Why I don’t loan out instruments

ByBret Pimentel

I am slowly building a good collection of high-quality instruments. It’s not easy to do that on a graduate student’s budget; I accomplish it by living frugally, saving carefully, shopping around, and generally putting a great deal of thought and planning into each purchase. I don’t buy instruments on credit. I protect my investments with conscientious care and maintenance, as well as an excellent insurance policy by a company that specializes in musical instrument coverage. (Incidentally, this policy quickly paid for itself, several times over, when there was an “incident” with my flute a couple of years ago. Seriously consider getting one if you don’t have one already!)

Every now and then someone asks to borrow an instrument from me. Often it will be a saxophonist who needs a flute or clarinet for a gig they have already agreed to play. My policy, which I have upheld almost perfectly for several years now, is simple: I don’t loan instruments to anybody, for anything, period.

Most people who feel comfortable asking me a favor like this are people who I know well, and who I know would take good care of my instruments. It’s tough to turn down a seemingly reasonable request from a friend, and in the past I have made exceptions in moments of weakness (though I am getting dangerously good at saying “no”).

But it isn’t fair for me to save and sacrifice to have expensive instruments, and then allow others to use them freely to get gigs that perhaps should be rightfully mine. A saxophonist who doesn’t have his or her own flute or clarinet (at least a cheap student model!) likely isn’t a strong or committed enough doubler to be doing doubling gigs. It’s not surprising that people who make these requests often also want to borrow a fingering chart or ask for help with reeds. I spend serious time and money obtaining instruments and paying my dues learning to play them. If you want to get those gigs, you should, too!

I suppose it’s possible that a good doubler could at times find themselves without the gear they need for one reason or another, but I have taken all necessary steps to ensure that I have what I need, and that’s the cost of doing business. Woodwind playing is a bring-your-own-tools situation, and I am acquiring the tools I need while some of my colleagues are driving nicer cars than mine. I’ve made my choice, and they have made theirs.

On the other hand, I’m fairly willing to loan out instrument stands or other non-instrument gear to trusted friends when I can. Serious doublers should own these, too, but to me they are far less personal items, certainly less valuable, and are matters of convenience more than gig deal-makers or -breakers.

I have also had people offer to “rent” instruments from me; I have turned them down as well. While a few incoming bucks to defray the cost of owning and maintaining my instruments might take some of the sting out of loaning them out, there are additional intangible costs that come into play. Every gig that I play myself means additional networking and reputation-building, accumulated experience, and polishing of my skills; I sacrifice these when I enable someone else to play a gig for which I am prepared equipment-wise and they are not. I also enter the treacherous territory of charging my friends and colleagues money, which I am happy to avoid when I can.

So if you find yourself lacking an instrument for a gig, don’t hesitate to give me a call—I’ll be happy to take that gig off your hands.

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  • So you want to hire a horn section

    ByBret Pimentel

    Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases, at no cost to you.

    So, you want to hire a “horn” section for an upcoming gig or recording. Great! Horns can add a special touch to your rock, pop, blues, etc. performance.

    If you haven’t hired horns before, here are some things to keep in mind:

    • A small thing: the word “horn” as it’s used in this kind of music usually means trumpet, trombone, and/or saxophone. In classical music it means one specific instrument, probably not the one you want for this situation. Just something to remember if you ask someone to recommend some “horn” players.
    • If you’re planning to play some covers and there are horns on the original, depending on the mix it can be hard to tell exactly which horns. A horn section might range in size from two to a half dozen players or more, with some combination of trumpets, trombones, and saxophones in various sizes. There’s no single, standard setup.
    • Good working horn players can learn their cover-song parts by ear from a recording, just like your guitar/bass/keys/drum set players probably do. But it can be tricky to get the chord voicings right, just like if you’re trying to get a group of backup singers to imitate the harmonies from a favorite recording. It takes some coordination to make sure all the notes are covered, nobody is playing/singing somebody else’s part, and it sounds like a cohesive unit.
    • One thing that makes a great horn section great is precision in executing the details. This includes things like the coordinating the exact moment that notes begin and end, their shapes (do the notes swell? taper? etc.), and the gentleness or aggressiveness of the notes’ beginnings. Plus, horns don’t automatically play exactly in tune or in balance, so each chord may require the players to adjust to each other. That kind of precision doesn’t come quickly or easily (or cheaply).

