it in F#?"

"Well, the guitarist doesn't mind"

(sigh) "Of course he doesn't"

We were there in September. It's a little further from where we live. We stuck largely to the tourist highlights; although my wife and I have been there before, it was our daughter's first time. We did a fair amount of walking and wandering though.

Being from New York, we made frequent use of the Metro. We saw a pretty entertaining group of Russian musicians in one station. It was probably 7 or 8 guys. Accordion, Bass, clarinet, a couple of violins and I can't remember what else. They were playing a polka rhythm. The tune consisted of barrel-chested Russian vocals in minor-key harmony, separated by instrumental breaks. The acoustics of the arched tunnel were well suited to the music, although we had to search through the labyrinth to find where the sound was coming from.

That's one difference between Our Subway and their Metro. In the main, a transfer point on the NYC Subway map involves going up or down a flight of stairs. In Paris it's often like being in a prairie dog colony, or an ant farm. To their credit, there's always a sign at each fork.

Tonight's gig reminded me of another oddity of the human condition, which can be observed at wedding receptions and other occasions where people dance.

We mostly play pretty recognizable songs with verses, bridges and some instrumental breaks. Since we play for people to dance, we will often play a song for a little longer than the original version, especially if the dance floor is full. But people are constantly testing the elasticity of the pop song format.

They listen to the intro, and sit.
They listen to the first verse, and sit.
They listen to the first chorus, have a bite of a roll, and sit.
They listen to the second verse, and continue to sit.
They listen to the second chorus, fidget a little, and sit some more
They listen to the bridge, but remain unmoved.
They listen to the sax solo, and say, "look Vinny, there's a guy playing a sax",
They listen to the repeat of the bridge.
They listen to the repeat of the chorus,

and suddenly, a revelation:
"I like this song, let's dance!"

They arrive at the dance floor in time for the last chord to reverberate, looking bewildered.

"The Twelfth Root of Two is my personal favorite, although I very much like Nervous Breakdown in the Nave."

"Most people don't bandy about the mathematics of Equal Temperament at weddings..."

True enough. Wedding guests may never have heard of equal temperament, but if they have a TV set they've heard of E-Harmony... and what else are those theoretically pure intervals all about. In a perfect world, alas. In our world, we have the problem of inharmonicity. Strings too thick, too short; bad scale design; faulty strike-point--- this could be a capsule description of a lot of honeymoons.

Great question for clearing out the deadwood in a Double Jeopardy "sudden death" round.

I've thought of changing some of the categories, but what they really need is to be thinned out. Not much luck here. The best I've managed is a few mash-ups: "An Elvis Impersonator Stole My Sugar." "Nancy Drew and the Secret of the Cubic Zirconia."

Sure, I have a few favorites, like "Chucked in the Chancel: Cold Feet Run Fast," but what's really needed is some fresh thinking and a stern editor. Chapter titles is not a bad idea; each chapter could start off with a question from the double jeopardy round, in a call-out box... you'd have to keep reading the book to find out who won. If anyone.

Well, I'm dying to hear the news from Paris.

Another PG Casualty

I know, this thread is called Let’s Talk Weddings and not Let’s Talk Medical Emergencies. But I’ll be damned if I’m going to start another thread just to deal with accidents that occur while playing the piano. Life is too short, as this next story will prove.

Some of you may be familiar with the choking priest story in Piano Girl. The chapter, called “Playback 1979,” recounts one of my gigs at the piano bar of the Redwood Motor Inn on Bankville Road in Pittsburgh, Pa. Now doesn’t thinking about that place make you want to run out and order a plate of buffalo wings and a blue cocktail? Cheers.

In “Playback 1979”, hardly a literary work of genius, but kind of funny anyway, I am being harassed by the room manager to play softer, softer, softer, to the point where I’m playing with one finger and not even playing a song. Those of you in the cocktail lounge piano business know the drill.

For those of you not familiar with the book, here’s a brief synopsis of that chapter: While I’m playing, a group of priests show up for the Friday night happy hour. Happy, happy, happy. I play "Amazing Grace," my one religious number, and two people get up to dance. The F&B guy yells at me for being too loud. One of the priests, a guy named Father Louie, orders the crab cakes and starts to choke. He makes horrible noises and then collapses. The room manager tells me to play louder louder louder so the guests don’t notice the choking priest. The choking priest is like, dead on the floor, and I’m banging out “I Feel the Earth Move Under My Feet.” Not one of my finer musical moments, but I was 20 years old at the time, and lacking finesse.

