November 17, 2004

Adding keys

Tonight, we got together to try out a keyboardist. Playing as a three piece is good, but there are times when an extra voice would help fill out the sound. To that end, Brett tracked down a keyboardist, and he sat in with us tonight.

We went through a few tunes, letting him find a place in the mix. On the one hand, we didn't open up enough room for any other instrument, keys or otherwise. The songs tend to be rhytmically dense, with lots of ghosting and grace notes. Both Brett and I backed down to try and open up some space, but I didn't think it gelled quite as much as I had hoped.

Now, to be fair, coming in as a keyboardist in an original band is a task -- not only do you have about a bazillion possible patches to choose from, you also have to try and match the chords (with all the qualities and accidentals) on the fly. We didn't help as much as we should have, either. A little preperation would have been a good thing. While we were playing, I stood next to him and called out the chords as we moved through as best I could.

Posted by Casper at November 17, 2004 09:12 PM
Comments

Do you have your tunes written out, leadsheet style? If you do, then you could send the leadsheets to the keyboardist to work out the harmonies beforehand.

Posted by: Scott Spiegelberg at November 23, 2004 03:59 PM

They're not written out at this point -- something we have to address. Anything would have beneficial, even just a listing of the chord changes.

Posted by: Casper at November 23, 2004 07:25 PM