Learning From Playing Live Music (My Flashband Story)
Originally posted on the S&R Blog.
Music is probably what drove you to this site. We all want to play more music – whether that is playing better, more frequently, live on stage, in the bedroom or with more people. More music is the ultimate goal. As I was growing up, I was a bedroom warrior until I went off to college. During that time, I would always hear or read other musicians saying, “You have to play live. It will change the way you play and make you a better player.” I thought, okay, it can’t change my playing too drastically, but once I began playing live, I found out that I was wrong. Playing music live changed my whole playing style, cut the learning curve in half and skyrocketed my desire to play more. This week, I want to talk about creating that feeling, or rejuvenating it if you haven’t played live in a while.
Last weekend, I played live music for the first time in about two years – it has been a busy two years – and it was the best adrenaline rush I have had in those two years. Needless to say, I am hooked again and cannot stop thinking about playing my next live show. I have become a better guitar player because of it, but it wasn’t necessarily playing the actual show that made me a better player, it was the people who had played alongside me.
Now, these musicians weren’t friends of mine before the show. No, I had just met these musicians exactly one month prior to the gig. Yes, In one month, I met a bunch of musicians (complete strangers), ended up jamming with them and formed a group based on connection and like-mindedness, practiced for a 15-20 minute set and performed in front of an audience at a bar in a hip place in downtown DC. The best part of all, no booking the venue, easy promotion, and for those of you who have not yet played live before, a short set to get your feet wet.
What is this amazing organization, you may ask? It’s called Flashband! Flashband is an organization designed to bring musicians together to play music. Each month Flashband will host a showcase with a given theme – i.e. 80’s Dance Party, Summer Hits of the 90’s, or My Girl Just Left Me Country Jam. A month prior to the showcase, musicians join at a meet and greet jam where they spend 4 hours playing and jamming with one another. After the meet and greet, musicians form a band in which they will practice for a 15 minute set at the end of the month. It is an amazing experience and I recommend it to anyone who is looking to play live music.
The great thing about Flashband is that it is open to all levels of playing, all styles of playing and instruments! This past showcase was titled “Make 2000’s Great Again” and there was an elder gentleman who was rocking a saxophone (not an instrument one would normally associate with the 2000’s, but he crushed it nonetheless). As of writing this, Flashband currently has six chapters – Washington, DC; Baltimore, MD; Philadelphia, PA; Knoxville, TN; Triangle, NC; Wilmington, NC.
It is amazing how much you learn in a month’s worth of time. Between the timeline crunch of learning 15 minutes worth of material in a month to getting in a groove with the rest of your band and making everything sound great is a high feat that shouldn’t be taken lightly. But the practice and the hard work really pays off come show time as well as skyrocketing my playing ability. The different backgrounds of each musician alone made my playing grow tremendously.
To elaborate, our bass player is heavily driven by 90’s grunge rock, our drummer loves classic rock, our singer and rhythm guitar player loves radio hits and I have a southern rock, country, jam band background. No real overlap between our backgrounds but when mixed together, you learn off of one another. Sure we were playing 4 songs that were played pretty true to their original note-wise, but the way each of us approached the piece was completely different and we learned from one another.
Another cool thing about Flashband is that each band has to have an original tune that coincides with the showcase theme. This is where the real magic happened with collaborations. The four backgrounds came together to create a funky, Red Hot Chili Pepers-eque early 2000’s tune.
The showcase came a lot faster than we had initially hoped for, but by the time we got on the stage and hit that first note, we knew we had all learned something in the past month. It’s amazing how much I learned in the short amount of time. I am a firm believer that I am a better player after every show I have played. There is something about achieving a goal with a set deadline that adds a push to make yourself a better musician. If you are in an area that has Flashband, go check it out, if not, keep on playing live. You will be surprised by how much your playing will improve and you also get to have a lot of fun in the process.
Until next time, let the music play!
-S&R