Okay, that’s the drift of that chapter. Now we get to the life imitating life part. Last week, I was invited perform at a literature festival here in Germany, presenting my Piano Girl reading/concert program in a nice theater in Siegburg, a beautiful little city in between Cologne and Bonn. The event was sold out. When I do a Piano Girl perfomance for a German audience, I present the program in English and German, working with an actress named Peggy O, who reads specific sections of the text that have been translated into German. This is lots of fun for me, because while she’s reading, I get to play, providing a piano score for each of the chapters.

So. There we were in the middle of the choking priest- Redwood chapter, with Peggy reading while I plodded through 'Amazing Grace" (part of the musical landscape of this chapter) when a rumple rumple noise came from the audience. I also noticed that Peggy was not getting the laughs she usually gets while reading this section.

She had just finished reading the lines he’s choking, he’s choking, he’s choking. Heart attack, heart attack, heart attack! Someone call a doctor!, when she stopped cold, peered into the audience, and said:

“I have to stop. There’s a big rumple rumple out there. Is everything okay?”

This question was followed by a gasp, then the sound of one of our esteemed audience members falling onto the floor. Rumple, rumple, indeed.

An anonymous voice from the audience called out: “We need a doctor!”

Peggy said: “Really? That’s unbelievable.”

I was just starting the vamp to “I Feel the Earth Move.”

The house lights came up and the house manager hustled to the site of the incident. I realized it was my show and I was in charge, so I did what any self-respecting musician would have done under similar circumstances. I took a break. My husband met me in the wings and sent me back onstage to inform the audience that we would be taking a short intermission while the unfortunate woman was transported out of the theater and to the hospital, which was conveniently located next to the theater.

I’m no stranger to weird events, but even I am astounded by the timing of this particular medical emergency, right in the middle of the choking priest story. It’s almost like the woman got the idea from listening to us.

“We need a doctor!”

“No we need a doctor!”

“No we need a doctor!”

After a ten minute break, I returned to the stage, explained that for obvious reasons we wouldn’t be continuing the choking priest story, and played a transitional piano solo to lead us into the next chapter, which was, I’m happy to report, “Here Comes That Bride.” The audience was resilient and generous with their praise and applause. Evening over.

On the way out the door, a friend asked if the fallen woman had purchased a CD during intermission.

“Why?” I asked. “You think that’s what made her sick?” I’m a little sensitive about these things. I have had several people tell me their relatives have passed away while listening to my recordings.

“No,” he said. “Just thought she might want something to listen to while she’s in the hospital.”

The unfortunate woman, I am told, survived. And so did I.

***

A trouper, Robin, you did just the right thing. I'm glad the lady was ok. What some people won't do to steal a scene!

Your feeling of being responsible, somehow, is kind of understandable. I happened to be in my music room at home in San Francisco, playing the piano and recording a song, when the big World Series earthquake hit. Strangely and irrationally, I had the same feeling of it's being my fault. It was one of my own songs; I blamed the lyric.

If I had been guilty somehow, I would have been way out in front of you in the number of wholesale deceases, not to mention property damage; also media coverage. That big fire in the Marina was great television. Still, retail is more personal and no doubt more frightening. "Ask not for whom the buffalo wing tolls."

When I think of the alternatives (which, unfortunately, I know something about), dropping in my tracks seems the lesser of two evils. And as for a soundtrack. Let's see. Car crash; scene of war; house burning down; hospital monitors beeping wildly; armed robber saying, "Hand it over--- I said now!" Family member remarking, "These mushrooms don't taste like the ones we used to pick back in Cambodia." Or, maybe worst of all, hearing yourself say something you really wouldn't have said in cooler blood, just before your neck is wrung.

Or, a pretty lady playing the piano and singing a song. You're out with your buddies in a nice outfit, sipping cocktails and nibbling finger foods, having a nice time when the clock ticks its last.

Sometimes people hear nothing at all--- many pass away with no one present; maybe the TV.

"I'll take "Wedding Ringers" for 2000, Alex."
"And the answer is: "Nancy Drew and the Secret of the Cubic Zirconia."
"Who? What?"
"I'm sorry, that is incorrect."
DING!
"Clef."
"What is Ubic-kay Irconia-zay, Ix-nay on the Edding-way?"
"I'm sorry, that is--- what language is that?"
"It's Klingon. It means, "This stone is fake, the wedding's off."

