The bait and switch: Jazz gig

dkerwood

dkerwood

Silver Member
I was asked a week ago to play in a jazz combo before my church's big Christmas Eve service. We did a couple of rehearsals with me playing on an acoustic kit, so I was using the usual assortment of acoustic snare sounds- cross stick, brushwork, snares off and on... the whole works.

Today I got the call that the worship director decided to go with an electric set for the service, and is totally opposed to any idea of having a second small acoustic set just for the jazz.

So... it appears that I'm going to have to make this work on an electric kit. My only hope is that they'll at least let me change the patches... Any suggestions about playing jazz on an electric kit?
 
Well, I played the sound check. It won't be ideal, but I can make it work. It's a decent kit, I suppose, with a Roland TD-12 powering everything. The biggest issue I had was volume balance. I couldn't get a loud enough hi-hat CHIK in general and on the "Brushes" kit, I could never get the "swooshy" stir sound high enough. Also, man, I forgot how little subtlety the kit has (I used to play one for church before I convinced them to let me use my kit). Forget trying to keep time with brushes. All you get is indistinct white noise. All the cymbals transform from taps to crashes at unrealistically low levels, and the snare's cross stick changes to a rim shot at way too low of a volume. I guess one can get used to it, but I don't have to like it. :)

Since it's somebody else's kit, I don't want to reprogram any of the patches. Do any of the presets have a better "jazz" sound than the "jazz" preset? The bass drum is super super open- much more so than I prefer.

Thoughts?
 
I say if they're insisting you play the kit, then you have to make it work. If that means finding different patches to play, then that's what that means. There should be no harm in creating a kit for yourself, especially if you really only need one kit to begin with. I think that's reasonable.
 
Bo Eder said:
I say if they're insisting you play the kit, then you have to make it work. If that means finding different patches to play, then that's what that means. There should be no harm in creating a kit for yourself, especially if you really only need one kit to begin with. I think that's reasonable.
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Well, this is true, but it also involves selecting models, pitching them to taste, setting velocities and levels, EQ-ing, and a whole host of other steps that take longer than I'll have tomorrow. Also since it's somebody else's personal kit, I feel awkward reprogramming anything. Heck, if I could have made it work, I wouldn't have even changed the preset, but I couldn't make the big rock snare work, nor the uber-compressed rock-n-roll kick drum.

Bottom line is that I'll just make it work. I always end up hurting myself playing Roland kits because I overplay... trying to coax a little more volume or rim shots or whatever. I hit the artificial ceiling of the kit and keep hitting harder and harder, until I realize that I'm swinging with full extension. My shoulder is sore just from the sound check! :)
 
I feel bad for you. Its hard to have to adapt to a different instrument esp going from an acoustic kit to a e-kit. I always feel uncomfortable using someone elses rig. I never want to touch their settings, even if they say its ok.
 
dkerwood said:
Well, this is true, but it also involves selecting models, pitching them to taste, setting velocities and levels, EQ-ing, and a whole host of other steps that take longer than I'll have tomorrow. Also since it's somebody else's personal kit, I feel awkward reprogramming anything. Heck, if I could have made it work, I wouldn't have even changed the preset, but I couldn't make the big rock snare work, nor the uber-compressed rock-n-roll kick drum.

Bottom line is that I'll just make it work. I always end up hurting myself playing Roland kits because I overplay... trying to coax a little more volume or rim shots or whatever. I hit the artificial ceiling of the kit and keep hitting harder and harder, until I realize that I'm swinging with full extension. My shoulder is sore just from the sound check! :)
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I wish I had seen this earlier. Probably the best bet would be to use an "acoustic" ride cymbal and hi hats. These don't contribute as much to the volume problem generated by acoustic drums. I don't know that they would go for this but the ride cymbal is the expression in jazz (at least for me) and a patch in an electronic kit sounds sterile at the very best. The hi hat will keep the rest of the band in time as well.

If there is brushwork involved, set up an acoustic snare to your left (assuming you're a right handed drummer). Think (gasp) Steve Gadd as far kick drum work goes and for the sound patch to use.

If there was a way to go about it, I would just state the case that one reason why the drums keep the time is because they can't be turned down in a monitor mix and thus ignored. A ride cymbal and hi hat would help keep everything for falling apart, time-wise. usually, there is always someone who has an axe to grind against drums in a situation like this.

What they end up getting is a production which comes off sounding very generic and very bland. And sometimes, the trainwreck happens because now the band doesn't have to listen to you!

Mike

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Sounds like good subject matter for the youtube jazz robots to discuss LOL!

I have been studying Jazz for about five years now and I am just beginning to be proud of my cymbal and brush work.

I have fooled around with many electro kits over the years and I despise them because I can't pull sound nuances from them.
They are nothing more than an interesting toy to me that I get bored with after only a few moments.
I spend hours learning how to play and the e-kit takes it all away!

In my case I would have told the worship director to stuff it. (In a nice Christian way of course)
I then would have probably had to look for another church to join!
 
I totally agree with Bobdadruma,

ekits have their place but you loose those subtle abilities that acoustics lend themselves to.

That is the main reason I no longer wish to play at my church. They have become accustomed to overly loud drummers so they built a completely sound proof enclosure for the drums.

I would have suggested to your worship leader to just program all the drum tracks through a keyboard and give you the night off. In any case, more power and patience to ya brother.
 
Nodiggie said:
I totally agree with Bobdadruma,

ekits have their place but you loose those subtle abilities that acoustics lend themselves to.

That is the main reason I no longer wish to play at my church. They have become accustomed to overly loud drummers so they built a completely sound proof enclosure for the drums.

I would have suggested to your worship leader to just program all the drum tracks through a keyboard and give you the night off. In any case, more power and patience to ya brother.
Click to expand...

Yeah... well, I've only been going to this church for about six months, and am trying to get INTO playing there, not out of it. :)

The gig went well, relatively speaking. We prepared six tunes and ended up only doing about three. That part was certainly a bummer, especially since I went to some extra trouble of writing out melodies for the horn players to noodle around.

The sound was actually quite big, I was surprised to discover. The room was huge, and yes, it probably was easier on the soundman to use an e-kit. Heck, they didn't even use multiple outputs to send the drums to the system! They just sent one (presumably) mono output into one channel on the mixer. That means, of course, that the drummer has to make sure his own kit is balanced, and if there's problems, I guess the sound guy just had to yell back.

For my playing, though, it was sufficient. I hate not being able to be subtle, though. I'm not a flashy drummer, and I don't have remarkable speed or crazy polyrhythmic fills to display. My calling card is nuance, subtlety, and the ability to play in the pocket no matter what. The pocket was fine, but there is no nuance or subtlety with an e-kit. Maybe six levels of attack, triggered by hitting *a little* harder? Meh.

With the size of room, it makes sense that they wouldn't want to mess with an acoustic set. It was a big enough venue that they'd probably want to throw at least a couple overhead mics on the drums, which is a lot of extra hassle for three jazz tunes before the service even started.

Oh well. Hopefully I made some good impressions and can start getting into the regular rotation at church.
 
You did a good thing in one sense that was to comply and fit-in within the constraints presented. However, it would also be worth pointing out that for a decent drummer, aka yourself, then an acoustic kit would have been more appropriate for jazz. Jazz kits/players do not play at high volumes and so the balance can be made to work. I have a TD12 and whilst I genuinely respect Bobdadruma loathing of ekits, I have no choice but to use an ekit. I agree that the ekits are worst for jazz for the reasons Bob stated.

As you become a trusted member of the worship team, then the leaders will take more notice of you and your demands.

Davo
 
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