Worst (Mis)use Of A Mandolin

[Daniel Nestlerode]

I think the worst part about the clip other than the train-wreck vocals was the fact that the Eastwood sounded small, cheap, badly intonated, and slightly out of tune. I was thinking, "D### man, if you're going to play it on TV at least have the thing set up properly and have the professionalism to play in tune."

JourneyBear, I'm guessing you do not subscribe to the "No such thing as bad publicity" school of thought.
Someone who saw that clip, is right now searching the internet for one of those "little Tele's" and he or she may be the next hot player to come down the pike.

Daniel

[RickL]

My playing!

[Roydw3]

It isn't necessarily my kind of music and I really don't think most people would even know it was a e-mandolin. I thought his violin playing was worse than his mandolin playing. He must be a good keyboard player or he may be an electronics whiz. For some reason he is a part of the band.

I guess what I really wish some of the late night shows would do is bring in some great bluegrass bands right before a festival or show or awards program or some other high profile activity so that it would bring in more viewers to the venues. I think that if many people could see and hear this music performed live it would blow them away.

[Tobin]

Reading this thread reminds me of why I'm terrified of playing an instrument in front of strangers. There are critics everywhere, and no matter how good I ever think I might be, someone will always be thinking that I'm misusing or abusing the instrument or that I just plain stink.

The only public performance I ever did (in the early 1990's, playing bass guitar) was awful. We tuned up beforehand, but when we got out there, everything sounded wrong. We couldn't hear each other like we thought we could. Our rhythm was off, vocals didn't match the music. I could tell the audience thought we sucked, although they were polite enough not to boo us off the stage. To this day, I wonder how many of them snickered at us behind our backs like you guys are doing to this fellow. And it has kept me terrified of public performance.

I didn't even watch the clip. But I'm sure the guy probably has his own silent self-doubts about his skills, just like any musician does. It probably took a lot of nerve (and perhaps some of that good old-fashioned liquid courage) to get up there in front of millions of people and act like he's self-confident, when in reality he was frightened that people would say exactly what you folks are saying about him. And you did not disappoint.

Even if he's a horrible player, I still commend him for doing it. They say that attitude is 90% of what makes a person successful, and if he was strutting around, maybe he was just trying to show some confidence to get him through. He's gotten a lot more exposure than most of us will ever have. And if you ever find people criticizing you behind your back for your playing skills (or even suspect it), remember that what goes around comes around.

Sorry to be the downer here. I didn't really mean for this to sound like I'm chastising you all, honest! But catty talk like this really keeps a lot of honest folks from ever wanting to share their music with others. I think it's pretty poor support for fellow musicians. But then again, that's show-biz, I guess. *shrug*

*edited to add:
To the OP, sorry, I know you didn't want this to focus on your example necessarily. But I think it applies to pretty much any example. Unless someone is smashing their mandolin against the speakers or otherwise literally abusing it, I wouldn't consider any honest playing an "abuse" or "misuse".

[andyjingram]

Tobin, part of learning to play live is getting used to the fact the you can't hear anything properly and ignoring that creeping sense that the audience is putting up with you at best! Don't let it scare you, it's what people do onstage.

[JoeD]

Well, I just got around to watching the video. I guess if one of my kids was on that, I'd be telling them what a nice job they'd done.

I don't think there's much that guy could have done with a mandolin that I'd enjoy much, but clearly they're not really my thing anyway. Funny thing - they're from my home town, but I don't think I've seen any of them at our local jams. Maybe they're new.

[Mike Bunting]

I nominate McCartney's use of the mando on that video that made the rounds a while back.

[journeybear]

Tobin - You didn't say if you still play an instrument, but if you do (hope it's mandolin!) you should understand that part of playing is being heard by others, and obviously everyone has their own tastes, likes and dislikes, and you can't let their judgments outweigh yours. As the old philosopher put it, "You can't please everyone, so you got to please yourself." Gotta get up on that horse and ride it again. Not necessarily at a gig, but at a jam, or just sitting around picking with some friends.

Public performance is not for everybody. It takes a certain willingness to put yourself at risk of criticism. In the situation you described, you and your bandmates must have gone through several levels of checks and balances, self-criticism and analysis, to arrive at a point where you felt you were ready to step onto the stage. Things didn't go well - granted, it sounds awful - but if you had continued, and done more gigs, this experience would have receded in your memory, diluted by subsequent gigs and their associated memories, so that you would have eventually (perhaps even sooner than later) been able to laugh about it. Just about every musician who has ever played a gig has a repertoire of these stories. They all begin with: "Do you remember when ..." or "You think that was bad! One time ..." or "You're not going to believe this, but once ..." or something similar. As another old philosopher said, "Comedy is tragedy plus time."