Trebec looks at his notes; he appears to be at a loss. Jeopardy is madly popular on the Klingon homeworld and also the out-planets, and who knows if they may have a ship within transporter range. Not that Jeopardy would ever bend the rules, but there was an awful fuss last time a correct Klingon answer was disqualified. And as for a cubic engagement ring--- Klingon honor--- blood. At least.

Trebec ventures a wan smile into the camera. Someone in the back office was going to be looking for a job.

"Judges? We have a ruling--- that is... CORRECT! Congratulations, Jeff, you win Double Jeopardy!"
Clef smiles rather smugly as the studio audience applauds (though he attempts to appear modest), then looks puzzled, puts hand to chest and drops behind the lectern with a thump.

Alex doesn't even try to smile this time. How are the Klingons going to take this? Then again (he reflects), death doesn't bother them that much. Honorable, that's the big deal. Why should they complain; they won.

I guess you could do worse. My mom passed away suddenly while doing what she loved: watching television. She was shaking her finger at the TV set, admonishing Dr. Phil. Or was it Regis...

OK. I give.

I have always held that musicians have the best stories. And I have felt well-blessed in that regard. The perimeter around my keyboard rig has always been a target-rich area, story-wise. But this tale of yours takes the prize. This is the one they use to calibrate the meter. The academy decides to mold the trophy in your likeness. A theatre full of hopefuls dream of carrying home a "Robin": 12" tall, gold, with a cocktail dress.

I have been trying to to recall whether anyone has ever been taken away on a stretcher while I was playing. I don't think so. Many have claimed that our music was sure to send them to the hospital, but I don't think it's actually happened.

I'm not sure if it's a sign of an increasingly cautious society or an audience of advancing age, but I often see an ambulance standing by when we play outdoor concerts. (yes, really)

While not a wedding, I recall a local lawn concert where the band was experiencing audio difficulties. We could hear their instruments, but the microphones were not working to allow us to hear the vocals. The musicians were pretty good, and the audience was enjoying the show in spite of the difficulties. Eventually the sound man figured out what was wrong, and the vocalist came in loud and clear. Almost as one the audience of several hundred looked at each other and muttered, "turn it off, again."

Yes, he was that bad.

Little change of pace: this encouraging post from Piano Forum. It cheered me up, since through some oversight the mayor didn't invite me to dinner this Thanksgiving. However, I don't much care for dressing up, and especially if eating is involved. Hazards pile up, as you all know, and...

When I read the post's last line, "I lacked only a low cut slinky sequined black dress to complete the cocktail pianist picture," you know I thought of you, Robin. Though when I think of cocktail dresses, I don't also think of getting sloshed on beer, unless I'm in Bavaria. But, still.

https://www.pianoworld.com/forum/ubb...el%20piano%20experience.html#Post1313002

"I had a good experience recently with a hotel piano. This one was a Kawai (marked K. Kawai). I don't know the model but by the looks of it, it was considerably under six feet, I would say. We sat down to it because it was there, and because piano playing was a scheduled leisure event at the conference I was attending. (Don't you hate it when lobby pianos are kept locked, BTW?)

"First impression: out of tune. We expected that. I almost gave up then but a funny thing happened. Correcting for the out of tuneness in my mind as much as possible, the more I played the little piano, the more it grew on me and the more I wanted to play on it. It had a remarkable singing treble and the bass had more than respectable power, much more than you'd expect in a small grand. Overall it was a very pleasing tone and balance.

"I ended up having several very enjoyable sessions playing and singing with others, and getting impatient when it wasn't my turn to play. Everyone seemed to like this piano.

"Best of all was late at night after a couple of beers when I fulfilled my longtime ambition to be a cocktail pianist. It seems to me the best of all possible piano performance worlds: No one is really listening, so you can screw up and get by, and there's just enough background noise that what you're playing blends with the noise and sounds good even if it isn't. I had bought a collection of old standards from my famous collection of sheet music of the '40s and '50s, had a blast playing until the wee hours, and got compliments from those who happened to notice I was there.

"I lacked only a low cut slinky sequined black dress to complete the cocktail pianist picture."

