r/musicians Rules

I think synthesizer will be much better for me, because there's not so much space at my home. Also, I think I need low budget instrument, because I have played piano like 5 times in my whole life.
Another thing: if you have any YouTube channels with tutorials on how to play keyboard instruments, please share with me

I’m 31 with a small business and a child. I can realistically only play around 30-50 mins per day if I’m lucky.

Used to play guitar when I was a teenager but stopped because I got stuck bc I never learned theory. Now I’m amending that.

I bought a trumpet and played for 2 months and then I read/realized it’s extremely demanding of time to get to play decently. So now I’m looking for something a bit more simple

My favorite instrument after trumpet is soprano sax but I’ve read it’s a bit tricky. But there’s one selling in my area for kind of cheap. I read another way to start is to learn clarinet which also has the convenience of being extremely portable.

I want to do this for myself so I’m not against the idea that learning whatever instrument I end up playing is going to take me years.

TLDR Should I just get the soprano sax and power through or let my wallet rest a bit and get a clarinet for a couple of years and then make the switch. Final goal would still be soprano sax.

Organizing a show for my band, was wondering if anyone had like tips or things they wish they knew before they started organizing shows and events.

I'm putting together a small music room at home where ideally 5–6 people can casually play together. I'm a beginner when it comes to audio equipment, so I'm mainly looking for a sanity check on the setup and signal flow, especially whether I've misunderstood anything or am missing some important piece of equipment.

I'm not trying to build a professional studio or get the absolute best gear for the money. The goal is basically:

• 5–6 friends can come over and play together
• Everyone can hear the whole group through headphones
• Everyone can independently adjust their headphone volume
• I can easily adjust everyone's levels at the mixer
• I can occasionally record individual parts into GarageBand
• I can leave most things plugged in so it's easy to just turn everything on and play

Current planned setup

Instruments:

• Alesis Nitro Max electronic drums (possibly upgrading to Roland TD-07DMK if the budget allows)
• Yamaha TRBX174 bass
• Electric guitar that I already own
• Yamaha PSR-E383 keyboard
• 2 × Shure SM58 for vocals

Mixer:

• Yorkville VGM14

Headphones:

• 4–6 × Audio-Technica ATH-M20X
• 2 × Behringer HA400 headphone amps (giving me 8 total headphone outputs)

Other:

• Drum throne
• Keyboard stand
• 2 × mic stands
• Guitar/bass stands
• Appropriate instrument/XLR cables
• Long headphone extension cables

My understanding of the signal flow

For group practice, I'm imagining:

*Instruments → (Optional: Pedals/Amps) → VGM14 → HA400 → Headphones *

So essentially everyone hears the same main mix, and we use the mixer to adjust the relative levels of the instruments/vocals. Each person can then adjust their own headphone volume using the HA400.

When I want to record something:

VGM14 → USB → Mac → GarageBand

I would mostly be recording individual parts by myself, rather than trying to record a full 5–6 person band with every instrument on a separate track simultaneously. So I'm not sure I need a multitrack USB interface/mixer.

A couple of specific questions

1. Is there anything obvious I'm missing in terms of cables, adapters, DI boxes, etc.?
2. For the keyboard and electronic drums, should I run their left/right outputs into the mixer for stereo, or is mono preferable for some reason?
3. Is there any issue with using the VGM14's USB connection to record individual parts into GarageBand? Again, I'm not trying to multitrack the whole band simultaneously.
4. If you were spending the money, are there any components here where you'd specifically spend more or less? I'm much more interested in practical reliability/ease of use than subtle sound-quality improvements. The stuff I've listed here is about $4,000 CAD and I don't want to spend more than that.

Thanks!!

Hello, I am having an issue on knowing what to practice and basically how to practice.

For reference, I play alto sax, and played all through middle school and high school. I am now a sophomore in college, and was graciously given a chance to play in my college orchestra. The issue is, I didn’t play for the last semester of highschool, and didn’t play any while I was a freshman in college.

