United States

finding the right kind of musicians is hard but not impossible....wanting to collaborate with talented musician like yourself, but I live in Texas between Austin and San Antonio and my style is jazz, funk, rock, new age.....and so on. I am a singer/songwriter and I have ideas but need the musicians who want to do originals...anyone out there?

finding the right kind of musicians is hard but not impossible....wanting to collaborate with talented musician like yourself, but I live in Texas between Austin and San Antonio and my style is jazz, funk, rock, new age.....and so on. I am a singer/songwriter and I have ideas but need the musicians who want to do originals...anyone out there?

Its a long and arduous journey... I have similar dilema in my neighborhood...
Its about finding ones that share the same page...

There are more than a few here that should be committed. Somewhere.

Typically finding the right combination of people, the music magic so to speak, as well as committed members is quite similar to putting $100 down on the roulette wheel in Vegas...the odds are not in your favor. There are many reasons for varying levels of commitment. The easiest to understand is the job thang. Paying the bills is not easy on musician wages and if you are starting a family you might as well hang the guitar up on the wall next to pictures of your old buddies you used to hang out with...you aint gonna see much of either of them. The second is...uh...age. From my own experience younger musicians tend to be ADD specialists, they have a hard time focusing on music when in the presence of alcohol, drugs, video games or women. The third is talent. I'm sorry did I say the dirty word? I have been in bands where everyone knew that we were not going anywhere, or at least some of us, and we stayed in anyways. It's fun making music so you stick around...but your commitment is tempered by the reality that we may not be as talented as the pot makes us feel. (That's why I don't smoke the herb) Lastly, it's not all that bad sometimes.
I stopped playing in bands a long time ago due to the ego's involved. I just could not afford to pay for therapy for four people. I confined myself to my home studio for a gazzilion years making lifeless musical duff. When I emerged one day, all grizzled and grey, with a voice that sounds like sand paper....no one was around to play with. Eventually I hooked up with a musician, not as grizzled, but just as time tested, and we have slowly been working on what I consider both our best to date. Yeah we may have to contract for a drummer or other players but it works out just fine. So you see it's not so bad making music a serious hobby. There's less pressure and if you get lucky it will be even more of a surprise. Good luck

Typically finding the right combination of people, the music magic so to speak, as well as committed members is quite similar to putting $100 down on the roulette wheel in Vegas...the odds are not in your favor. There are many reasons for varying levels of commitment. The easiest to understand is the job thang. Paying the bills is not easy on musician wages and if you are starting a family you might as well hang the guitar up on the wall next to pictures of your old buddies you used to hang out with...you aint gonna see much of either of them. The second is...uh...age. From my own experience younger musicians tend to be ADD specialists, they have a hard time focusing on music when in the presence of alcohol, drugs, video games or women. The third is talent. I'm sorry did I say the dirty word? I have been in bands where everyone knew that we were not going anywhere, or at least some of us, and we stayed in anyways. It's fun making music so you stick around...but your commitment is tempered by the reality that we may not be as talented as the pot makes us feel. (That's why I don't smoke the herb) Lastly, it's not all that bad sometimes.
I stopped playing in bands a long time ago due to the ego's involved. I just could not afford to pay for therapy for four people. I confined myself to my home studio for a gazzilion years making lifeless musical duff. When I emerged one day, all grizzled and grey, with a voice that sounds like sand paper....no one was around to play with. Eventually I hooked up with a musician, not as grizzled, but just as time tested, and we have slowly been working on what I consider both our best to date. Yeah we may have to contract for a drummer or other players but it works out just fine. So you see it's not so bad making music a serious hobby. There's less pressure and if you get lucky it will be even more of a surprise. Good luck

Very similar path for me... except I'm still working at it alone. But it's all good.
Good tunes VI... the great constantini+song for my critics reprise and The Deserter flow together well.

and as Bear Bryant said "it's better to be lucky than good"

im a guitar player been playing for over 30 yrs live in md looking for a band or musicians to writr record play out. to me family comes first and music is next. have pro gear.practice. place in lanham md. its always i want to be in a band i have a hour once every other week i can play. sorry i just cant do that.
i play hard rock heavy metal what they play on 98 rock
i just want to play. need a guitar player foe recording im open weekdays weekends nighttime. too
contact boardwlk17@aol.com

@ the OP: I'm suffering through this scenario right now.....in MY area, it's real hard to find musicians that A: have the talent/skills to play where I want to be (those sights are NOT stellar by the way or B: have the time/commitment I'm looking for, or C: have good workable gear.

