Advice for accompanists: a rant

[Ro3b]

IF YOU DON'T KNOW THE TUNE, DON'T PLAY.

IF YOU DON'T KNOW THE TUNE, DON'T PLAY. I don't care if "all you're doing" is "just" playing accompaniment. IF YOU DON'T KNOW THE TUNE, DON'T PLAY.

Hey! You there with the acoustic bass guitar hiding on the outskirts of the session where you think we can't hear you. IF YOU DON'T KNOW THE TUNE, DON'T PLAY.

You, boomchucking a I-IV-V progression in A to accompany a tune in D mixolydian. YOU CLEARLY DON'T KNOW THE TUNE. DON'T PLAY.

If you do know the tune, but your rhythm is so shaky that you couldn't carry a steady beat if it were stapled to your forehead, DON'T PLAY. If we're playing a jig and you don't know how to play in 6/8, DON'T PLAY. If we're playing a slip jig and you don't know how to play in 9/8, DON'T PLAY. If we're playing one of those twisty screwball Larry Redigan tunes and you don't know where the downbeat is, DON'T PLAY.

If you're new to a session and one of the regulars is playing accompaniment, DON'T PLAY WHILE HE OR SHE IS PLAYING, at least not without introducing yourself and asking if it's ok. This is especially true if the person in question is a tall guy with tattoos and a shaved head, because it's me.

But especially, IF YOU DON'T KNOW THE TUNE, DON'T PLAY.

And lastly, IF YOU DON'T KNOW THE TUNE, DON'T PLAY.

Thank you.

[alurker]

Good advice Ro3b.

Hopefully it will strike a chord out there.

May it will even be the right chord at the right time for a change.

[MTGuru]

C'mon, Ro3b ... Can you be a bit more explicit about what exactly you're trying to say here?

For example ... If I don't know the tune, is it still OK for me to play?

[Cass]

Always happens when I'm singing and playing guitar...on my own. Sometimes it will be a new song that I've just written, so no one except me is going to know the tune anyway! Someone "helpful" will always "try" to join in. I end up listening to their mistakes, and not to what I'm playing! Very off putting! A friend was playing whistle at a folk club nearby (a slow aire, unaccompanied), and someone started singing along really loudly. He just stopped, told them to shut up because it sounded ****** awful, then carried on playing. It worked (and is still working!)

I agree....if you don't know the tune..........................

Cass.

[Tim2723]

Oh yeah, the guy in the audience that just has to sing along. At least the accompaniast is a musician.

[Redwolf]

Oh yeah, the guy in the audience that just has to sing along. At least the accompaniast is a musician.

Well, that is, if you're lucky. Sometimes the "accompaniest" who wanders into a session is little more than a beginning guitarist with a few chords under his belt, or a bodhrán "player" who doesn't know a tipper from a roll of toilet paper.

Another bit of advice for the accompaniest...if you're playing so loudly that the people on melody can't even hear their own instruments, that's not accompanying...that's OVERPOWERING! It's RUDE! It ruins the music! A session is not the place to demonstrate how hard you can strike guitar strings!

Redwolf

[Craig Stuntz]

Accompaniment is kind of like nude photography: When it's done really, really well, people call it "tasteful." (In order to distinguish it from the other kind....)

-Craig

[Domhnall]

A good band name: The six-string pornographers.

[Dr Funkenstein]

As both an accompanist and melody player, I think this rant can easily apply to melody players as well:

IF YOU DON'T KNOW THE TUNE, DON'T PLAY! Sure, you're trying to figure out that tune in 3 tries, but if all you're doing is holding whole notes to find a note here and there, get the name of the tune and learn it for next time. Especially when you have no idea of the tonal center and are playing notes clashing with a backer's ideas or (gasp!) clashing with the melody itself.

If you don't know the tonal center of the tune------FIND OUT!!! Explore some theory and progressions, it will help you to develop variations that make sense and that can work with others' playing.

If you can't play the tune in time, are constantly rushing or slowing down, DON'T PLAY THE TUNE!! Keeping time is everyone's responsibility, not just a backer, especially if they CAN'T PLAY THE TUNE BECAUSE THEY DON'T KNOW THE TUNE--it will be up to the melody players to exclusively hold time. By themselves.

[Ro3b]

He just stopped, told them to shut up because it sounded ****** awful, then carried on playing.

Amazing how rarely people even try such a direct approach, considering how effective it is.

Sigh. Thanks for the validation, everybody...

[talasiga]

......accompaniast........

......accompaniest...

If you can't spell DON'T POST!

[Rob Sharer]

Is an accompaniast like a pederast?

