Jason Heath’s Double Bass Blog

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This is the second installment in This Crazy Business, a multi-part analysis of both the challenges that performing musicians face and the psychological reasons why we tolerate these challenges. This series is based on my observations as a full-time freelance classical musician, and builds upon the ideas and considerations presented in Road Warrior [...]

I’d like to welcome jazz bassist Bill Harrison to the doublebassblog.org writing staff. An active double bassist and educator, Bill is the owner of PlayJazzNow.com, the world’s only source for downloadable play-along tracks, and he maintains a blog called Jazz Underneath.
Bill is a prolific and insightful writer, and I urge readers to check [...]

 

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This week we are continuing our conversation with Chicago Symphony Orchestra bassist Michael Hovnanian that we began on Episode 24 of the podcast. Michael has been a member of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra since 1989, and he serves as the president of Discordia Music (double bass music publisher). Michael also plays for the Gunnelpumpers, [...]

Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan freelancers may be interested in this audition for the South Bend Symphony. The scale is fairly low at only $73 per service, and the mileage rate is not specified. I believe that they do have some mileage compensation, although I am not sure what the rate is or [...]

I am wrapping up my portion of the Midsummer’s Music Festival in Door County, Wisconsin this week with some fabulous performances. This is my third summer with this ensemble, and it is a great way to decompress after getting up at 4 a.m. and working until 11 p.m. for the past six months. [...]

John Floeter put out a great post on his bass studio blog recently about his thoughts and observations on freelancing and auditioning. This post is quite relevant to many of my writings about the freelance business (which you can find under my Articles link).
Here are a couple of key points from this post:

I’m in [...]

Doing a weekly wrap-up is something that I have been thinking about for a while. I got the idea from Lorelle VanFossen’s blog Lorelle on WordPress, an excellent blog about blogging (of great interest to me–probably not so much for most bass blog readers). Anyway, she does a weekly wrap-up that I always find [...]

Adriel Bettelheim sent me this recent Denver Post obituary for former Colorado Symphony bassist David Potter. David was a well-loved bassist and teacher with former students in all corners of the country. Boston Symphony bassist Benjamin Levy is quoted in the following obituary from the Denver Post.
A Colorado Life
Bassist a dedicated, “incredible” teacher
By [...]

So where do we go from here? Do we all just turn in our instruments and quit this miserable business? Not me, and not you either, I imagine. We musicians know the value of what we do. We know that our art can change lives, create happiness, inspire greatness in others, [...]

The Elgin Symphony Orchestra (of which I am a long-time member) was recently featured in a great extended article on the orchestral musician forum Polyphonic.org. The piece starts with some introductory information about the Elgin Symphony, and how, despite their (relatively) small budget, they are making big plans while being fiscally responsible:
The Elgin Symphony [...]