Reading in the Studio

Often on sessions being the best sight reader isn't really critical. There are times when the cue (piece of music) is so short you have plenty of time to learn it and master it all before they've finished getting drum sounds. However, you should never count on all a show's cues to be as short as the ones below. These are what's called bumpers. The music you hear coming in and out of commercials. I've seen bumpers of just one note before. 

The two bumpers below were from a recording session for a show called "American Detective" and were two of a dozen or so. Probably the shortest two. So while I might have had time to look over and rehearse these charts five or six times silently before tape was rolling there were others where sight reading chops played a far greater roll.

Now on this show every episode took place in a different city, so the composer themed each episode a little different. And yet it was themed. Meaning that similar melodic and rhythimic devices were utilized throughout the episodes. The best part was that I was on every week as second guitarist and the first guitarist was a revolving chair. A different guy every week. Michael Thompson, Dean Parks, Grant Geissmann, John Goux. I was getting paid to go to school!

I was reminded of this this past month when I did two gig where I was in the less-pressured, second guitar chair admiring the playing and gear of the players to my right.