london - Gary Mullins - Professional Guitarist

What a Weekend – Frankie Valli, Richard Shelton, Waddesdon Manor

October 12, 2015PermalinkBye Bye Baby, Denmark Street Big Band, Gigs, Jazz, Live Work, Solo Workaylesbury, baby, band, big, bye, club, dean, denmark, express, film, four, frankie, guitar, jazz, london, manor, pizza, seasons, solo, street, themes, valli, waddeson Leave a comment

This weekend has been a really varied, interesting and fun set of gigs, covering over 700 miles!

On Friday I was in Whitley Bay with Bye Bye Baby – a Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons tribute show. This took place at the Playhouse where we played to 500 people, and had many of them dancing in the aisles!

This is a great production – incredible music, faithfully recreated by myself and my colleagues. It’s loads of fun and I really look forward to these gigs, partly because I get to play my Gibson double neck!

I also take my Gibson Les Paul Gold Top as a back up, and I needed it this time as I snapped the high E on the six string on the double neck!

600 miles later, and I was in central London with the Denmark Street Big Band for the Richard Sheltpn album review show at the Pizza Express Jazz Club on Dean Street, London.

Amongst some original tunes arranged specifically for the big band, we also played a lot of Sinatra classics. My highlight of the gig was an instrumental performance of Under My Skin, where bass and tenor sax were largely playing together, and they were incredible!

Richard was great too – entertaining the crowd with great stories and anecdotes, and his voice is fantastic too. I particularly enjoyed his duos with pianist Ben who was loving it!

The weekend got wrapped up with a solo performance at Waddesdon Manor, playing during Afternoon Tea. This is a bit of a slog (4.5hrs!!) but it’s wonderful to share my arrangements and performances of tunes like Li’l Darlin’, Pure Imagination, Misty and more!

Like the big band gig the night before, I played my Gibson ES175, which was exquisite! I used the AER Compact 60, and have started using a little bit more gain on the first channel with the guitar which has been great – it gives the guitar more presence and sounds really full.

Needless to say, the food was great, and it was really busy! You should check it out – one more week to go – next Sunday is my last slot, 12:00-16:30.

The coming weekend is going to be just as hectic, with a workshop from Clive Carroll at the Aylesbury Music Centre to facilitate, a gig with Rollacoaster and the final Waddesdon Manor performance. Before then, prep and practice! Bring it on!

Playing Wicked with LMTO – The London Musical Theatre Orchestra

September 29, 2015PermalinkLive Work, Theate Workchoir, incredible, line6, LMTO, london, music, musical, of, orchestra, piece, play, show, Sound, theatre, through, wicked Leave a comment

The London musical theatre orchestra is a relatively new organisation designed to take famous works and extend them to orchestral playing. The integrity of the original works is kept, however where necessary additional parts are arranged to accommodate extra members of the orchestra not normally present in the show’s stage counterparts.

The most recent production, that I had the honour to perform, was the music of Wicked, as part of a 100 piece orchestra which included 40 voices!

The music was orchestrated for two guitars of which I was Guitar One. This particular part had the majority of the electric guitar parts and included passages requiring me to use an Ebow and Seek Wah sound amongst typical heavy distortions and shimmery cleans. There were a lot of interesting suspended chord voicings, searing lead lines and some delicate chord and arpeggio work. A real workout!

There are many ‘corners’ in the music of Wicked, involving lots of time signature changes and variations in feel. In order to navigate these we had a rehearsal in the afternoon and a full run-through with the choir in the evening. The sound was incredible, and it was a real buzz to play this music in such a setting.

It was a shame we couldn’t perform the music to an audience (due to rights issues), however I am hopeful that the opportunity will arise in the near future. The next show will be the Sound of Music, however I will be otherwise engaged elsewhere, so I will have two wait for the next one! Do check out the LMTO, as it’s a fantastic organisation!

Mitch Dalton and the Long Dog

June 24, 2015PermalinkGigs, Jazzdalton, dog, jazz, london, long, mitch, nights, pros, pub, the, tuesday, waddesdon Leave a comment

Last night I went to the Long Dog pub in Waddesdon to check out the jazz night that takes place there every other Tuesday. This is because I bumped into one of the organisers and house band members on a recent gig, and he told me that Mitch Dalton was going to be playing at the next one…. So I had to get there!

It was incredible!! The quartet are all top, top, players who have played for some of the most important names in music, and they’re playing a village pub just outside Aylesbury… I left feeling like I’d robbed them – all I bought was a coke! Typically I’d be paying proper money for a ticket to see these guys – if I could get one – and that wasn’t necessary at all on this occasion… Or any Tuesday at the Long Dog!

If you’re local, stick it in your diaries!! You can see some of the best musicians in Jazz without having to travel into London to do so – or pay the money, which I would only be too happy to do!

I got to meet and watch one of the top guitar players last night, and I’m still buzzing now! See you there in 13 days time!

Christmas at Cliveden House

December 30, 2014PermalinkBig Mama Funk, Gigs, Jazz, Jazz Juice, Solo Workband, berks, big, bucks, cliveden, function, funk, guitar, herts, house, jazz, juice, london, mama, oxford, party, solo, trio Leave a comment

Christmas has been a pretty hectic time for gigs this year, with a performance on Christmas Day, and 3 on Boxing Day. Still, with them all being at Cliveden House it made for a very special couple of days.

