Cruise Musician Job – My First Impressions

So I thought I should collect my first impressions on this gig, since they will probably end up being just as important as my final impressions with the gig.

First off, my job is the exception to the rule. People on this ship work all the time, and at hard jobs. They certainly earn their money. Some of the people are working 12 or 14 hour shifts, especially on days at sea. There is a bug of flu going around the ship now, so a lot of people are covering for the sick ones that have to stay in their cabins, etc.

My job, however, is not like this. On average, I work about 3 hours a day.  My biggest decision today was whether or not to read in my cabin or to read up on the promenade (and golly, the promenade on deck 2 or deck 3!?). For those of you keeping score, I scrapped both plans and just took a nap. Again.

This morning we have a short performance and then an hour practice. Afterall, it is a sea day today and we might go insane if we didn’t at least do something. I played a 15 minute set in one of the piano lounges and then I went to dinner. Dinner here really isn’t all the great to be honest. At least not for the staff. They seem to boil the vegetables in butter, and they seem to be unaware of the distaste the planet has for brussel sprouts. There must have been a killer sale on brussel sprouts at the last port or something, cause those slimy little buggers are all over my plate every night, whether I ask for them or not. Blech.

I played two shows tonight, each an hour long. The second one went better than the first one. We had a classical violinist performing with us tonight, and as the keyboard player, it’s apparently my job to play the flute and piccolo parts to incredibly intense classical compositions like The Sabre Dance and other impossible pieces that she plays in her set.

We also had a singer tonight, but we didn’t even practice his stuff before the show, it was pretty simple.

And let me take a minute to talk about the music. That’s the biggest thing people talked about before I came on this gig. The music is cheesy. Can you live with that?

Ok, let’s set it straight. The music that we play during the shows is about as creatively interesting as a TV dinner. Yes, it’s cheesy, but it’s worse than that. If this is the nonsense that international audiences are craving for, then the music world is in for some serious trouble. It’s no wonder nobody back home makes any money for making good music if this is actually what people want. This music isn’t the stuff you hear in a blues club in Chicago or a rock club in New York – this is the music that happens when you put Las Vegas, MIDI programming and Lawrence Welk together in one terrible devil spawn that is sure to multiply and use your body as an incubator for it’s young. Clear the way, I believe I’m gonna lose my brussels sprouts all over my keyboard and ugly rayon shirt.

The musicians, however, are top notch. I don’t mean just like “hey, he can play fast huh-huh” – no, I mean these dudes know what’s going on. One rehearsal, one time through the material and they are hip. No need for extended rehearsals, you better keep up. And what’s even better, they are totally cool. Nobody is here to out do each other, no one is rapping with the bar owner trying to steal the next gig while his buddy is busy playing on stage. Nobody’s talking about how they are in the middle of recording their next album, or thinking about going on tour, or dropping names of people that they claim to know and probably don’t. There’s none of that silly, stupid music bullshit that goes on on land. The musicians actually seem, for once, content.

And why shouldn’t they be?? They have every reason to be satisfied. We have rooms to sleep in, we only work 3-4 hours a day, we can go almost anywhere in the ship, 1/2 price massages from the cute girls in the spa, plenty of time to read, a free gym, 50 cent beers in the crew bar, etc. It beats sitting at a desk all day and wondering if you’ll ever be able to play music for a living – or teaching lessons and wondering if you’ll make the rent this month…or ever move out of your parents place.

But yeah, the music in the shows isn’t the pinnacle of your creativity. So cry me a river, you’re getting paid to be here and that’s the part of the job that vaguely resembles work. All jobs have parts that are unpleasant – some jobs don’t have any other parts! The perks of this gig override the cheese you have to spew out during the shows.

Plus, at least for me, during my 15 minute sets in the lounges, or my 1 hour sets for private parties, I can play whatever I want and be as creative as I want.

I can see, though, that with the lack of content the days – again, especially sea days – have, it would be easy to fall into a perpetual habit of laziness. I found the gym tonight and made myself go though. That fact is that this is more like a vacation that anything else.

That’s, at least, my initial impressions of this place. From the dispositions of some people around here, clearly something happens to you after a few contracts and you begin to miss the harsh realities of living on land. Sounds nuts to me.