Jazz Pianist, Composer, and Teacher based in Vancouver, B.C., Canada

>Back in April of 2010 I was perusing through Craigslist (which is huge out here in Vancouver) looking for some gigs for myself.  It’s not the most time effective way to find work, but it tends to lend me something every once in a while.  I got my first pay check for a piece I wrote called Wanderings from a music licensing site I found off of Craigslist called You License.  I submitted the song to a company in the UK promoting music for malls to play and they accepted it.  I made a whopping $22 CAD after paypal stole all my money, I don’t like them, but I got paid for my own composition, that was sweet on all levels.

So I’m perusing Craigslist and I come across an ad for this pop/rock singer, Rachel Thom, looking for a band.  She’s holding auditions and I figure, hey the music is good, different than my norm, but still good so I send off a one liner email saying I’m interested and tell here where my website is.  I didn’t expect to hear back, but maybe a week later they got back to me saying they’d like to have me come out for auditions in May and that they’d get back to me.  Great, this might turn into something…

May comes and goes and I’m positive auditions have come and gone.  Most of June goes by and then I get an email on about the 15th telling me my audition is on the 20th at 2:30 and I have to learn one of her songs and come up a cover to play for the auditions as well. 
Her song wasn’t too bad to figure out off of the recording she had, although it had no keys part.  I prefer it that way because then I get to write the part myself.  The cover gave me more problems because everything I play is a cover in jazz, technically a jazz standard.  Most of which I figured were to obscure for the audition.  Eventually I settled on the Beatles-Blackbird, cliche sure, but still a fun song.  Look up Brad Mehldau’s rendition for a nice Piano/Bass version.

So on the 20th of June I drive to North Van and audition for the keys position in this band.  Audition went good they said I was way above what they were expecting, 110 %.  Met Rachel of course whom is very nice, her drummer/boyfriend also a great guy and her manager. To top the audition off Rachel had made cupcakes for everyone.  Then I made my home to await the result.

Couple of days later I get an email saying I’m the new keyboard player and now I’m heading off on a whole new musical path in life.  Still love jazz, but also excited about playing something slightly more popular and hopefully much better paying.  Time will tell.

Stay tuned.
Ryan

>Hello one and all!  Welcome to my blog about well me.  Well not entirely me.  There will be all the people I meet, the gigs I play, my band mates, the fans, etc…  No matter what it should provide some entertainment and good laughs or at least some people to laugh at.

So being a musician is hard.  I knew that.  Just didn’t figure it to be this hard.  Years of slugging away playing solo ‘wallpaper’ gigs as I call them.  (Think about it for a second and it will make sense).  Don’t get me wrong they’re all right in their time and place and I sure enjoy the money, but it leaves you wanting something more…something like more musicians to play with.  Playing in a group/band is so much more fulfilling on stage and off.  So many more people to make fun of and have fun with.

I’m trained as a jazz pianist, which luckily means I like to make up stuff and play off chord sheets and lead sheets and what have you.  Did classical growing up, not for me.  Jazz is way more fun, but nobody makes much money at it.  Hopefully the money aspect will change soon as this new band I’m in backing up singer, Rachel Thom (see links) is going places.  It’s a blend of Pop/Rock that is fun, exciting, and more importantly I still get to write all my parts and being the jazzer I am, some of them tend to change every time.  It’ll be interesting when I start recording….

Anyways, that’s just the start, keep tuned for band stories, gig stories, and whatever else I happen to come across musically in this portion of life.  Check out my website for some old samples, someday soon I hope to have some more ready to go. 

www.ryanfaas.ca