Spot on, Rob. While I'm generally in the line of encouraging people's interest in trad sessions, this doesn't extend to letting anyone take advantage of others in order to get a few cheap jollies with no prior investment in practice/listening time. Some folks, anxious to get a start as a trad musician and possessed of a D-28 and a small selection of basic chords, see a voluntary gathering of musicians and immediately swell with a sense of self-importance and entitlement, to wit: "this is a free country; I'll sit down and play if I want." Wrong. The good time you'll have by jamming along freely will almost certainly crimp the enjoyment of everyone else, and let's just assume that everyone else includes players with years of hard graft assimilating the music.

Sessions are fun, and there's always the old playground temptation to just barge in and disrupt the game when you see the other kids are having fun and you aren't. It's called bullying. You may not think you're doing any harm, but to play a guitar or bouzouki (to keep with the theme of this thread) at a session is to wield great power over the rhythm and the perceived harmony; . With great power comes great responsibility, and it's especially incumbent on accompanists to respect this fact. After all, even a great accompanist is only doing a bit of backing; if the other players stop, there's be nothing to listen to, or to back. As a backer of any experience, you're entirely subservient to what's being played by the melody players, so at the slightest whiff of trouble, back off.

In closing, I really would discourage seeing accompaniment as the quick way into having fun at the session. It's a subtle art, and a good practitioner makes it seem so simple, so logical, so do-able that it's easy to get lulled into thinking that there's nothing to it. The best backers generally play at least one other instrument, and have a thorough understanding of the tunes through having learned to play a good selection on a melody instrument. To that end, I'd suggest that anyone of rank beginner status interested in playing accompaniment for Irish music look on it as a future goal, and immediately set out to familiarize him- or herself with the tunes through listening and through learning a melody instrument. Hard to beat a tinwhistle for accessability. Cheers,

Rob

[Dr Funkenstein]

I agree with you on the majority of this, Rob. I think many of the best backers have a good concept of the melody and more than likely can play a melody instrument, if not tunes themselves on their backing instrument.

This one bit is dependent on the situation at hand, however, especially if any sessions include dancing:

After all, even a great accompanist is only doing a bit of backing; if the other players stop, there's be nothing to listen to, or to back. As a backer of any experience, you're entirely subservient to what's being played by the melody players, so at the slightest whiff of trouble, back off.

I don't how many times I've been playing for dancers (especially set) where a guitarist, bodhrani, or other accompanist has saved a figure on a tune change. Either all the melody blanks on the tune change or someone misses a repeat on an A or a B section, and the backer holds the music together for the dancers. In this type of situation, if the other players stop prematurely, the dancers wouldn't be able to keep going! And this is dance music, after all.

True, sessions attract a lot of backers who aren't familiar with the tradition, and they tend to think this is just another big jam session. As a session leader, I've seen this happen, and I'm quick to point out to these players that this is a different situation. I'll give them names of albums to check out for inspiration on backing tunes, names of teachers, and the importance of absorbing how Irish music works before jumping into sessions. The same goes for a number of melody players that show up (violin players who haven't studied the tradition or someone who just bought a tin whistle and thought they could sit in right away). Although I do this politely, many of them don't return, simply because they weren't aware of the effort someone needs to give to this music. Fair enough. But hopefully they're out there listening to the music and practicing, or seeking lessons from other backers to get involved with the music.

[IrishPiper42]

I've been playing Irish Trad for about 30 years, starting on whistle and eventually playing tenor banjo, mandolin, and dabbling in Uillean pipes. All that time I also played guitar. For the last 8-10 years I've been strictly trad on the guitar, switching to DADGAD exclusively. I'm a pretty fair guitar player, and I'd rather play accompaniment than melody. I play with a trad band with pipes, fiddles and flutes. We play various gigs including set dances every month. It's gotten to the point that they dread playing a gig without me on the few occasions they've had to do so.

It's been 15 years or more since I've been to a session. Marriage and 5 children can really cramp your social life. The kids are growing up though, and I've been thinking I'd like to start going to sessions again. But every time I visit the Chiff and Fipple there's nothing but guitar bashing on every thread. It would seem that I haven't been missing much; guitar players are apparently most unwelcome at sessions. I'll probably stick with band gigs and forget the session idea.

[alurker]

But every time I visit the Chiff and Fipple there's nothing but guitar bashing on every thread.

I take exception to this allegation. There is a lot more than guitar bashing going on on every thread. There is a hell of a lot of threads dedicated to bodhran bashing, more than a fair share of banjo bashing treads, some accordion bashing, no end of spoons bashing, some singer bashing as well as pipes, concertinas, whistles and practically every other instrument bashing to boot.

There would never be another session if the players of every instrument which got bashed here refused to attend. Now stop being so bloody sensitive and head off down to your local sesh for a few tunes.

And please remember: IF YOU DON'T KNOW THE TUNE, DON'T PLAY.