One night, I go jam with a guitarist (I'm a guitarist also) I met on Craigslist. All he knows are Barre Chords, I mean, literally. Like You Really Got Me in the 5th to 3rd position......every song, every chord, a fully qualified (and well played) Barre chord. He was adept with them, I'll give him that. But you don't get a good You Really Got Me raunch using a full Barre in the 5th position......to top it all off, he knew no lead, no pentatonic, nothing.

Another night, another guitarist. Blew my doors off, played like Vai/Vinnie Moore, clean, fast sweeps, you name it. I felt humbled. I'm a Page'ish hacker if anything, but cleaner.
We took a break. then he lit up some crack .........

Had a good 3 piece going, me, bass, drums. Drummer hit hard which I like, bass player knew every Zeppelin bass run, studio, and Live, which I love. I love playing live versions of Zep songs ......
Two or three weeks go by, good jams, we decide we're a good core, let's get us a singer......we put up a CL ad, drummer is 'in charge' of contacts......I hear nothing for like 5 days........my voicemails go into the nether.....
Finally get through to drummer. I find out the bass player relapsed back onto heroin.........now it's me and the drummer... we go for 3 weeks as a duo, jamming, seeking bass... he calls me: he can't play anymore, his GF decided she don't like him being out nights........

Met a bass player on good 'ol CL.... talked for a bit, took a tough stance as I don't like to waste my time. Talked scales, bass runs ( I DO hack enough bass well beyond root note bass
We hooked up, and he arrives with some Frankenbass he made from parts of IIRC every named bass known to man.......and an amp with a 12" speaker, made by Sumyungai......he had skills, but was nowhere near geared for a good jamfest. A 5 year old drummer would drown him out. And nowhere near earning enough to get some at least fair gear.......I hacked on his Frankenbass for a few mins... felt all dead.....I could get better tone if I thump my Ex-mother in law.......


So, such is my dilemma here in SW Florida...... presently, just looking for 1-2 guys to jam with. I like to build in a singer last....I believe if your core isn't up to snuff, and you got a GREAT singer in front of you, any negatives in HIS mind would most likely cover all musicians involved....even in possible future endeavors....

I feel ya OP

Brian - it ain't easy, that's for sure. I think a 'tough stance' is exactly what is needed if you want to avoid wasting time. I see lots of ads on CL that specifically say 'no drugs, no angry wives ....' etc!
I request online music (youtubes, etc) or MP3s so I'm not wasting my time with 'wannabes'. Done that too much already.
Auditioning another guitarist Wednesday night. Asked him a bunch of questions he didn't answer via email, so we'll see what happens.

I request online music (youtubes, etc) or MP3s so I'm not wasting my time with 'wannabes'. Done that too much already.
.

+1
In this day and age of digital recording devices like Zooms .... there is no excuse not to have something to share ....
Big Red Flag when they nada to share.

Brian - it ain't easy, that's for sure. I think a 'tough stance' is exactly what is needed if you want to avoid wasting time. I see lots of ads on CL that specifically say 'no drugs, no angry wives ....' etc!
I request online music (youtubes, etc) or MP3s so I'm not wasting my time with 'wannabes'. Done that too much already.
Auditioning another guitarist Wednesday night. Asked him a bunch of questions he didn't answer via email, so we'll see what happens.

I'm curious, what constitutes a 'wannabe'?
I can understand wanting something tangible online to check out; videos, MP3's, etc.
But, what if all they've got is old stuff? Nothing recent.
What if the material isn't exactly the kind of thing they're doing NOW?