I have recently unearthed the memory of what were probably the third and fourth weddings I ever played at. I use the singular noun "memory" because the two have melded into one over the years.

Have you noticed how many of life's absurdities come our way through "a friend of a friend"?. I think that this is because the person's roster of direct acquaintances know better than to get involved; he needs that extra degree of separation.

It would have been the late Seventies. My experience with wedding bands was only as a spectator. I have 19 cousins, most of whom are older, so I'd been a spectator quite a few times. I had also been to the odd bar mitzvah and anniversary party.

The bands that I saw bore little resemblance to the ones I would encounter in the late Eighties when I joined a wedding band. By that time a band would have to be able to convincingly reproduce a wide variety of styles. But back in the Seventies, it was still four ruffled shirts and a cocktail dress most of the time, none of whom played bass guitar.

My friend George played guitar the band I was in as a teenager. His friend and childhood neighbor Jimmy played drums in a wedding band. The wedding band's leader, whose name has been expunged from my memory, was a guitarist. Three degrees of separation. Beware. I'll call him Louie.

Louie reached me at home. Although the details are fuzzy, I'm sure it was some version of the boilerplate story about being left in the lurch by a shiftless keyboard player. He sounded a little twitchy.

For some reason I decided to take the 2 gigs, even though my repertoire and my gear were comically inappropriate for the task. I wasn't gigging at that point and cobbled together a Rhodes, an 80 pound Ampeg amp head, a large PA cabinet and, most amazingly, a two-piece modular analog synthesizer. This was easily 350 pounds of gear, some of it less than completely gig-worthy.

Remember Venn Diagrams from grade school? The intersecting circles? Their repertoire and mine had only the tiniest sliver in common. Standards, Cha-Chas and the obligatory "International Medley" ** were on the song list. In my later years I would come to see this sort of no-preparation gig as an enjoyable challenge. But I was less well-rounded at the time (musically and physically) and worse, bass players had yet to be discovered in the wedding universe.

That's what the analog synth, complete with tiny patchcords, was for. I was going to play my first left hand bass gig, on songs I didn't know, with a semi-experimental electronic monstrosity whose tuning tended to wander a bit. Perfect.

Back to "Louie". Louie, you will remember, had reached me in the evening at home. The next day, after I had accepted the gigs, I found out that he had first tried me at work. The story was apparently good enough that it had been told a few times before I even got the message.

It went like this: Louie was halfway into leaving a more anxious and detail-heavy message than would normally be socially appropriate, when his mother happened to pick up the phone.

"Get off the &%$#!! phone Ma, I'm on a business call".

Click.

And without taking a breath, he continued "So tell Greg I really, really need a keyboard player for the 15th at the XYZ lounge on 23rd and Park at 7:30 with a tux and..."

Twitchy indeed. This did nothing to improve my outlook on the situation.

I don't remember the gigs in precise detail. The band consisted of Louie on Guitar, Jimmy on Drums and two guys on Sax and Trumpet. I think there was also a female vocalist on the first gig. Louie's guitar chops were about on a par with his social skills, and he sang about as well as he played. There was one advantage to his modest skills; his simple chording was easy for me to "read" off his fingers for the songs that I had never heard.

There were a fair number of songs I could more or less immediately work out, even back then. But left hand bass is a gruesome experience for player and listener alike, especially when the player has no experience. I can somehow recall playing "Take the A Train" with the wrong chords. For all you aspiring performers out there, take the standard lesson: None of the guests noticed.

I remember the second wedding more clearly. The couple was Chinese and the reception was held at a very fine Chinese restaurant, the Silver Palace on the Bowery in Chinatown. The room was large and there must have been over 300 guests. The dinner featured the Banquet Menu, 12 courses served in succession, family-style.

There used to be a hateful but common practice in the wedding entertainment world known as "Continuous Music". It meant that someone had to be playing something at all times. The band would take only short breaks, and would leave one or more players behind to play background music. This was entirely useless, especially during dinner, but agents would use it as a sales tool. With some wedding band offices, this would be standard.

We played for the first half-hour or so of the party before the first course came out. There was a table for the musicians in a small anteroom, from which we could see into the main dining room.

For "Banquet-Style" dinners, the waiters generally bring a large serving dish to the center of the table. If any of the food is left by the time the next course arrives, the waiter distributes the leftovers into the diners plates. Sometimes this would be almost all of the original food, as with the fluorescent-orange octopi that we got at the wedding of a former high-school classmate of mine. I tried one. It was almost exactly like eating a wetsuit. It takes quite a long time to serve twelve courses this way.