I don't know you, but I wish you hadn't given up after that. No musician should let one bad experience define his or her entire performing career. Even the greatest musicians that ever lived have had bad gigs; it's part of the deal. The best you can do is try to keep the errors minimal in size and frequency and keep plugging along in spite of them. Because they won't end. Stuff will always happen. Stuff won't stop happening. It's inevitable. Dadgummit!

But believe in yourself, and your abilities. And don't be afraid to put yourself on the line. That's one good way to assess your musical development, and also build self-confidence. I think it's safe to say every musician worth listening to has gone through these challenges and survived, and even surpassed them, moving on to greater challenges which they also survived and surpassed. It's part of the deal.

(Note subtle inclusion of topical content: "every musician worth listening to." There are those who ain't but still get gigs, which baffles me, and seem to not care, which baffles me more ... ... )

[journeybear]

I see there's validity to the argument that Americans have nearly lost their critical acumen. Audiences applaud everyone and no longer boo; hundreds of school districts have banned the use of red ink for correcting papers; everyone ges a trophy; everyone gets a standing ovation. If you can't say something is bad, how do you know what's good?

I'm not advocating slamming people for the sake of slamming or if they don't deserve it - only if they do.

Do we really live in the merry old Mando Oz, where everybody's mommy and daddy are named Rhonda and David, and everybody's kids are named Chris and Sierra, and everybody plays clean and fast and in tune?

I don't want to discuss the merits of criticism, nor its moral implications. I just want to know:
Has no one ever been to a show or seen a performance on TV in which someone played mandolin badly?

Well, maybe we really have arrived at Mandonirvana and I didn't know it.

Never mind ...

[Mike Bunting]

A whole lotta truth there, JBear.

[Tobin]

I see there's validity to the argument that Americans have nearly lost their critical acumen. Audiences applaud everyone and no longer boo; hundreds of school districts have banned the use of red ink for correcting papers; everyone ges a trophy; everyone gets a standing ovation. If you can't say something is bad, how do you know what's good?

There's a difference between saying someone needs improvement and saying that they're abusing/misusing the instrument.

As for booing, I for one wouldn't ever want to be booed off the stage. Would you? Even if I tried really hard to deliver my best, but the audience didn't like it, I would feel it is pretty rude to boo someone off the stage. That ranks right up there with throwing rotten fruit at them. It's uncouth and unbecoming. And it certainly doesn't improve the quality of anything. It just makes everything unpleasant. I for one don't want to see a return to that kind of behavior from rowdy crowds.

I'm not advocating slamming people for the sake of slamming or if they don't deserve it - only if they do.

And what is the standard for them 'deserving' it?

[RichM]

Originally Posted by journeybear

I see there's validity to the argument that Americans have nearly lost their critical acumen. Audiences applaud everyone and no longer boo; hundreds of school districts have banned the use of red ink for correcting papers; everyone ges a trophy; everyone gets a standing ovation. If you can't say something is bad, how do you know what's good?

No matter how many times Lucy pulls the football away, you keep running up to kick it...

[journeybear]

Originally Posted by Tobin

And what is the standard for them 'deserving' it?

Taste.

[allenhopkins]

Originally Posted by journeybear

Taste.

De gustibus non est disputandum.

[journeybear]

Originally Posted by allenhopkins

De gustibus non est disputandum.

Chacun à son goût!

[Mike Bunting]

Chacun à son goût!

Hey, where did you find the accents? I used that phrase the other day but had to go accentless!

[jim simpson]

I think if you were to show up wasted at a performance and couldn't play - then you might be deserving of a booing. (They wanted her to go to rehab, but she said no, no, no)

[journeybear]

Originally Posted by Mike Bunting

Hey, where did you find the accents? I used that phrase the other day but had to go accentless!

Well, as much as I don't like to give away my secrets, this is too obvious you will kick yourself ... I googled the phrase and scrolled down the results till I found one with the diacritical marks. Copy and paste. There's also wikipedia, chock full of lists of foreign languages. I copied examples into a draft in my email which I access as needed. I tend to have my email open in another window while I'm doing other stuff, so it's always right there if I want it.

If you have Word there are keystroke commands for a lot of these. Search on that phrase in Help. Create the character there, cut and paste here, becasue these commands don't work in the text box here. I inherited this computer and it doesn't have Office so I've had to improvise, because I don't remember all of them. I do remember how to do é so you can write Café properly: ctrl + ', then type e. Oh, here we go: ctrl + `, type a to get à; ctrl + shift + 6 to get û. I'm actually able to do this in WordPad - they just don't have any mention of it in its Help. But these keystroke commands follow similar approaches. They have been staring back at you from your keyboard all along, just no one told you they were there.

It's a bit of effort but it's worth it. Not only is it impressive, it's actually accurate, which is always preferred, to my line of thinking.

Got to go - Spinal Tap is on Leno tonight - notice I can't put the umlaut over the n as they do - that doesn't exist in reality, just in the ST goofy universe.

Glad to help!