In her regular attire, Cliveden is spectacular, but during Christmas she is even more resplendent in no small part due to the Christmas trees, and general extra decoration throughout the place.

It has been quite busy there this year, and myself and my musical colleagues have worked hard to provide the best quality jazz music possible in our time there. We’ve received a great number of positive comments, and hope to hear back from the business cards that have been handed out.

It’s now time for a quick rest before another clutch of New Year gigs, and then back into some sort of routine!

I wish you all the best for the New Year, and hope to grace a stage alongside, or in front of you sooner rather than later!

Live on Radio Blackfrog

November 18, 2014PermalinkLive Work, Solo Work175, acoustic, aylesbury, blackfrog, bucks, electric, gary, gibson, guitar, internet, jazz, london, martin, mullins, radio, solo, taylor, thame, theatre, work Leave a comment

On Sunday 15th November I had the privilege to be interviewed on Radio Blackfrog – Thame’s internet radio station. I also performed a few tunes and talk about a couple of my favourite songs and a few stories from my musical life so far!

If you missed it, you can catch up with the link here… http://www.radioblackfrog.co.uk/catch-up.html

Montcalm Hotel, Marble Arch

August 18, 2014PermalinkGigs, Rollacoasterarch, band, function, hotel, international, london, marble, montcalm, party, rollacoaster Leave a comment

I had a lovely gig at the Montcalm Hotel near Marble Arch with Rollacoaster last night. It was a bit cramped on stage, but we put on a good show and the Jewish numbers were fantastic fun! Plus I had a slightly different amp stand to normal… The Blues Junior was probably the comfiest member of the band last night!

David Gilmour with Roger Waters at the O2

May 13, 2011PermalinkGigsarena, david, floyd, gary, gilmour, guitarist, london, mullins, o2, pink, roger, waters One comment so far

Last night I went to the O2 Arena in London to see Roger Waters perform the Wall. Around the time I booked the tickets (possibly a year ago!), I had heard that David Gilmour would be guesting with Roger on one of the nights. I was skeptical about this, since I’d heard various different stories about the indifference to putting Pink Floyd back together, and also a difficult relationship between the members of the band. However I went to the gig hopeful this may happen, but very quickly forgot about it when the concert started.

It was fantastic – kicking off with a big bang of red lights and pyrotechnics, shortly followed by an aeroplane flying into part of the wall that would gradually be built and completed over the course of the first half of the show! Amazing.

To my shame I wasn’t familiar with the material from the Wall from cover to cover, so there were only one or two tunes that I recognised (and thoroughly loved!), but I was entertained throughout by a fantastic stage show, and I really enjoyed all of the music that was new to me too. It must be said that Roger put on a superb show, and it was really refreshing to hear “Roger is happy for you to take photos, but please make sure the flash is switched off”.

I filmed a couple of the tunes that I knew, firstly Another Brick in the Wall Part 2, and then Comfortably Numb. At this point, the construction of the Wall was complete, with the band playing behind it! Roger was singing the first part of the verse and patrolling the area of stage in front of the wall, and then suddenly, a subtle, but beautiful voice could be heard emanating from an intense shaft of light from the top of the wall. The crowd went nuts. It was him! David!

I had managed to book tickets one row from the back of the tallest part of the Arena, but I was fairly central. Knowing this I took my binoculars and just watched Mr. Gilmour sing and play through them, open-mouthed. He was playing his black Fender Stratocaster with the maple neck – like his signature model that recently came out. On the video you can just see bright light where David is, but with my binoculars I could see him clearly playing his guitar and singing.

Here is the video. I’m very pleased with it – the sound is fantastic! You can also get a sense of the scale of the venue, and importantly, the wall itself. You can also get an idea of how they used it – the video projections were staggering, even from where I was.

Enjoy the video. What an amazing experience!

Sitting-in on Wicked

April 6, 2011PermalinkTheate Workguitar, london, musical, wicked Leave a comment

I’ve just boarded a tube train leaving Victoria Station in Central London having just had the best seat in the house at Wicked The Musical in London. I was in the pit, between Keys 1 and the Guitar player!

It was fantastic. I got to watch one of the top players in London play the part for one of the most exciting shows out at the moment, and it was fascinating. It was really interesting to see how he interpreted the music, and added his own style to the part.

It’s quite a complicated pad – lots of Ebow and ‘seek-wah’ which really help give the magical vibe of the show, and many changes to acoustic and back to electric.

The acoustic guitar parts require some explanation because there isn’t a real acoustic guitar being used! Instead it’s a Line6 Variax, and it’s necessary because it has banjo, jumbo acoustic, and 12-string acoustic sounds available whenever they’re required. It’s an important choice instrument-wise because without it there wouldn’t be enough room for all of the other acoustic instruments that are required – it’s really cramped down there!

This was the second time I’ve had the privilege of sitting in through the show and it was just as fascinating as the first. I really enjoy the music of Wicked, there are passages of real tension, lush heavily distorted lead and rhythm sections, as well as really sensitive acoustic and clean parts. The addition of the Ebow makes for a slightly more complicated experience – you have to be really on the ball to get in position, but also be accurate when sliding up and down one string.

This is the sort of gig I’m working towards. I have been working hard on my reading and putting myself into challenging environments to give me a better chance of hitting these West End heights. I think it’s going well, and I have another show in a couple of weeks which is testing my own banjo playing, only this time it’s a real one! I’ll be playing in Seussical at the Elgiva Theatre in Chesham on 21/4 and 23/4 – come down!