Performance in the streets of Oxford

Earlier today we had to perform in the streets of Oxford right by the Westgate shopping centre, Bonn Square, where we had to perform 3 songs to the public. It turned out to be very song and there was a change of instrument for me, I played acoustic guitar. This was my first live performance where I played a different instrument instead of my usual bass. I gathered that it's good to try out a different instrument in a live performance because it will help you progress as a musician and make you more confident. We covered 'Mr Brightside', 'Sweet Home Alabama/Free Bird'.

We had to perform at 13:30 at Bonn Square right by the Westgate Shopping Centre. Bonn Square is pretty much the city centre so it was very busy and a lot of people stopped by and checked the different bands performing 3 acoustic covers. I felt that it was good performing to the public, it helped to make more a lot more confident and not worry about what people think. I thought that it was a great success that I made it through those songs because it was very cold and when my hands are cold i struggle to play bass and guitar. That was a learning curve I had to step around to get the best performance I could deliever to the aduience.

Our first songs we played were 'Sweet Home Alabama/Free Bird' which I thought was brilliant. This song is a real good crowd pleasers and pretty much everybody knows it therefore this was a good song to pick to perform to the audience. The only problem with the song was the mixing which was most likely due to the cube amps which were battery powered. They're not very powerful amps and it was hard to get a good tone. I think Elesa's guitar was too loud and Owen's guitar was struggling to cut through the overall mix of the performance. My guitar was at a good level, I decided to turn it down right before we started to play so that Owen's lead guitar could be heard. Charlottes vocal levels were good and were able to cut through fine. Xana was ill so Marco, the keyboardist in my first band at college, had to help us out by playing the Cajon for us. I played acoustic guitar, Owen played lead guitar, Charlotte on lead vocals, Elesa on rhythm guitar and Marco on the cajon. We played 'Sweet Home Alabama' as usual minus the bass solo but we managed to join in the song 'Free Bird', also by Lynyrd Skynyrd, which is famous for having a 5 minute guitar solo. The song is essentially broken up into two sections with singing in the first half and the guitar solo by Allen Collins in the second half. We performed the second half of the song. When Lynyrd Skynyrd would perform 'Sweet Home Alabama' they'd usually finish on the chords F, C and end on G. The studio version fades out on the piano solo but we wanted to end it like the version heard on their live album 'One More From The Road'. So when we were finishing by playing F and then C we waited and went straight into 'Free Bird' which starts with the chord G. This transition between songs sounded great and it was perfect because they're both well known Lynyrd Skynyrd songs with great solos. 'Free Bird' is possibly my favourite solo and Owen did it justice, it was a great performance. The second half of the song only has 3 chords, G, Bb and C, so it wasn't too demanding but it sounded great and more is less so anymore chords wouldn't have added any dynamics, it would have ruined it. I've learnt that sure, it's important to add dynamics when needed but it's when you should add dynamics, knowning the right time to add to a song that might have a lack of texture. You don't want to over complicate songs by adding too many chords and if the 3 chords sound good together and you add an interesting rhythm to those 3 chords then that should be fine.

'Mr Brightside' is a completely new song to us and we haven't been practising it for very long. It was very fun to play and I learmt that it can be good to perform different songs to people rather than just covering the same songs that the teachers and other music students have heard. We were very quick with learning the song which was good, we hadn't practised the song a lot so to get a good performance from that song was going to be hard but I believe it sounded great and it's a common song that a lot of people know so it was a good song to play to the public. I felt that the ending could have been tighter leading up to the ending on the chord D but other then that it was good. We performed this song last with Elesa on lead vocals and guitar, Owen on lead guitar, me playing acoustic guitar and Marco playing the cajon.