King Crimson - VROOOM VROOOM (Live At The Warfield Theatre, 1995)
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I’ve written the words ‘King Crimson’ a lot lately. The Commentariat and social media are pretty stoked up about the upcoming 50th Anniversary edition of ‘Red’. A fascinating, if inward-looking. documentary is widely available for discussion. I’ve said enough on this channel for a while about this venerable, decades old concert at the Warfield Theatre in San Francisco. So, this week I thought I’d talk a little about the future and what I’m up to.
I’m currently a featured performer in The Pete Roth Trio. Pete is an exciting young guitarist beginning to develop a career as a performer. We’re playing his music locally, when and where he wants. He does the logistics and heavy-lifting that comes with any band starting out. He’s taking on an older, more experienced player who’s along for the ride. I have marginal interest in developing my own career (already developed!) but I do want to further my music skills, which have lain fallow for fourteen years. Pete and I have a balance of needs. I’m low maintenance, and free as a bird.
I’ve been asked many times to explain why I want to play a more reflective, interactive music in small intimate rooms to 150 people rather than a less reflective, less interactive music in enormodromes to thousands of people. Music, for me, now, is not so much about being able to play something, it’s more about being able to think up fresh things to play, in conjunction with others, in a small place, in real time. How best to do that, at my age? Performing in the Trio is a good way.
The Brufords have just downsized from a house that was too big to something smaller and more manageable. How about, I’m thinking, downgrading from professional musician to amateur? Could I leave behind the disagreeable bits that the professional has to endure and reconnect with the amateur me who did it, back in the 60s, for the sheer love of it, with barely a care in the world?
The Musician’s Union here in the UK has a ‘professional’ musician as one who earns the majority of her income from music activities. An ‘amateur’ is held to be one who earns less than half her income from music activities. This deals only with finance, and speaks not at all about skill level, success and failure (however measured), time taken, or any pleasure achieved or achievable. Amateurs are frequently more ready, willing and able to perform than their professional colleagues.
So out go the front covers of magazines, the tour bus, the elections to Halls of Fame, the (usually unhelpful) record company attention. Out goes the full panoply of late 20th century record industry awards, incentives and bigger bucks. Been there! In comes meaningful, small scale, improvised human interaction, in a wonderful Earthworks- or Pete Roth- sized place called music. In come the small bucks and the love of doing it for the love of it. Bring it on!
#billbruford #drummer #officialchannel #kingcrimson #drums #drumsolos #drumming #robertfripp #tonylevin #treygunn #patmastelotto
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