[ToomanyTenors]

The current Covid situation has put most musicians out of work, out of being able to practice together in a band, and has likely prevented them from playing in public for most of this year if not longer.

The bands I was in have obviously lost all their gigs, and the venues are all shut.

The financial fallout from lockdown is likely to hit everyone - as is the fear of re-infection at a gig.

I'm seriously thinking of quitting all musical activities after 50+ years - the reboot may never happen at the local level I operated at.

Are you thinking the same?

 

[LAP13]

I don't make my living from music so have not lost as much as some and I feel therefore very fortunate that the impact is far less personally.

That said however, I'm fearful of the overall impact it will have long term both as a musician and as a consumer of entertainment.

There have been some bad days, some really dark days and some brilliantly inspiring days. Seeing how people have adapted, even if temporarily has kicked me into taking this time to go back to basics, to really practice, try new things and try to get the best out of my time.

I think there is a sense of loss, of grief for what was. Things will be different in the future, no doubt but it doesn't mean the end of everything.
I am kind of hopeful that people on the main will come out of this with an appitite for, respect and bigger appreciation for what was taken for granted and then lost during this time.

 

[jazzcat58]

Well music is my living for which I am self employed, and likewise no gigs or teaching but im looking to stay optimistic.
No one has really experienced this unwanted situation anywhere really, and from a musicians viewpoint, and it will be interesting to see how
venues/premises? come out of the lockdown.
It will affect people in so many ways, will the public want to go out into areas?,where they may be nervous over contacting
a virus that until a vaccine is developed? puts them at risk!.
Im wandering in the UK if pubs/clubs etc will reopen in early July?, in the US I get the impression things may be quicker?.
In response to your initial question though,im looking forward to resuming my music and forging on.

 

[MLucky]

I feel your pain. Even though I'm just a weekend warrior. All I can say: nobody knows what the world is going to look like in six weeks, let alone six months, or a year, so it's probably wise not to assume the worst. Maybe things will pick up a lot sooner than we might think?

For me, the inability to gig or play with others is not a financial issue, because I don't depend on that income. But man, I never realized how much I would miss playing! What I wouldn't give right now just to get together for a boring-*** rehearsal or ragged-*** jam.

The other issue is, I'm finding it harder to motivate to practice. I'm finding out that one of the things that keeps me motivated in the practice room is sheer terror: what if I can't get this down before the gig? And when there's no gig, not even a rehearsal or jam to go to, I sometimes find myself just fiddling around and not able to focus on anything much.

I guess the best thing to do is try to stay positive. Maybe things will be able to reopen sooner than we think. Maybe there are a lot of people out there who are now realizing how much they miss live music, and maybe they will pack the clubs when things open up again. Maybe new venues will replace the ones that've had to close, and maybe they'll be better. I'm just trying to keep hope alive, because life without music? That's not life.

 

[ZootTheSim]

The other issue is, I'm finding it harder to motivate to practice. I'm finding out that one of the things that keeps me motivated in the practice room is sheer terror: what if I can't get this down before the gig?

+1 on sheer terror as motivator. In the absence of any foreseeable stage fright, I'm trying to practice daily, but my opportunities are limited because my gf's now working from home. And when late afternoon rolls around, I'm just not always into it. Weekends are much more flexible, though.

 

[saxtek]

I've been a full time professional musician for 50 years. It's over.

 

[saxcop]

I'm thinking that people will eventually let go of their hysteria and get back to normal. Living has risk. Far more likely you will die of a heart attack. You are on lock down, because you allow yourself to be on lock down.

 

[Hassles]

I've been a full time professional musician for 50 years. It's over.

maybe consider semi-retirement and learn to enjoy your time.

 

[1saxman]

I've been gigging since 1963 and was full-time for seven years during the '60s. Even now I'm in three groups and have been playing about 20 gigs a year. These are not the little 'bop in with your horn, play some 'jazz' and split' gigs - they're full four-hour dance/show jobs where I will take two to three horns depending on the group and will be gone for a minimum of 9 hours even for a local show. The thought of quitting music because of this annoyance never entered my mind. I think everybody has gone crazy - out of seven thousand million people on this rock, there have been 4.5 million cases and about 300,000 deaths. Most people who get it don't even know they are sick or have very minor symptoms.
Things will open back up and I expect to be playing gigs by Labor day. Anybody quitting over this is just looking for an excuse to quit for whatever reason.

 

[Reet McVouty]

I'm thinking that people will eventually let go of their hysteria and get back to normal. Living has risk. Far more likely you will die of a heart attack. You are on lock down, because you allow yourself to be on lock down.

