Musings on playing for Theatre

Most blogs suffer from one of two fates, lack of content or lack of time. I am currently suffering from the latter. I have at least 6 posts stored up in my head, but don’t have the time to write them all down at the moment. So my summary of Tony Hall’s gig at Islington Folk Club on Thursday is “Amazing”. I hope this will do!

So to business. The last two Musings were on playing for dance and playing for song. Playing for theatre however is one kind of performance that not many people get to do and I feel privileged to have done it not once, but twice. There is a distinction between being a pit band for a musical or playing incidental music for a play and doing what I did, which is integrating music with theatre, with both sides reacting to one another.

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Musings on playing for song

So I’ve had a few absolutely manic weeks and things are looking to get even worse, so don’t be surprised if I don’t update this blog much over the next week or two. But I thought that I would take this opportunity (it being 3am) to provide you with some musings on something that I started doing very recently.

The last “Musings” post that I did was on something that I have done for years, namely playing for dance. I still have a long way to go in that sphere, but feel that I at least know what I am aiming for. Last Friday though, I did something that I had never done before – accompanied song in public. I am going to tell you about it.

Musings on playing for dance

I get a real kick out of playing for dancers, whether Morris or social dancing. There is a connection between dancer and musician which if you get it right can be really quite special. I’m not going to dwell on technique here, but on the sensation of playing for dance.