A good musician can get by on his old stuff in most cases. If he was in a Blues band, and now likes Hard Rock, he may want to get a few things updated.....not that hard to do with all the amateur/semi-pro home recording studios out there..... hell, a drum machine with some riffs over it is at least acceptable to see if someone has technical abilities needed for a band slot...or try out.......reasons to not be able to get an up to date recording today are pretty much weaksauce......

I won't explain what a wannabe is.......with over 2k posts and 49,221 links in your sig, I'm quite sure you know what one is....

Nice job Brian, I can see you're making friends wherever you go.

Anyone else you feel the need to insult?
I'm sure you haven't run out of material yet, right?

See if you can alienate anyone from your general area then you can blame it on the site...

("Pity" and he actually can play pretty well to boot, check out his sample.
It's good sh*t, too bad he is one as well.)

this might be a good thread in and of itself....

hey, you think YOU guys have it tough attracting musicians....imagine running an ad like THIS one of mine in Mid-MO! needless to say the response so far has been underwhelming.




GYPSY JAZZ and SWING TRIO seeks 3rd piece (Jeff/Columbia)


Former members of Django's Tiger are looking for a third member to round out (or more accurately...triangulate) our group.

We're presently two members....T.H. plays gtr and mandolin. I play gtr, mandolin, and bass.

So, this gives us a little bit of flex re. a third player...

We'd be open to any of the following: another gtrst, a bassist (acoustic preferred but not required) , a violinist, clarinet player, mandolinist, etc.

For gtr...ability to solo and improvise is great but we'd also welcome a strong rhythm gtrst who has a good handle on theory and appropriate chord voicings.

A large part of our material has been Django Reinhart's music and songs in that style. We also play some more modern things as well. Vocals are most welcome but not a requirement.

And we're open to taking things in other directions as well...Dawg Music/jazzgrass for instance, or.....

Some video of Django's Tiger here: http://vimeo.com/10221278 (T.H. is on lead gtr/vcls...i'm on bass)

Thanks for reading.

Enjoyed the video, man. Cool stuff.


You'd have no problem filling this vacancy if you lived in Budapest. When it comes to finding musicians, so much depends on geography (where you live) because not a lot of places have enough opportunity to keep musicians motivated and focused.

So the only way a band keeps working these days is by having a house-gig situation, or constantly traveling; and not many people are willing to do that, even when it pays well.



So I just accepted that things will never be like they were in high school when we had a band for the love of making music. Once you get out of school and have bills to pay, every person is going to have reasonable expectations that will not overlap with the reasonable expectations of others in the band.

I have been in working bands since I was 15. Seems like we were changing members twice a year to keep working. Got tired of spending money on recordings that were obsolete before they were mixed because of personel issues.

So I went solo in 2001 and now jam with bands on a non-committed basis. That's the only way, imo, that you can be sure what you're working on will come to fruition.

But some people do win in a crapshoot, so I don't want to discourage people from trying to form a band....just saying that I wasn't really successful until I gave that dream up.



.

I'm curious, what constitutes a 'wannabe'?
I can understand wanting something tangible online to check out; videos, MP3's, etc.
But, what if all they've got is old stuff? Nothing recent.
What if the material isn't exactly the kind of thing they're doing NOW?

Old stuff is fine - at least it gives you an idea of their ability level. I had one guy send me an MP3 of him 'with a band' - this was in response to me acoustic duo ad. The 'band' sounded ok, but I really couldn't tell what HIS ability was, but I gave him a chance. He could barely sing (mumbler), couldn't harmonize, and made excuses about his acoustic guitar 'being used by his daughter' both times I gave him a shot.'

There's no guarantee that the tracks you hear are indicative of the person's actual skill, but at least its something.

Like I've said before, if the person does not have the ability to record hisself or show videos, then he's probably not up to the level I'm looking for.

BAH humbug! The guy who was supposed to come over tonight to audition emailed and can't make it. -2 off the *maybe* scale already.