At this wedding, there was no time to waste on such formalities at the musicians' table. They brought is three and four courses at once, leaving us to divvy them up. The food was top-notch, and of such variety and quantity that anyone would be sure to find more than enough to suit his own taste.

Anyone but Louie, that is.

Louie winced at each new tray of foreign objects. He went as far as to ask the waiter if he could get a steak, or a hamburger at least. Although he barely nibbled at the food, he had the look of a man who had a mild intestinal difficulty of some sort. But in my short acquiantance with him, I had come to know that this was his usual expression.

In addition to his disapproval of the feast laid before him, he was beginning to utter nervous phrases on the general theme of "We should really be playing now" "Let's go", "We've been off a long time" "Are they still serving?". His anxiety increased with each tray of unfamiliar food that was brought to us.

The trumpet player's name might have been Alan. I may be imagining this, because he was a very funny fellow who reminded me of Hawkeye Pierce from M*A*S*H. Alan suggested that the guests were obviously enjoying their dinner; a band would only disturb them. He held his chin as if in thought. What to do?

"You know, solo guitar music would be perfect".

Off went "Frank Burns" to be ignored by 300 people.

We sat and ate for over an hour. Louie would gesture every few minutes that we should come up and play. Alan would flash back hand signals indicating that Louie was doing a fine job by himself. "Sounds great! Perfect!"

The dinner eventually ended and we finally played some more music. Even then it was essentially background. Even had there been a dance floor, dancing is not the first activity people think of after a meal like that.

My introduction to wedding work was not an auspicious one. It was ten years (during which time bass players had been discovered) before I decided to try it again.

Greg Guarino

**International Medley
No matter what the ethnic background of the couple, the traditional wedding band would play the same medley of moldy cliche music, usually including "Hava Nagila", "The Irish Jig", "The Tarantella" and the "Mexican Hat Dance".

Greg, congratulations on the fine recollection of the early career wedding gig. Louie sounds like the kind of guy who gives all musicians a bad reputation. As my alto-playing friend Andy once said (after a despicable Louie-like band leader tracked muck all over the hostess's white carpet, drank all of her scotch, and then hit on her) "No wonder they give us sandwiches."

Clef, your posts continue to delight me! Those musicians on the Piano Forum are discovering something I've known all along—playing in a quiet cocktail bar where no one listens is a hip way to make a living. Not everyone is cut out for this, but if you enjoy listening to yourself play, and thrive on the creative part of the music and can get by without the applause/praise factor, then the cocktail gig can be fun, and even, dare I say it, artistically rewarding.

Sorry I haven't been posting lately. My fairy musical for kids opened last week and that has been a truckload of work. Glitter! Tulle! Glissando/Bell-tree City! We have three more shows this week (120 kids per show) and then I shift into concert mode, preparing for my annual Concert in Candlelight (there's a Jeopardy joke here somewhere, Clef) on December 20th.

Tomorrow I am playing for another WINTER WONDERLAND wedding at the castle. I'm hoping for a bride wearing an ermine-lined cloak and maribou-trimmed booties. I shall wear my favorite Ralph Lauren midnight blue ball gown, taking care not to get the giant skirt caught in the sustain pedal. When this happens, the pedal eats the dress, and starts to suck the skirt into the pedal column. Not a pretty sight. Extracting that much silk taffeta from the piano involves a yank and tug maneuver that is not at all lady-like. I have learned to test drive my outfits here at home before subjecting them to a four-hour gig.

No white carpet in this place (probably no bottles of scotch, either). So, two hazards to the good, though of course, the world's Louie's will always find a way. I'm reminded that the first principle of Integrated Pest Management is: "Reduce Habitat."

"Louie sounds like the kind of guy who gives all musicians a bad reputation."

It's a clueless and blissful state, like that of the star of a play staged here not long ago. The ads read, "A story about a girl who lost her reputation, but never missed it." I'm consulting my files on Mae West, world authority, for suitable comeback lines. Maybe after the holidays.

Meanwhile, I can tell you that we don't get mad at pest species such as Cottony Cushion Scale or Mealy Bugs, Otiorhynchus Weevils, or Oak Moth Larvae. It may be necessary to ruthlessly exterminate them, but sometimes it's easier to reduce populations to non-significant levels. Sic 'em with a parasitic nematode or a harmless spray of Baccillus thurengiensis, dust off your hands, and enjoy the flowers.

