Rosie C

I'd like to have given it a go when I was younger, just for a short while. Maybe a couple of cruise ship tours. But the only people I know making a living from music are music teachers. I've run a couple of small businesses in my time and I found it really hard to make the same money as I could make working for someone else. I expect being a self-employed musician would have been the same.

Our Morris band use https://morrisbook.co.uk - you do have to pay for it once the free trial expires, but I like it as it handles the process of listing possible gigs, seeing who can make it, then accepting or rejecting the gig. It exports to Google calendar and probably others.

I do get withdrawal symptoms from not playing music generally, but I play a few instruments and I'm more likely to rattle off a folk tune on recorder or do some vocal work. On holiday or trip I'll often have a recorder in my luggage. I don't get withdrawal symptoms from not playing bass, as far as I don't miss it when I'm not playing. But when I play again I'm wondering why I left it so long. I played double bass yesterday for the first time in months - loved it and realised I'd missed playing so much, but not until I'd played.

Sound advice. I can't play guitar, but I learned the common chord shapes and have developed skills in guitar capo arithmetic! It's got me through many jam sessions.

The acoustics are quite good - a little goes a long way. Admittedly I'd have rather had a bit more oomph for the final hymn, and it lacks on the bottom end, but it was 'good enough'.

It went well, the band was piano, cornet and double bass. I took my little 25W Orange practice amp - just to give a little boost to the sound. We played: Alleluia Sing to Jesus There is a Redeemer All Heaven Declares Light of the World Guide Me Oh Great Redeemer (we were assured this was scheduled well before the rugby)

What with Christmas and our worship leader being on holiday in January, tomorrow is my first day playing at communion for a while. The BL suggested upright would be good for this service too. I've not played it publicly since the bridge was modified to adjustable and I fitted a lifeline pickup. So an exciting day on Sunday!

I kinda like playing in a church band - morning gigs, no drunks, daylight for loading & unloading, free coffee and biscuits. Home by 1pm.

Likewise. We have a Fender Passport PA - not for everyone, but perfect for two mid-50's women playing folk music. The boost it gets from plugging an old Orange bass combo amp (1x12", 35W) into the sub output is remarkable and didn't cost anything.

Perhaps! The first time I played in our church band, we played as people arrived, I forget what the tune was, but it was in 3/4. After a couple of times through the BL grinned at me and said "now let's play it in 4", and when we'd done that, "now in 2!". I felt like I'd been set some sort of initiation test and passed.

1. Why you don't have any gigs? - I'm recovering from laryngitis, and we have winter and summer set lists, so a few weeks to put together some new songs is welcome 2.Do you rely on an agent ? - no, most of our gigs come through recommendation 3.Who finds coordinates and confirms gigs? Me - band leader, lead singer 4. Are you or any band members in this for the money? Not really, we're happy doing community events - carnivals, fund-raisers, etc. 5.How much do you want to gig? - very much, I love the buzz from live performance 4 or 5 summer gigs and 1 or 2 Christmas gigs for our renaissance band. But I also dep. in a friend's cover band as needed 2-3 times a year and perform at folk clubs.

Thanks everyone! & thanks for the linke Phil, that lead me to

I'm looking at getting a wireless headset mic. The arrange of frequencies is bewildering. The options that are legal without a licence seem to be 863-865Mhz or 2400Mhz which is the wi-fi band and I'm guessing could be problematic. Just wondering what other people are using?

I won't name the studio, but my worst experience - I turned up for a classical piano exam and the staff had to explain they didn't have a piano.

I was looking at the National guitar, lot 37 from memory. But then I read the detail and it's not the one from the Brothers in Arms album. Makes me wonder how many guitars he has!

I've never been to Firebird, but it's the place RockSchool's also assigns me for exams, despite being in deepest, darkest Wales. That does look like a decent line up of equipment though!

One for bowing with metal strings, one for pizz with synthetics...

I recently had my bridge converted to adjustable, I was reccomended a luthier who will do it by mail. That could be a solution - adjust the bridge up a couple of mm?

I use an LS-2 for line switching - it has level adjust on both channels. At the end of the line is a GEB-7 for EQ, mainly to roll off the lowest tones to reduce feedback.

I have ACS ambients and I love them. I mainly use them for playing double bass I take a feed from my tuner pedal into a little amp them into the IEMs. I'm starting to use them when singing as well now, but that's a work in progress.

Or new even - my Squier jazz was a tad under £400, I bought it the day before covid lockdown. I couldn't fault it really, certainly compared to what I was playing in the 1980s.

I would dearly like a Hagstrom H8. One day...

I think similar at times. After 30+ years of just messing around on instruments I started a music degree. I have to be careful with topics like "effective practice" to look forwards and how I can do things better, and not back at thousands of hours of ineffective practice!

I placed several orders for acoustic treatment last year - delivery was a bit slow at times, but the price was the lowest around.

Brilliant, thanks!