A totally inaccurate statement. If you've ever witnessed anyone dying from an upper respiratory illness you wouldn't be so cavalier. The majority of people in my age group that get this virus do not survive it. So, you say living has it's risk, I guess the attitude must be, so what if a bunch of old people die from this, they would have been dead soon anyway. And, no one knows just how bad this would have got without the lock down.
I hope you and your loved ones have continued good health. I wouldn't wish this kind of tragedy on anyone.

 

[saxcop]

A totally inaccurate statement. If you've ever witnessed anyone dying from an upper respiratory illness you wouldn't be so cavalier. The majority of people in my age group that get this virus do not survive it. So, you say living has it's risk, I guess the attitude must be, so what if a bunch of old people die from this, they would have been dead soon anyway. And, no one knows just how bad this would have got without the lock down.
I hope you and your loved ones have continued good health. I wouldn't wish this kind of tragedy on anyone.

Real simple. If you are scared of the virus stay inside. Those of us that want to continue living do so. That's freedom. I never said any of the things you attribute to my statement. Read the OP's question. No I don't feel like giving up playing for good because I believe things will get back to normal. People will have to let go of their fear. What part of my statement is "totally inaccurate". 650,000 died from a heart attack each year. So it must not be that part. I watched my father die of respiratory illness last year. Since 60% of new cases in your state are from people that stayed inside, I'd say your statement is the inaccurate one. Enjoy your hysteria.

 

[Hassles]

We and the world with triumph - its just a matter of time and when that time comes 'everybody' is gonna' wanna' get out for some fun and hear some music.

 

[MLucky]

I've been gigging since 1963 and was full-time for seven years during the '60s. Even now I'm in three groups and have been playing about 20 gigs a year. These are not the little 'bop in with your horn, play some 'jazz' and split' gigs - they're full four-hour dance/show jobs where I will take two to three horns depending on the group and will be gone for a minimum of 9 hours even for a local show. The thought of quitting music because of this annoyance never entered my mind. I think everybody has gone crazy - out of seven thousand million people on this rock, there have been 4.5 million cases and about 300,000 deaths. Most people who get it don't even know they are sick or have very minor symptoms.
Things will open back up and I expect to be playing gigs by Labor day. Anybody quitting over this is just looking for an excuse to quit for whatever reason.

I hope so. But the projections are pretty frightening.

By the Trump administration's figures, infections are about to jump from about 25,000 every day to 200,000, an eight-fold increase, and the death toll will go from about 1,500 a day to 3,000 PER DAY by the end of June. Without venturing into politics, I think it's safe to say that the Trump administration has, if anything, tended to underestimate the risks, so if these are their predictions, they are probably on the conservative side.

If June really does turn out to be a month where 90,000 Americans die from this thing, I wouldn't expect to be playing gigs in August. Hope to God this turns out not to be true, but I'm not seeing many reasons for optimism.

 

[Arundo Donax]

The stats, predictions, etc., have all been by medical personnel and they've been wildly pessimistic that didn't match reality. We can't shut down the world and live in our closets.

Like many, I'll probably die of a heart attack, stroke, or really bad music. I survived cancer against a 75% chance of death - even so, the fear of it never goes away.

Perhaps the only good aspect of restaurants being closed is that I'm no longer exposed to their truly awful background music - FM subchannel garbage from the 1980's that was a failure even then.

Anyway, I give this thread 200 posts till shutdown.

 

[jman1977]

Some of the posts in this thread are truly myopic. This virus has been making the rounds for not even 5 months and the infection and death rates not being worse than they are (they are still pretty bad as it were) are largely the result of the dire measures implemented by governments worldwide. Without those dire measures it's not hard to imagine things being worse than they are (which again is still pretty bad).

People who take precautions get sick anyway because there are those who don't take precautions and end up spreading the virus (albeit negligently/unknowingly/irresponsibly). If precautionary measures had been implemented earlier and everybody had strictly adhered to such measures, this thing would not have gotten as bad as it has. If the Chinese government had been transparent from the beginning instead of trying to squash information about the spreading virus and precautionary measures had been implemented much earlier (and everybody adhered to such measures), things would not have gotten as bad as they have.

You do not get cancer or suffer a stroke or heart attack by being exposed to other people. Dozens of doctors and other health care workers and people in general who are still in the prime of their lives do not die within days/weeks of each other in the same concentrated geographic areas from cancer or heart attacks. Four members from the same family who had a family party do not die within days of each other from the common flu or from cancer or from heart attacks. Bodies are not left rotting in refrigeration trucks that have failed to work due to crematoriums and funeral parlors being completely overwhelmed and overextended due to outbreaks of heart attacks or even the flu.