If you served tea instead of scotch, Louie would be gone in a hurry. Reading aloud from Dr. Seuss might work, too.
Oh, The Places We Tune from Tuner/Tech

This thread is borrowed from Tuner/Tech, thanks to Sam for the place and Monika for the good idea (once you scroll down to the photos, you'll see the posts).

I didn't know this style had a name. I was at an Oktoberfest recently where the main band had only minimal orchestration: keyboard, sax, drums (several of these doubled vocals).

The keyboard player emulated a bass very well, must have been able to split his keyboard somehow? And actually it was less obnoxious than the usual bass player who insists his amp won't go below 9. But it must take some skill to pull off.

Winter Wonderland Wedding Update:

Bride was not wearing ermine or feather trimmed booties. She was, however, 8 months pregnant and the recipient of many wedding gifts that doubled as baby shower items. At one point there was a diaper pail with a large taffeta bow sitting on top of the grand piano.

I wouldn't call it a "style". It's more of an economic decision. One less player means one less split of the pay for the musicians, and an easier sale for the agent. This only works, of course, when you get the gig in the first place. In an era when most every wedding band used keyboard bass and when many were even booked sight-unseen, it probably seemed like an easy choice, especially for the agent.

It's a pain, though, and never really sounds right. Back in my wedding band days there was only one group in our "circuit" that still used left-hand bass. Their keyboard player was quite accomplished at it (which is rare) , and the band was good. But to a musician's ear, the compromises were evident.

The keyboard parts to some songs can be played successfully with the right hand only. But think of what you actually play on a ballad, say, or the chord forms you use on Standards, or how hampered you'd be rhythmically without the left hand on a B3 part in a fast Blues. This list goes on and on. In my case, having never done it before, the problems were considerably more pronounced.

Having made my case against one-handed piano, I should admit that my gig setup does actually include two keyboards. I don't play bass, but I do play left-hand horn section, string and even organ parts. This is again, an economic decision. Our band includes a Sax player, but we couldn't support the four horn players that we might like. This is not to mention the eight string players and the three female vocalists. Beyond making $27 a man, it's considered poor form to outnumber the guests at the affair.

In my case, the kidnapping of my left hand is intermittent. Even in the songs that require horns, the parts aren't generally continuous, so it's a manageable situation, and we get to do some material that we couldn't otherwise do. I think we do a surprisingly good rendition of "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is?" (Chicago) , for instance. But when we play "Since I Fell For You", I have both hands for the piano, as Nature intended.

Thanks for the explanation, I didn't know the history.

So it's not so much that the left hand plays the bass badly, it's that it's no longer available to play what it should.

I cringe at the sound of keyboard horns, though the technology has improved considerably. But keyboard strings do quite well to my ears.

I played in a musical pit, maybe it was Guys and Dolls, and we had a keyboard player covering the strings. Just before we played I got curious, i leaned over and asked if she had trouble reading alto clef for the viola parts. This look of utter horror came over her face as she realized she hadn't checked the clef - fortunately the parts had already been rewritten in treble. i almost felt guilty. Almost.

It is partly that, but the bass part suffers as well. No matter how good the sample, the subtlety of control that is available to an actual bass player can't really be matched by someone playing a keyboard. I find that it is particularly difficult to play the very brief "grace notes" that are so important to the rhythmic function of a bass player. Beyond the technological and ergonomic limitations, it's a difficult task to cover bass and piano together and most people don't do it well.


I agree that no stock sound I have ever heard is bearable for my use, that use being playing live with one hand. I wonder why the various manufacturers haven't done better with that. I once chanced on a split configuration on a Kurzweil -- Trumpet and Trombone on the upper half of the keyboard, Saxes on the lower half -- that was quite magical when I played them together. But that won't do for my live situation.

However, I've been working intermittently on my horn section patches for many years. I get a fair number of compliments, some from other keyboard players. The latest crop is several variations on a 4 part layer with some crossfaded splits in it. Each part has a slightly different volume and timbre envelope and other parameters to add to the "imprecision" that mimics several players. The addition of a Sax player to our band for the last several years has helped give our parts an extra dose of realism.


Yet another good reason to avoid sheet music.