    Here are some tips to make it all work:

    • Most working horn players read music well. (They often have some kind of formal training.) If you can get some professionally-prepared horn “charts” (sheet music) for the combination of horns you intend to use, and hire top-notch players, they will likely be able to nail the parts on stage with little or no rehearsal. Well-written charts don’t just tell each horn player which notes to play, but also have detailed markings that help a good section play together with precision and style. Good charts cost money, but once you’ve got them you can reuse them with another horn section next time, or even hire local horn players at each tour stop.
    • To put together a really polished, professional horn section without charts requires some rehearsal time to get all the notes sorted out and establish a unified style. This also costs money, because good horn players usually won’t rehearse for free.
    • Depending on the market you are working in, it may be possible to hire a pre-existing horn section. There can be advantages to this, like that they have already put in many hours learning to play together as a coordinated section. Some horn-sections-for-hire might have a set instrumentation, or they might revolve around a single player who provides services like contracting the rest of the section from a roster of top-notch players, and maybe composing or transcribing horn section charts.
    • One budget-friendly option to consider is a single horn player. It’s not the same as a tight, well-coordinated section, but it’s flexible and easy. (I think a single saxophone works especially well for this, but I may be biased.) If you hire the right person you can go without charts or rehearsal time. A good player will learn the most important horn lines from a recording, or even make up something convincing on the spot. I do a fair amount of playing that way—a band hires me to join them on a gig, and either I already know most of the cover songs well enough, or I can play something off-the-cuff that works. If the gig pays well enough, I can afford to do some extra homework in advance and learn the cover parts cold.
    • Horns are loud, but not loud enough to compete with amplified instruments. They will need mics and monitors. Basic vocal/general-purpose mics like SM57s or SM58s are a solid starting point, or your sound engineer may have some other options available. Include the horn section in your sound check so they can get monitor levels. (Generally they will need to hear fair amount of themselves in the monitor, like singers.) If you are providing charts they will also need music stands and maybe stand lights, but can probably bring their own if given advance notice.
    • Horn-playing freelancers are often accustomed to jazz gigs and maybe performances in a local symphony, so they should be ready on a moment’s notice to wear coat and tie (or equivalent female attire), “gig black” (all black, somewhat dressy), or “concert black” (tuxedo or similar dressiness). Decide whether you have any dress code expectations and communicate them.

    A horn section brings some extra class and professionalism to your performance. Knowing what to expect helps things go smoothly. Enjoy!

  • Technical limits

    ByBret Pimentel

    If I try to play too softly, sometimes my notes don’t respond as I would like. If I try to play too loudly, sometimes my tone or intonation suffer. I have similar limitations when it comes to things like finger or tongue speed, tone color or pitch flexibility, and more.

    The way I deal with these limits is very different depending on whether I’m performing or practicing.

    If I’m performing, I want to stay just within my limits. I want every note to be predictable and reliable. I want to take advantage of every bit of my dynamic range, but no more. I want to make wise, deliberate, professional-quality choices.

    If I’m practicing, I want to explore those limits. Push those limits. Live just beyond those limits. It’s important to do this for couple of reasons. First, if I don’t go past those limits, I won’t know where the limits are for my upcoming performance. Second, if I’m too afraid to go past the limits in the practice room, I’ll never expand them. And if something goes wrong—a note cracks or fails to speak or is out of tune—that’s okay, it’s just practice.

    Find your limits, know them well, and, in your practice space, break them.

  • Confessions of a mail-order shopper

    ByBret Pimentel

    I’m not sure I can recall the last time I walked into a music store and bought something.

    I hear every so often that I should support local businesses and mom-and-pop shops, and I have to admit that this sounds vaguely like a responsible and virtuous thing to do. But here’s why I don’t—and can’t.

    1. It costs too much. Prices are inevitably higher in local stores. I understand that so-called “full-service” establishments have overhead, but so do I. If they can justify charging higher prices, it seems fair that I can justify shopping around.
    2. They don’t stock what I need. Other than a few scattered specialty shops, local music stores stock what they can sell in volume, and that’s inexpensive instruments and accessories for the beginning band market. I live in a small town, but even in the fairly large cities where I have lived, I have, more frequently than not, been unable to get what I like. A few months ago I made a two-and-a-half hour drive to go saxophone shopping with a student at a large music store in a large city. The store was large enough to have a saxophone specialist on staff. The store regularly stocks one brand of (arguably) professional-quality saxophone (and it’s not Selmer, Yamaha, Yanagisawa, or Keilwerth), and had exactly two major-brand instruments available, used. We also contacted a small saxophone specialty shop that was a little farther away, one that actually has “saxophone” in the store’s name. They had zero pro-line horns in stock.
    3. As far as I can tell, the “superior customer service” factor is largely a myth. I think most woodwind players have experienced the frustration of going into a music store and being “helped” by the heavy-metal guitarist behind the counter. And even in specialty shops, I’ve rarely found a salesperson who can answer serious questions with much more than regurgitated advertising copy or a personal opinion. And, while I don’t doubt that specialty retailers are passionate about what they do, it’s important to keep in mind that they are businesspeople and subject to motivations other than getting you the best possible product for the smallest possible price. Read More “Confessions of a mail-order shopper”