I do agree that eventually we all have to leave our homes and try to live as normal a life as we can. These stringent measures are not so much about preventing people from ever getting the virus (at some point most will contract it in any event) but buying some time so we can put ourselves in a position to handle it adequately.

But that will come once we have sufficient understanding of how this virus works, sufficient infrastructure to handle it (e.g., our healthcare facilities and healthcare workers are not completely overwhelmed and stretched way beyond capacity to deal with the crisis and while the virus will continue to spread, it will do so in manageable/isolated pockets instead of in overwhelming, simultaneous outbreaks), and hopefully a working vaccine and/or cure. We are close to achieving the first two... as to whether there will ever be a vaccine/cure.... who knows.... all we're really doing right now is buying some time so we can handle the crisis better and if people had just been less bull-headed and self-centered (this applies to leadership all the way down to individual citizens) we would have gotten there sooner.

True, for many staying home is about self-preservation. But it’s also true that for many others (including myself) we stay home because we are being responsible citizens and we care about our loved ones and others and do not want to be unwitting transmitters of the virus and potential bringers of death. So don’t generalize and attribute everything to fear or hysteria. If I was the only one to be put at risk as a result of my actions I’d have a more cavalier attitude as I’m still fairly young and generally in good health. But no, if I contract the virus I could easily transmit it to 2-3 people, who each could just as easily transmit it to 2-3 people, and so on. Those other people may not be as equipped as I am to cope with the virus.

 

[Arundo Donax]

The whole world, nor the whole country, is not like high density New York City. In NYC, it's probably impossible to go from where one lives to a store without encountering 200 people along the way.

In other parts of the country, that's not the case. NY, NJ, and Mass. - - those three states which are 11% of the population - - account for 55% of the cases and deaths in the country.

Even so, what we are seeing in many areas are entire counties shut down even though the deaths in that county are only in nursing homes. It makes much more sense to protect the vulnerable and that can be done without shutting down everything. That's what is being done in Sweden.

I know the difference between this virus and other non-contagious diseases. My point was that we all have to live with some risk. There may never be a vaccine for this. At some point in time, probably in well under two years, everyone will have been exposed to the virus. The most vulnerable will die and life will continue. Keeping quarantined delays this, but doesn't prevent it.

 

[lesacks]

It makes much more sense to protect the vulnerable and that can be done without shutting down everything. That's what is being done in Sweden.

The swedish chief epidemiologist has apologised for not protecting the vulnerable.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...ilure-prevent-elderly-deaths-coronavirus.html

 

[Hassles]

Our strengths as a community is that we know how this virus spreads and we know how to best to make our own contributions to keeping ourselves and others safe and not contributing to the problem. Many governments have been slow on the up-take of good management and lessons will eventually be learned. yes in high density areas such as New York it is nigh on impossible to keep "social distancing" at optimum levels. I used to walk everyday (here in Melbourne town) but found I was encountering more people on the walking trails than I did at the supermarket - so - I stopped walking. We will come out of this, many with less family and less friends and at that time our existences will be different but our passion for music shall not wane! We will play on

 

[Arundo Donax]

The swedish chief epidemiologist has apologised for not protecting the vulnerable.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/ar...ilure-prevent-elderly-deaths-coronavirus.html

For those visiting or working at nursing homes, not having a virus test (or in lieu of that, a restriction) was clearly a mistake.

Nonetheless, they're not a country in shutdown.

Time will show whether their approach was the more sensible. Regardless, after being used to avoid a spike in cases, extended quarantines just impose a delay on people being exposed. Eventually everyone will be exposed, just as with any virus. Those who don't become ill and those who do recover will be the survivors who most likely will be able to fight the inevitable mutations over the years.

I'm actually considered high risk (old and diabetic) and I'll be as careful as I can, but what will be, will be.

 

[lesacks]

Time will show whether their approach was the more sensible. Regardless, after being used to avoid a spike in cases, extended quarantines just impose a delay on people being exposed. Eventually everyone will be exposed, just as with any virus. Those who don't become ill and those who do recover will be the survivors who most likely will be able to fight the inevitable mutations over the years.

I'm actually considered high risk (old and diabetic) and I'll be as careful as I can, but what will be, will be.

Possibly. But possibly it'll be like the many other chronic diseases we never developed "herd" or species immunity to and the only solutions are vaccines and / or the elimination of the disease. Cholera, for example, was very prevalent in Europe for 1000s of years with regular, lethal, outbreaks; and has been cleared. Not to mention the really unpleasant cholera vaccine and quarantine measures etc. There's a long list of similar diseases. And, indeed most countries that are now slowly reopening are doing so because of low prevalence, not population immunity.