I never really practiced outside of band class in highschool, but for some reason I now feel very inclined to try and become as good as possible, and I think I need some practice to help knock the rust off.

My question is, how should I structure a practice for myself. In orchestra we play through all the pieces and stop and go over certain areas if needed. I am very confident in my playing ability in being able to play the music we need to, but I want to improve myself as a musician.

Some things I struggle with after returning is my counting, remembering the symbols and words,(f,p,mp,etc), how to play notes out of my standard range,(High D Low D), and I have a lack of knowledge of scales and basic music theory which I would like to improve upon.

Any help or ideas are appreciated.

Hey all, I hope this makes sense to someone who was in a similar spot and pushed through it.

Since I was a kid I always learned music through memorization but never learned underlining concepts. I can play a few pieces on piano, toured in bands, can get around a guitar and even fingerpick some more complex fingerstyle folk stuff but I don’t feel like I can improvise well at all.

Basically I have the muscle memory down well enough to get by and even tour but throw me in a jam session and I will be lost.

I don’t know theory beyond some very basic concepts. I do know the note names on the guitar fretboard, what a 5th is, major vs minor etc.

I love playing music and feel very fortunate to have played in bands people actually listened too but as I get older I’d love to be able to sit in with others easier and improvise.

Anyone find themselves in a similar position and push through it? I’m curious what I should study or what kind of lessons I should seek out.

Would love suggestions of some free video lessons to begin going down some rabbit holes. My primary instruments are guitar and keys.

I'm currently using $20 apple earphones to transcribe. they work okay for me, but i'm just getting started to trasncribe chords and I can't hear any of the bass notes. so I think it's time for me to upgrade. i don't know anything about headphones so, can you recommend something that has nice sound quality that can easily pick out bass from the mix.

also I don't want to spend more than $150. so if you know of any good pricepoint from $150, $100 or under it would be appreciated. thanks

Long story short, the band I'm in is finally going to play our first gig (yay).

I am a bit concerned about our singer, they have had a few personal issues this year, which can explain some of the behaviour, but they have been a no show for rehearsals too many times for my liking. Now we have this gig booked I'm worried that they may flake on the gig.

Has anyone got any advice on how to ensure we have a singer when wrong walk out on stage?

I'm a singer song writer, who likes indie slow accoustic atmospheric melodies and artists like bon iver sombr, beabadobee, noah kahan, laufey!

I'm looking for a composer/producer to help bring my songs to to life! I'd love to work with u or anyone. I can sent my demo and we can go over song inspiration

Hi! I'm currently researching a new concept aimed at helping independent and emerging musicians better understand how listeners react to their music.

Before building anything, I want to speak to actual artists instead of making assumptions.

I'm specifically looking for musicians who:

release their own music

are trying to grow an audience

have used or considered promotion, ads, SubmitHub, Groover, playlist pitching, etc.

It's not a sales pitch and I'm not asking you to sign up for anything. I just have a few short questions about how you currently test your songs, promote them, what kind of listener data would actually be useful to you, and what you would or wouldn't pay for.

It should take around 5-10 minutes.

If you're interested, please send me a private message / DM rather than answering the questions publicly.

Honest and critical opinions are especially welcome. I'm trying to find out whether the idea is actually worth building.

For context, I'm a singer/songwriter, I perform regularly in and around my community, and I've been hosting a few writers nights and other similar events in an area that mostly just focuses on cover bands and brewery gigs. I grew up in that grind, and I respect it, but I'm also pretty over it.

With my writers' nights, I pay each artist a guarantee out of my own pocket, pay for a sound tech, have posters done up, and even hire a photographer. I pray I recoup money through ticket sales.

At the end of the season, I break even if I'm lucky. I don't have a lot of money to begin with, but I do it because every one of these shows I've curated has been filled with laughter, tears, eclectic music, and excellent storytelling. At the risk of being cheesy, it's magic, and it keeps me going mentally.

