Last issue’s installment on playing in a rock band (Issue 226) was about touring, and how to deal with the rigors of the road. In the course of researching the article I spoke with a number of touring musicians and here, I’m going to feature my conversation with guitarist/producer/composer Gabe Cummins. (Some of his comments appear in the last issue.) He’s been in the music industry since age 13, and holds degrees in performance and composition from the Berklee College of Music and NYU. He’s worked with brands like Nike, HBO, Cinemax and others. Gabe is currently touring with jazz/rock legends Blood, Sweat & Tears and performs internationally, as well as in his home base in New York City.
Frank Doris: How did you get to the point where you became good enough to be a touring musician?
Gabe Cummins: When I was in high school I auditioned to get into the Eastman School of Music, which I did not get into, but I remember asking at the interview: “how does one get to be a professional musician?” I don't remember the name of the man who was conducting the interview, [but] he said, “listen, you know how to get to Carnegie Hall.” I practiced a lot; basically took every gig I was offered. I did my best to do a good job.
I think initially I focused a little too much on the music and not enough on showing up on time and being dressed for the part and being agreeable. But those are things you learn along the way. If you're supposed to wear all black, wear all black. If we're supposed to dress like a rock star, dress like a rock star. And knowing the music and understanding what that meant and being agreeable, which meant getting a good night's sleep and eating good food before [the gig] and those kinds of things. I think the things that I got wrong initially were just [about] being a good human. I thought if I [just] showed up and played [well], everybody would want to work with me, and that's…not really it. Now, I feel like mostly I mostly get hired because I'm OK to be around.
FD: That’s a recurring theme with every pro I talk to. I've heard it said so many times: the hang is as important as the playing, if not…
GC: More so.
FD: When you're traveling on a bus, you're in close quarters with people.
GC: Oh my God.
FD: If there's somebody who gets on your nerves, I would think that they get on your nerves pretty quick.
GC: Yeah. If somebody's too up all the time or too down all the time it can be a drag. I think [you need to have] the right amount of positives and not too much negative. I mean, everybody I've been on the road with have been guys that were going through a divorce or what have you [at one time or another], and life happens to all of us. The way we manage it is who we are, and I’ve found that to be very, very true. You learn how to navigate that pretty quickly.
Gabe Cummins performing with Blood, Sweat & Tears. Courtesy of the artist.
FD: I have to think you have to have a certain personality to be able to tour. How are you psychologically and physically able do it for a month, or three months, or be somebody like Taylor Swift who toured the world for almost two years?
GC: I think fundamentally one has to enjoy the travel and the music and such. There's plenty of people I know that can really, really play who don't enjoy touring at all, and everybody has a certain capacity. I don't know that I could do a Taylor Swift tour where they're out for six months, even though they're flying private [jets] and all that. It's a commitment.
FD: The potential for screwing yourself up is pretty strong. A really obvious consideration would be getting enough sleep, and eating. I talked to a guy who was touring in South America and he said that after about a week or two, the band members were so tired that when they were up on stage they were doing silly things just to try to amuse each other, to try to fight off the exhaustion. So how do you manage that?
GC: I've developed a lot of, I guess people call them hacks, and some of them are super-basic, like drinking a lot of water and not drinking any alcohol, and some of them are more advanced. There's an app that I use called Timeshifter. When you're going from one time zone to another, it puts you on a sleep, caffeine, and sunlight sort of schedule. I’ve found it to be very, very effective. And finding a balance between the hang, as you were talking about before, and getting enough rest. I am 45, and the difference between my 35-year-old body and my 45-year-old body is pretty significant.
So my ability to recover…I mean, I can't really go out. Once the gig is done, I go back to my room and I try to do my best to get to sleep as soon as possible and get as much sleep as can. Missing one night of sleep is not great, [but] no problem. [Missing] two nights of sleep, that's going to affect my performance, and I want to be operating on as high a level as I can. So I try to treat my body kind like an athlete would. I'm hydrating three days before for the gig: if the first gig's on Friday, I start preparing my body on Tuesday, and I try maintaining that level.
