Please read this page before asking for a gig. If you ask for a One Note Sunday gig now, then it's clear you haven't read this page, and I will only think Bad Things about you.

Who does the booking?

I did, but I don't any more. There aren't any One Note Sunday sessions in Derby any more. They ended in April 2014.

That said, do not let that put you off from reading the simple yet for the most part completely ignored guidance on how to get a gig for One Note Sunday.

What are your tastes?

I have a very strong preference for original and rarely heard music. This is what I wanted to hear. And (at the time I was booking gigs) I wanted to hear musicians who are capable of creating that kind of sound for between one and one-and-a-half hours.

I tried encouraging suggestions from people living in Derby about groups to put on: this rarely worked. And I did want to hear from bands and musicians! But only those that had read this first.

But it really did have to be music I'd like. In my head, this included

  1. jazz from its inception to the present day (but bear in mind my preference);
  2. chamber music;
  3. funk;
  4. totally improvised and experimental music;
  5. folk (and music derived from folk traditions) from Britain and abroad;
  6. choral music
  7. old-style ska;
  8. dub;
  9. decent reggae; and
  10. R&B and soul with original songs with great lyrics, voices that sound authentic and everyone playing an instrument.

But of course, the list is not exhaustive. If I listened to it and I liked it, then I didn't care what genre it was. Of course, all of this is moot now.

What was the fee?

As stated here - it was a door money gig. And this always upset me, because if you knew me you'd know how much I hate door money gigs.

However, we did not do too badly. I had a benchmark against which I measured "success": I had a trio gig in London where eight people turned up and we earned £10 between us. No gig I put was ever going to be that bad, and it wasn't.

The most practical thing I could do in terms of maximizing how much you took home was to limit the band size to four people. Some of you never understood this; and I never understood (and still do not understand) why you did not understand this; but it doesn't matter now.

Could I have done a double bill with another band?

No.

One band actually tried this, by bringing along a warm-up act at the last minute. It didn't work, and I personally vow it will never happen again.

Having other performers on the night diminishes your fee. The audience understands that the musician gets all of the door, which is why the bands were on the smaller side and there's only one group. It's a focussed listening experience, like a concert.

Did I have to send you a tape/CD?

No no no no no. Put your music on-line. A CD is stock. The idea of stock is to sell it. Unless you've specifically made review copies of your music, no musician should be sending out stock unless they're going to make a return. Free downloads or on-line listening? Yes! Stock? No. This is the most backward aspect of the mess that is termed "the music business" and it really needs to stop.

Final notes on booking

There was no guest list. Although of course if a partner/friend has travelled with you he/she would not be expected to pay!

If I chose not to book you, I tried to let you know straight away, but this didn't always work out, for which I apologize.

"No, sorry." meant no (and possibly also sorry), and "I've got no spaces" meant I had no spaces. And sorry. Neither of those things meant that you shouldn't try again, or that I wouldn't ever book you. But now, "no, sorry" just means no, sorry.