With that said, I've started to have a lot of local people reach out asking to play these, or artists I don't know reaching out to book me for shows with an unspoken but palpable expectation that I will reciprocate by booking them for the writers night.

I'm struggling with setting boundaries and communicating that this isn't something you ask to be a part of. I pick musicians based on their ability to write provoking lyrics and deliver them in a moving way to an audience with nothing but their dry vocals and a guitar/piano. I carefully curate who I put together so that the chemistry is amazing between each writer and the audience.

I like a lot of these people, but they aren't demonstrating that they are ready.

Some of these folks don't have any recordings or performance videos where I can listen to their songs. If they do, it's heavily produced and gives me no reference for what they would sound like at the show.

Some are great career musicians, but their lyrics aren't up to par with their musicianship. I don't like speaking about people's self-expression negatively, and I do believe in a certain degree of art begin subjective, but it's hard to connect to these songs that are either so cryptic that only the writer can draw any meaning from it, or so simple and surface level that it sounds like it was written by A.I.

Some are decent writers, but don't treat the night any differently than a noisy bar gig. They don't promote, they barely give me anything to promote them with, and they play locally for free so often that I don't see how I can count on them drawing an audience.

And I don't want to tell these people these things, because even if they take it well and work on those things, it still doesn't guarantee that they'll be the right fit. I've got a long list already that far exceeds the amount of spots I have available.

I always strive to be kind and build people up rather than tear them down. At the same time, the best shows I've put on have been the ones where I completely listened to my gut, and I feel like I'm building something truly special and genuine. In a world that feels like it's on fire all the time, I feel like it's my duty to protect this thing that gives audience members a place to laugh, cry, feel, and be in community together.

What would you do in my shoes? Again, some of these people are people I will regularly encounter in my community, and some even regularly attend these shows.

I've been going to a local blues jam, and it's pretty fun. Great house band, well-organized, nice crowd. And of course blues is good for this sort of thing as even if you don't know the song you can basically follow along.

But there's a few guys who come and want to play really complicated blues-rock, i.e. it doesn't follow the I-IV-V-turnaround pattern. They'll shout out corrections as we're trying to learn it, start over if they don't think it sounds right. It'd be one thing if they brought chord sheets, but we're supposed to go by ear.

A few people groan when they see a particular offender show up, and try to avoid getting called up on stage with him.

Not really sure how to avoid this, besides suffering through.

Spent last weekend tweaking neck relief on a build I thought was done two months ago. Customer was happy to wait, but it got me thinking about how differently players and builders define "finished." For me, a guitar leaves the shop when the setup is stable and the thing makes me want to keep playing it. But I've handed instruments to players who immediately want the action lower, or the pickups hotter, or the neck profile sanded down. Fair enough, it's their tool.

The tension is interesting though. I build these things to last decades, ideally, yet the first interaction with the player usually involves immediate adjustments. I used to take that personally. Now I see it as the instrument starting its real life, becoming theirs.

Still, there's a point where I have to stop tinkering or I'd never let anything go.

Curious how other musicians handle this with their own gear. Do you know right away when an instrument fits, or is it a gradual process of small changes? And for those who've had custom work done, what separated the builders who nailed it from the ones who missed?

I've been watching the coverage from Reading this weekend and I can hear the singers are live vocals but they often seem to have additional vocals that aren't coming from anyone on stage. Plus the bands themselves sound so clean I find it hard to believe it's live playing.

Please prove me wrong. I hate to think this is live performance these days.

I'm applying this to live performance too, because I've decided I'm going to make mistakes at my gig 🤷🏻‍♀️ despite practicing my ass off

I’ve made two full songs that have been semi released and I feel when making a song there’s only so many vibes you can do so I’m 13 rn I kinda wanna stop making music rn bc I’m scared by the time I’m 18 or whenever I’m gonna run out of ideas I literally pour my whole heart when making a song and I try so many ideas on one single song bc I like to make every song a banger lol and I’m scared I’m gonna run out of ideas and different vibes to try and different metaphors but idk