It is not easy when you're traveling and when you're on somebody else's schedule, but [with] the bands that I play with, they know that I'm doing my best to prepare myself. If there's a flight they want to put me on that leaves at six [a.m.], which means I've got to be up at three, I'm like, no, man. Put me on the nine o'clock flight! For the most part, the bands I played with have been accommodating in that regard.
FD: Can you mention some of them?
GC: I’ve been with Blood, Sweat & Tears for five, six years now. I just started playing with Jason Scheff, who was with Chicago (as a singer, songwriter and bassist).
FD: Any relation to Jerry Scheff? (Jerry Scheff was the bassist for Elvis Presley for many years.)
GC: Yeah. Jason is Jerry Scheff's son. I just played with Jerry in Las Vegas. I forget the name of casino hotel where Elvis did his residency.
FD: The Intercontinental. (It later became the Las Vegas Resort and Casino and is now the Westgate Las Vegas Resort and Casino.)
GC: Yeah, that's what it was. It has the biggest green room I've ever seen. What an experience that was. It was so special.
FD: I would go to CES in Las Vegas every year, and there’s the Elvis statue in front of the lobby, and a bunch of us would go pay tribute to the statue.
The statue of Elvis Presley that used to be in the front of the Intercontinental Hotel, now in the lobby of the Westgate Hotel and Casino. Courtesy of Picryl.com/Pixabay.com/public domain.
GC: The stage is so massive. And they have a little piece of the old stage where Elvis would do his prayer before every show.
That night, Jason [said], “yeah, we're going to play with my dad.” We're playing the song “Fever.” Jerry starts playing, and I mean, he's close to 90, and he's got the best f*cking feel I've ever heard. It's outrageous. He started playing and man, I've never, that song had never felt so good. So anyway, [a] very, very fun experience for me to have done that.
FD: Well, moments like that are part of what makes touring fun. My friend Danny Miranda plays bass for Blue Öyster Cult, and he’s played with Meatloaf and Queen, and when he was with Queen he got to see a lot of really great places as a result of touring with them at a luxury level. But that doesn’t always happen.
GC: You do get to experience new places in new cities, but usually it [all] happens so fast. [While] you're working, you're not a tourist. You fly to a place, sleep, wake up, maybe have breakfast, go to soundcheck, go have dinner, go do the show, go to sleep. That's your day.
If I know we're going somewhere that I haven't been, and I have the time, I'll either have them fly me out a couple days or a week before, or I'll stay a couple days or a week after and then have them fly me home.
FD: The opposite side of the coin would be a really low-budget tour, like bands driving in vans and sleeping in friends' houses, or trying to get gigs just anywhere on an off day.
GC: Yeah, I've done that as well.
FD: You have to start somewhere. Traveling in a van has got to be extremely tough.
GC: At my age, at this stage of my career, I wouldn't want to, unless it was something that I really, really believed in. I don't know that I could do it again, but I have fond memories of it. There is something special about that experience, [but] you really have to love it and really have to believe in what it is you're doing. And if you have that combination of things happening, special things happen when you're doing it.
FD: What about dealing with personal hygiene and laundry and things like that? I've heard it said so many times: make sure you have enough socks. I guess if you don't, it would be uncomfortable after a few days, and the people around you would not appreciate it.
GC: You need to find the right combination. Maybe you do two pairs of pants and 14 changes of underwear, so you do laundry every two weeks, but figuring that out where and how to do it is not so easy.
FD: I’ve heard that a lot of people have gym memberships so they can have a place to take a shower.
GC: I have a Planet Fitness membership for that reason. They've got ’em everywhere in the US, so if you're touring around the US, you can likely find one in the city that you're in. You go work out, shower, good to go.
