Klarinet Archive - Posting 000110.txt from 2007/07

From: kurtheisig@-----.net
Subj: Re: [kl] Loud Shows (OT)--MY RANT TOO!!!!!
Date: Fri, 13 Jul 2007 03:11:25 -0400

I well remember a local IDIOT with a big band. We were playing in "a closet". This restaurant had room for maybe 20 dancers. This jerk, who used to have a band that opened for Buddy Rich, put a mic in front of ME!!!!, saying "You can't be heard". That took a lot of effort to keep my Irish side down!!! My mouthpieces are labeled Kurt Heisig The Biggest Sound for a REASON. I play with a massive sound, I'm an old bari player! Well with 4 of the 5 saxes miced (he did NOT mic the lead who has a PUNY sound--???), and the speakers behind our heads, it was PAINFUL! My ears rang for SIX MONTHS! I didn't know if I would ever gain my hearing back or make mouthpieces again.

Besides ________ me off about my LITTLE sound, he demonstrated his tremendous lack of professionalism with his ignorance. Part of playing with ANY ensemble is playing in balance with other players, and that is MY job, not the job of the orangutan on the board. We are trained to listen to each other and balance and blend. Even if we have a sound as big as a Mack Truck!

Here is something EVERY musician should realize. We only get ONE set of ears. They are PRECIOUS! There is NO reason to use distorted amplification in MOST venues. True, I probably can't fill the Cow Palace or the Oakland Coliseum with my clarinet, nor even my sax, but most any other hall in Northern California is EASY to fill, with ANY single reed instrument. We have played many outdoor performances with a (classical or rag, not jazz) sax quartet acoustically and been heard by audiences of a thousand or more that were all TALKING, and we were heard CLEARLY.

This NONSENSE of distorted electronic power is ---ready?---ILLEGAL!
OSHIA has established sound levels that can be inflicted on the barmaids! It is ILLEGAL to abuse the barmaids with excessive decibels. That also applies to the bartender, or the usher. That is state and federal OSHIA!

I soooo regretted not walking off that job and then turning this clown in to the union and OSHIA. I thought my career was over.

And why do we talk about ear plugs and other "protection" which distorts and allows damage anyway, when our (for ONCE) intelligent gov't has WISELY established laws for OUR protection.

They are NOT our friends---they are HURTING us....

TURN THE ________s IN!

Kurt

-----Original Message-----
>From: Karl Krelove <karlkrelove@-----.net>
>Sent: Jul 12, 2007 5:53 PM
>To: klarinet@-----.org
>Subject: [kl] Loud Shows (OT)
>
>Funny I noticed Rien's tag line just after I got home from a trip we took
>some students on. We went into Philadelphia to see Disney's A High School
>Musical at (of all places) the Academy of Music. If anyone is unfamiliar
>with the show, it's a rock musical with some "horns" in the pit but mostly
>guitars, drums and synthesizer. Both the pit and the actors on stage were
>amplified so loud that it was frequently painful, and I literally (apropos
>Rien's tag) couldn't hear the words or, sometimes, even the tune. It was all
>just a strident, painful, din. The only parts I could really make sense of
>were the lines of dialog. And we were sitting (10 adults and 81 kids) in the
>amphitheater - the third balcony, the highest and most distant from the
>stage. The speakers were all in front surrounding the proscenium. Even the
>kids thought it was loud. I can't imagine what people sitting closer had to
>deal with.
>
>The irony, which wasn't lost even on a few of the students, is that the
>Academy was built as an opera house where Verdi and even Wagner were played
>with no microphones (indeed, no electricity) at all. Somehow they managed to
>be heard back then.
>
>Sorry - just a rant unrelated to much of anything here, but I had to let it
>out somewhere.
>
>Now I feel (a little) better. I'll be better still when my ears stop
>ringing.
>
>:-)
>
>Karl
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Rien Stein [mailto:rstein@-----.nl]
>> Sent: Thursday, July 12, 2007 11:51 AM
>> To: klarinetlijst
>> Subject: [kl] Re: Il convegno
>>
>> Rien
>>
>> "The orchestra was wonderful", he said, "it played so loud I couldn't even
>> hear what they were playing!"
>>
>
>
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>

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