Session Work, Day One

One of the advantages of playing a strange instrument (pedal steel) is that I get to do a bunch of session work. For those of you who don't know, session work involves someone giving you money to learn their songs and play on their record. Or, if they're your friends, usually just giving you a "thanks for coming by". But much differently than with my own band - where I can fight tooth and nail for an idea I love - even though I'm usually writing the parts, they're not "mine." Its a situation where you basically do as you're told, for better and for worse.

I started a session yesterday - it was supposed to be cut and dry. The guy gave me the demos of the songs, chord charts, and we talked through them. So I went away and hid in my little cave and worked out parts for the songs. Easy enough.

Of course, by the time I actually arrived at the studio, things had gone differently. The songs I'd learned were mostly by the wayside, jettisoned for new songs with entirely new arrangements. Its a terrifying situation - its like writing a speech, and then, upon taking the podium, discovering that you're supposed to improvise a new one. While someone else is paying for the time you're there.

But that's my job, right?

So onward we go - and gradually, things start to come together. The parts that I originally had become "concepts" for me to steal ideas from, and with the help of the songwriter and the engineer, new parts gradually and slowly emerge, and everyone seems to be pleased with them. And by the end of a few hours, lo and behold, we've actually got a few songs, and I've got a few new ideas to try out tonight.