FD: Are groupies and after-show partying even a thing anymore? I’ve heard a lot of musicians say that by the time they’re done with the gig they just want to pack it in for the night.
GC: What I've found is there's a 15- to 30-minute window where, right after I've performed, I look “super shiny” no matter where I am. It's really hard to describe what's even happening, and I know it's not “real.” I've seen it so many times. As soon as I get off stage, yeah, there are groupies, but they will disappear within 15 to 30 minutes. [And then] I'll be in that same club [some other time], and those same people will see me, [and] they don't care. So I know [the temporary attraction is] not real. Knowing that it's not real and being the age that I am, hooking up with a stranger in a strange town and not really knowing them is way less desirable to me than a good night's sleep.
FD: Wait until you're 70!
GC: I can't imagine.
FD: Hey, you know what? Mentally, I don't sit there and go, “oh my God, I'm an old man.” I think, “I want to play my guitar. I want to go out and do something.” I think music helps keep you young, but like you say, it's also a little bit disconnected from reality. The average person doesn't go out and play a gig and hear their music on the radio or play with famous people.
GC: A day in the life of another person is very hard for anybody to imagine.
The thing that I guess gets the most focused on is your time on stage, [which] is an hour to two hours maximum. If we're playing a gig every other day, that's basically between two and three percent of your time. [But] that is what everybody focuses on. And it makes sense, because that's the dreamiest part, that's the part that we all live for. But what we get paid for is the other…
FD: 97 percent.
GC: The time of actually getting to the gig and getting there in a state where we're actually capable of playing. When I am touring and focused, basically my entire day is focused around preparing my mind, body, and spirit to be top-level or as close as I can get at stage time. Whether that's 6:00 p.m. or 8:00 p.m. or whatever it is, my entire day is focused on getting myself to that place. And as soon as I'm done, maybe there's five to 15 minutes of “good job, man.” Good job, man. And reveling in what we just did, and then it's onto the next thing.
The stage part is…it's almost always magic. I mean, I love being on stage. It's a beautiful, beautiful experience. There's nothing like it, and I'm so grateful for everything I ever get to do. Yeah, it's a comedy of errors. You get a lot of funny stories out of it and a lot of life experience.
What I see about touring musicians [is that] they're great for dealing with people of all walks of life. Because you have to be agreeable even when you're tired, and getting to that place is not easy, and staying in that place is not easy. The people that I know that are really, really successful at it, they can talk to anybody. They're never too up. They're never too down. They're consistent. And that is not an easy thing to come by in this life: consistency.
I think that's what I admire the most about the best touring musicians that I know. The Springsteen's of the world…my God, that guy's been doing it for over 50 years and he's just outrageously consistent, and everybody in his band is. And they're doing it night after night. That to me is what's really remarkable and magical about it.
FD: I also admire the way many musicians deal with their fans. Sometimes the artists will just be whisked away and disappear, but when they take the time to meet with their fans, that's got to be extremely hard when they’ve just finished the show and just want to shut down. I really respect people like that, because if you're a kid and you're meeting one of your idols, you'll remember that moment for your whole life.
GC: I think the people that do that in the most gracious way are the ones who wind up [being] the most successful. Any time I've ever seen anybody who's had a high level of success…it's still remarkable to me to see my peers, my colleagues, my heroes when they're able to be gracious with everybody after playing a show when they're tired.
That is another part of the job that is very, very hard. But when it's done well, like you said, it affects people for the rest of their lives. The [artists are] creating that moment for a lot of people. If we [as artists] can understand it and understand how important it's to that person, then it completely makes it worth it. [For] any of my heroes that I’ve ever met, I have a vivid memory of it. Yes, every once in a while you have to deal with a weirdo, and that comes with the territory, and managing that's not easy. But most people want to tell you how much they loved your performance or love you, and that's a lovely thing to have happen.
Header image courtesy of Gabe Cummins.
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