[man dough nollij]

From MS Word help:

Press
CTRL+` (ACCENT GRAVE), the letter
à, è, ì, ò, ù,
À, È, Ì, Ò, Ù
CTRL+' (APOSTROPHE), the letter
á, é, í, ó, ú, ý
Á, É, Í, Ó, Ú, Ý
CTRL+SHIFT+^ (CARET), the letter
â, ê, î, ô, û
Â, Ê, Î, Ô, Û
CTRL+SHIFT+~ (TILDE), the letter
ã, ñ, õ
Ã, Ñ, Õ
CTRL+SHIFT+: (COLON), the letter
ä, ë, ï, ö, ü, ÿ,
Ä, Ë, Ï, Ö, Ü, Ÿ
CTRL+SHIFT+@, a or A
å, Å
CTRL+SHIFT+&, a or A
æ, Æ
CTRL+SHIFT+&, o or O
œ, Œ
CTRL+, (COMMA), c or C
ç, Ç
CTRL+' (APOSTROPHE), d or D
ð, Ð
CTRL+/, o or O
ø, Ø
ALT+CTRL+SHIFT+?
¿
ALT+CTRL+SHIFT+!
¡
CTRL+SHIFT+&, s
ß
The character code, ALT+X
The Unicode character for the specified Unicode (hexadecimal) character code. For example, to insert the euro currency symbol (), type 20AC, and then hold down the ALT key and press X.
ALT+the character code (on the numeric keypad)
The ANSI character for the specified ANSI (decimal) character code. For example, to insert the euro currency symbol, hold down the ALT key and press 0128 on the numeric keypad.
Note If you type extensively in another language, you may prefer to switch to a different keyboard instead.

[journeybear]

Thanks, Lee! I was planning to go to the library tomorrow to copy and paste these into a draft ... and here you are, saving me the hassle!

Why they don't have these in WordPad Help is beyond me. The commands work, but they don't tell you about them. Weird. Really, truly weird. It's like they were saying, "Here you go, you can use this program. But if you want to know all that it can do, you'll have to figure it out for yourself."

Weird. Really, truly weird.

[Mike Bunting]

Hey, thanks guys, if I can figure out how these work on Mac, I plan to post more often in French!
Merci, mes amis.

[journeybear]

Originally Posted by Mike Bunting

Hey, thanks guys, if I can figure out how these work on Mac, I plan to post more often in French!
Merci, mes amis.

Pas de problème, mon ami!

[EggyToast]

Mac is éäsÿ! î çould pøst lïkè that all day but would probably get some HateMail™®©

Mike, on your mac, go into System Prefs, then International, then Input Menu. Then check "Keyboard Viewer." You should get a little flag or something up near your clock on the menu bar. Click that, and select the keyboard viewer. You'll get a keyboard up that shows all the keys. Hold the Option key, and they all change. Hold Shift+Option, and they'll change yet again. That should « get you going » ;D

Anyway, to the topic on hand, I see this all the time since my primary instrument is double bass. Proper left hand technique is a sort of "claw," yet many players, especially in bluegrass, use a "clamp," where all of their fingers are together and they play primarily with their middle finger, shifting all over the place!

That doesn't mean that some very good players use bad technique, of course. I do like that their "multi-instrumentalist" is really not that good on mandolin or violin, though, but whatever -- if they're getting the sound they're looking for, more power to them. I wouldn't be surprised of some of these songs are written with a mandolin so that the keyboard player can get out from behind the keys and run around a bit.

But it is ultimately about the music. If it sounds good, great. It might be cringeworthy to see a mandolin player flip his mandolin over and play it like a hand-drum while the guitarist for the band croons a song, but if the music's good, then "mission accomplished" right?

I'll agree that playing songs that emphasize simply technique typically aren't that interesting, unless you're familiar with the instrument or you're easy to impress. But a lot of songs are pretty simple and, perhaps even better, sound good whether they're played with a mandolin, violin, guitar, whatever.

ç'est peut-être juste moi

[journeybear]

Originally Posted by EggyToast

Mac is éäsÿ! î çould pøst lïkè that all day but would probably get some HateMail™®©

I miss Macs! Such fun!

Wouldn't it be nice if hatemail really were a registered copyright-protected trademark? Maybe more people would be less inclined to snip, snap, and snipe willy-nilly.

Maybe not. People are people ...

And welcome to the Café!

[rhetoric]

Originally Posted by JoeD

Not only that, but I'd bet that most of the mandolin players on this board picked it up at least in part because you can't swing a cat without hitting a guitar player.

'scuse me. I've got to go yell at some kids to get off my lawn now.

I hate it when I come late to a thread and somebody beats me to the punch. I too have to get some kids off of my lawn, too.

Er. I mean, I too like the novelty of the mandolin. I'm the best mandolin player in my circles (pretty small circles, thank goodness) and I enjoy that.

p.s. Even if I had said it first, I wouldn't have given you the wonderful image of swinging cats and hitting guitar players.