  • Airline travel with musical instruments

    ByBret Pimentel

    airplaneDuring the past few months, I’ve had the opportunity to do some traveling with my instruments, on a number of airlines and through quite a few airports. Here are a few thoughts on getting instruments safely and smoothly to your destination.

    Going through airport security

    • In most cases, your plan should be to carry your instrument(s) onto the plane with you. That means taking the instrument through airport security, and sending it on the conveyor belt through the x-ray scanner. In my experience, security personnel are generally very good about recognizing musical instruments as such, and sending them on through without raising an eyebrow.
    • Security personnel may, however, wish to open instrument cases for closer inspection. In my experience, inspectors are uniformly courteous and respectful about this, and usually notify me before they begin. Earlier this week I had a security officer let me know that he needed to open my oboe case, which I had sent  through the x-ray within a larger carry-on bag. I asked politely if he would let me open the case for him, and he was more than happy to allow this. I recommend taking this approach, since security personnel may not know which side is “up.” If you open the case yourself, you won’t have to worry about instrument parts rolling out onto the airport floor.
    • I also like to lock any carry-on instruments cases that can be locked, and, of course, make sure I keep the keys handy. This ensures that security personnel can’t open the case without me while I’m still trying to get my shoes back on. Besides, airports and planes can be crowded, and I like to be sure that my cases won’t pop open if jostled or bumped. Read More “Airline travel with musical instruments”

  • Experiments with electric woodwinds

    ByBret Pimentel

    Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases, at no cost to you.

    I’ve been having fun with woodwinds enhanced with pickups or microphones. (If you’re interested in natively-electronic instruments like wind controllers, I’ve written about those elsewhere.)

    I still have a lot to learn about working with electronics. But here are a few observations in case anyone finds them helpful.

    Which instrument(s) to use? I find lower-pitched instruments to be more fun, since they can provide convincing bass lines. Electronics can pitch a high instrument down, of course, but I haven’t had the success I would like making this sound good. So far I’ve installed pickups into a bassoon bocal, a bass clarinet neck, and an English horn bocal. I’ve used microphones for other instruments.

    Which gadgets to use? I’m personally using the Little-Jake pickups, a looper, and a multi-effects unit. When I started getting into effects pedals, I found it alarmingly easy to accumulate quite a few. This was a good and inexpensive way to get started. But I quickly discovered that it was becoming unwieldy to try use use more than a few in performance (I literally had to walk back and forth across the stage to get to them all). A multi-effects unit turned out to be much more practical, with a few foot switches I can configure to operate a large number of effects. (I’m currently using one by Boss.) It takes a little more advance setup than individual pedals, but greatly simplifies the onstage footwork. And I was pretty easily able to sell off the individual pedals to fund the purchase.

    Which effects to use? I think the best-known guitar-type effects are distortion, delay/echo, and reverb. Those are fun to play with, but I’ve become more interested in ones I can use to give my instruments new capabilities, rather than just give their sounds a little grittiness or echo. For example, smart harmonizers (which add harmony lines based on a selected key) and pitch shifters (which add harmony lines based on selected intervals) make my instruments polyphonic, a significant upgrade for a woodwind player. And a looper, or even a cleverly-used delay, can create counterpoint.

    Here are a few examples of my experiments:

    There are eight audio tracks here, but each one is performed “live.” I’m trying to somewhat replicate sounds from the original song: two vocal parts, two guitars, piano, electric piano, and electric bass, plus various synthesizer lines that I’ve consolidated into one. I’m using harmonizers and pitch shifters on the “guitars” and “keyboards” to perform chords in real time. I’m also pitch shifting the “bass” to let the English horn play much lower than its natural range.

    I’m using a harmonizer here similarly to how I used it in the English horn video, but you can get a better view of what that involves footwork-wise. I’m using several carefully-programmed footswitches to change the harmonizer’s parameters as I go, in order to get the chromatic harmony that I want. On the A sections of the tune, I’m also using a pitch shifter to double the melody up an octave. The separate bass part that starts at about 0:28 uses pitch shift to drop the sound down an octave.

