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This is a post I just made to the looper’s delight mailing list:

I have developed a practice of “no bad gigs”: taking each performance on its own terms and giving what is required. My attitude is that any time I am being paid to play, and/or I have been invited to play, it is a good thing and there is something to be gained from the experience: money, audience development, practice, what not to do next time, etc. I play lots of different kinds of gigs. Some scenes are more song-oriented, e.g. a house concert where my own compositions are the central focus; at the Farmers’ Market gigs (which I love), I play lots of familiar songs – old favorites from my youth, etc. and I’m free to do a 20-minute loop piece because no one is there specifically to hear me and I am just incidental to the market experience; and so on.

Next Saturday I have a gig at the Iron Springs Pub and Brewery in Fairfax, California. I played there the other night with Rubber Souldiers, a “Beatles jam band” I do for fun (and money) with a couple of other guys. We had a fine time, with a good crowd, and between the modest pay and a full tip jar my share was $117. Saturday’s gig will be different: the 49ers’ playoff game will be happening at the same time, in another part of this one big room. The owner of the brewpub wants me to do it anyway, and sort of apologized in advance for the weirdness I am likely to experience. I have talked about my “no bad gigs” philosophy with him before, and I said I’ll be fine. My wife and I will have a nice meal, I’ll take home a few bucks, and I’ll probably spend a good part of the 2-hour gig doing loop improv, which I will record and (if all goes well) develop into a new piece. The football fans will not pay attention to me, and I will return the favor. There will be a few other people in the room who are listening to me and not watching the Niners, and that will be sufficient.

I come from the Grateful Dead music culture, which has a long tradition of recording everything, so I have a long-term practice of listening to my performances to find out what worked and what didn’t. These days the technology makes it super easy to listen to last night’s show on my way to today’s. I am pretty good at listening in a detached way, and I know I hear a lot more flaws than the audience is likely to notice. As long as my own standard is higher than the one I have to meet as a performer, I will continue to improve. I am pretty much at the top of my game these days, so I hardly ever hear anything cringe-worthy in these playbacks. For me, the question has more to do with, Did I give the gig what it needed from me?