Category Archives: music

Monday Music Lesson – May 6, 2013

Posted on by Lori Crane

I’ve been a professional musician for mumble mumble years, so I thought it would be fun to write a post or two on music. Some will be about actual music, some about performance, some about my personal experiences in the business, most will be sarcastic and jaded. If you are a musician, enjoy.  If you know a musician, send them over. If you’re not a musician, maybe you’ll gain a bit of insight into the business that is music.

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This post is titled: The Guys in the Band vs. The Bar Owners.

I can’t say this enough. Be loyal to your musician friends–ALWAYS.

I’ve played in clubs for years, and all the clubs I’ve played in are now gone. Clubs have a shelf-life of 8-ish years. Bars come and go, bar owners come and go, bar managers come and go, but guess what? I’m still working with the same fabulous musicians I started my career with decades ago. If a club owner offers to bring you back to the club as a solo, because he doesn’t like your band, tell him to go fly a kite. DON’T DO IT! In a few years his bar will be closed, and you will be out of work and will not get any other gigs because you screwed your comrades. Be loyal to your band members. Be loyal to your musician friends. The music business is tighter and gossipier (newly created word) than any other business. If you do something unscrupulous, word will travel faster than triplets in 4/4 time at 300 bpm. (I’ll explain that to non-musicians at a later date, but trust me, it’s really, really fast.)

It’s difficult if not impossible in the small music community to rebuild your reputation. The music business is all about who you know and what you’ve done in the past–good or bad. It’s all about picking up the phone and finding a gig for the second week of June. Bar owners are not going to help you do that. The bass player you used to work with four years ago will be the one who hooks you up. Play good. Play nice.

Loyalty is as important as talent.

A to Z Challenge – L is for Lori…duh

Posted on by Lori Crane

Blogging from A to Z April 2013 Challenge

L is for Lori

Well, of course it is.

It’s also for Late. I am late posting this because I’ve been on the road all weekend. If you don’t know me personally, I am an indie author by day, but by night, I’m a dueling piano player. I’ve slept about 6 hours in the last two days and the couch is calling my name, so until next time, here’s me at my real job. This was obviously taped on a Saturday following four straight nights of dueling piano insanity. If you don’t know, singers are only allotted so many high notes in any given week. 😛

Thanks to my film-maker friend, Phil Koch, for the video.

A to Z Challenge – I’m late – Here’s A, B, and C

Posted on by Lori Crane

Blogging from A to Z April 2013 Challenge

Apparently people around here are doing fun things, and I’ve been so busy I’m missing out.

The challenge is to blog alphabetically from A to Z through the month of April – excluding Sundays. That makes 26 blogs in 26 days using 26 letters. Okay, I got this! I need to catch up on A, B and C though, so here it is.

A is for Ancestry

I’m an ancestry and genealogy nut. It is a time-consuming hobby that takes over your life and causes you to spend more time with dead people than living people. You voluntarily give up sleep, food, and going to the restroom. The most amazing thing I’ve learned is that life is about those around you, which is in contradiction to the whole researching-your-ancestry process, but we all end up in the cemetery, and we all end up forgotten as time passes. What you do in the very short time between your birth and the cemetery is up to you.

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B is for Bars

I spend every evening in bars – not partying, though it is always a party, but playing. I’m a dueling piano player. I tell raunchy jokes, I sing songs with incorrect lyrics, and I lead massive, drunken sing-a-longs. My favorite part of the night is when the audience is hot, and their applause and cheering is deafening. Favorite song: The one with the most tip money on it. Favorite drink: Crown Royal. Favorite toast: “Here’s to relationships. They’re a lot like garage sales. They look good from the outside, but once you get in, you find it’s just a bunch of shit you don’t really need.”

lori vince wes summerfest milwaukee 2012

C is for Children

I have two. They are older now and are dating and on the brink of multiplying, so I will have more very soon, I’m sure. That’s enough on that subject.

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Check the A to Z Challenge page and join in!!

Who do I have to talk to to get more hours?

Posted on by Lori Crane

Is there anyone who can arrange more hours in the day for me? I’ll pay you! No, I don’t need a “Survival Guide for Busy Folks” or a new pocket organizer. I am the Queen of Organization! I need more hours. Maybe a 28-hour day would help. 32 would be better.

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My to-do list is trailing off my desk like Santa’s gift list in December.

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I’m usually good under pressure. As a matter of fact, deadlines feed my soul. I admit, most of my deadlines are self-imposed, but that’s how I get things done. And I get a whole lot of things done – I think. I may have too many irons in the fire right now because I’ve apparently added a few new hats to my job closet.

1) I am a full-time musician. I work late nights and don’t sleep well because I keep changing my bedtime hours throughout the week. Sometime I crawl in bed at 8:00 p.m., and sometimes I don’t go to bed until 4:00 a.m. That job also requires daytime hours for rehearsal and scheduling. I would like an extra two hours added to the music portion of my day.

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2) I write. Books. Not just any books – historical fiction books. Anyone who has ever written anything of length knows how insanely time consuming it is. Now add to that hours and hours of research to make sure the historical part of the story is legitimate. I admit I go off on tangents. I’ll hunt for information on a website, click on every link, and look up to find it’s three hours later. I love web surfing. I also have a bad habit of getting side-tracked on Ancestry.com and FindAGrave.com when I simply go there to check a wedding date or a death date. Rewrites, editing, proofreading, formatting, designing covers? Three more hours a day would help.

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3) I am my own publisher/publicist/agent/video trailer producer/audio book narrator/etc. I don’t even know how much time is spent doing that stuff. It’s a ridiculous amount. I don’t mind doing it, I just need about four more hours a day.

4) Blogging? Ugh. I’m a slacker. It’s true. No amount of time will fix that.

5) Wife and mother? Ha. Yeah, that cooking thing? Not so much. And you can do your own laundry. Do mine while you’re at it. And somebody pick up some milk.

Ok, rant over. I have to go brush my dog now. Poor little guy.

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How it all started

Posted on by Lori Crane

I’ve been a professional piano player my whole life. I started professionally as a church pianist when I was nine years old. I guess it is my niche. I’ve never known anything different. I’ve always played.

Well, I started wondering when it was that I got involved in this “line of work”.

My mother tells the following…

I was three years old when I saw someone play a piano for the first time. I don’t remember it, and I don’t know who or where it was. When they were finished playing, I crawled up on the bench and started hitting the keys the way they did. I did not, however, make wonderful music (surprise). I could not figure out why they hit the keys and music played – I hit the keys and made nothing but noise.

My mother said I bugged her about it for two whole years before she finally signed me up for piano lessons. I took lessons from age 5 to about 8 ½.

Today…I teach.

I don’t have any students who hunger for it the way I did.