    This is an example of using a looper (the red unit) to layer multiple lines, while using the multi-effects unit (black) to do real-time harmony and some other things. The “bass” part, shifted down two octaves, isn’t as convincing as I would like (you may have to use earphones to hear it).

    Here’s a live-performance example using looper plus multi-effects unit.

    Here I’m using the multi-effects unit to perform the melody “call” and harmonized “response” (unfortunately distorted and too soft), and using the looper to provide backing for an improvised solo.

    Here’s an attempt to replicate one of Paul Hanson’s incredible electric bassoon “hocket” performances (I fell a bit short). The technique uses a delay to create a single well-timed echo, with the result being that I’m only playing every other note you hear; the in-between notes are echoes of previously-played ones. To get the full effect, check out Paul’s video.

    This one you can actually buy sheet music for; the arranger, Melissa Keeling, provides parameters for using a harmonizer and a delay (which could be separate pedals or functions of a multi-effects unit).

  • Dvorák’s “New World” and jazz music: Heirs to a common heritage

    ByBret Pimentel

    In 1892, Czech composer Antonín Dvorák came to the United States. He came at the invitation of a Mrs. Jeannette Thurber, a wealthy music lover who wanted him to head up her latest pet project—a conservatory of music meant to rival the famous conservatories of Europe.

    Dr. Dvorák, already known for his use of traditional Czech musical elements in his compositions, arrived in the New World to find it rich with ethnic music. He was particularly impressed with the spirituals of the black slaves:

    I am now satisfied that the future music of this country must be founded upon what are called the Negro melodies. This must be the real foundation of any serious and original school of composition to be developed in the United States. When I first came here last year I was impressed with this idea and it has developed into a settled conviction. These beautiful and varied themes are the product of the soil. They are American. . . . In the Negro melodies of America I discover all that is needed for a great and noble school of music. . . . There is nothing in the whole range of composition that cannot be supplied with themes from this source.

    Read More “Dvorák’s “New World” and jazz music: Heirs to a common heritage”

4 Comments

  1. If I played as well as you do Brett, I’d be following these well thought out guidelines about loaning instruments. But the folks I lend my instruments to know they may be called upon to sub in one of my bands with or without pay. And these players rock! Evil, I know…

    Reply

  2. I have never had a person ask to borrow a horn from me…Although I have had the director of a high school band program suggest that I will my instrument collection to his school. Huh? I wasn’t even a graduate of that school, or even of the city or province. It takes all kinds I guess…

    Your point is on the mark though. If a player accepts a gig, without the proper equipment, and then comes to you looking to borrow what they are lacking, that takes a certain kind of nerve.

    “No” would be the only answer someone would hear from me under those circumstances. Good to read that you’re getting good at saying the word. Keep on practicing it. “No”.

    By rights, the gig should go to the person with the gear. Student model instruments are reasonably priced and plentiful. There’s no reason a serious player shouldn’t have the standard “doubles” in their closet.

    Reply

  3. Thanks for the post Bret. I feel the exact same way that you do. Now that I’ve read this post I feel so much better about politely telling people “no, but thank-you for asking.”

    Why should others benefit from the sacrifices you choose to make so you can have great horns to double on? The answer is they shouldn’t.

    My thoughts are: I choose to invest in all intermediate to professional horns (I have 6-7 now) … don’t come crying to me if you don’t have any doubles or when your plastic student model clarinet or your leaky cheap flute isn’t going to cut it for the gig.

    Your statement “So if you find yourself lacking an instrument for a gig, don’t hesitate to give me a call—I’ll be happy to take that gig off your hands,” says it all. :o)!

    Reply

  4. Thanks for this article ,was helpful for me because I’m a drummer and had a friend who hired me for a church gig and later mentioned that some kid was gonna play drums for one song and I kindly asked if the kid was gonna use the church kit or bring his own, friend told me he was gonna use mine ,I was kind of bothered that my friend didn’t care to ask me if it was ok for a kid to play my kit,I kindly declined that the kid could not play my drum kit because it’s mine and I don’t let anyone play my gear and also because it cost me 14k which I bought by myself and anywho he kept insisting it wasn’t a big deal and was just one song and perfered for me to use my kit I got irritated that he still kept insisting and finally I just told him I don’t loan my head and I’ll use whatever the church has and my friend hasn’t really talked to me since but I don’t care since I worked hard to have what I have

    Reply

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