Adding Strings to the Mix: What Bands Should Know About Working with String Players

It’s no secret that having a good string player or two in your band has become enormously trendy, and has been made even more desirable by the likes of Mercury Prize winners Elbow, who have no less than a string quartet on stage with them for the majority of their live performances. And why not! Strings - whether a solo violin or cello or a whole damn section - add warmth and dynamics to the mix that standard band line-ups and synthesisers can’t. Add to that the fact that they are visually striking on stage and can help to draw and hold the attention of your audience and you’ve got what should be a brilliant addition to your band.

All very good in theory but what about the practicalities? After all, Elbow can afford to pay session fees to their professional string players at the going industry rate. They can also get endorsements or sponsorship from the best manufacturers of electric stringed instruments to provide their players with beautiful matching electric violins, viola and cello. They have live sound engineers with years of experience who get tour after tour to perfect the live mix and get the sound of the instruments just right. I mention these things not to begrudge Elbow – after all, they have worked tirelessly for well over a decade to earn these privileges – but to point out just a few of the difficulties faced by bands with string players amongst the line-up. Here’s a close-up on the logistics with a few suggestions for overcoming the hurdles you’re likely to face.

Where do they hide?

The number of bands with string players you see on the live circuit has definitely been on the increase over the past few years, which may give the impression that finding them is relatively easy. With the exception of getting lucky, it really isn’t. Although there may be many string players around, especially in bigger cities with music colleges, there tends to be a fundamental conflict of interests. It would be unfair to say that all classical musicians listen to and are interested in nothing but classical music, but it is accurate to say that many are. Career wise, most are geared towards becoming soloists (very few achieve this) or playing in orchestras, smaller classical ensembles, becoming teachers or a bit of all of the above. I must stress now that what you are about to read is a series of generalisations which are intended to make your search a little easier. Like most aspects of the music business, this is not an exact science.

My first suggestion is to limit your recruitment drive to one player, not a quartet. The bigger your band gets the more difficult it becomes to organise and the more expensive it becomes to equip, transport and look after. Should you become successful, the bigger your band the more complicated contracts become and the less earning power each member will have.

I recommend targeting amateur players, especially if you’re looking for a permanent addition to your line-up. And here’s why: College students tend to be very busy with their studies as well as ensembles they belong to which tend to rehearse and gig regularly. Even if you do find a good college player with a genuine interest in your music, when they get paid gigs that happen to clash with yours you’ll get dropped like a hot potato. As for professional players, they’re not likely to rehearse or gig with anyone free of charge. Even if you have industry interest in place that would have most non-classical players bite your arm off for an opportunity to play in your band, classical musicians who earn their living from playing are very unlikely to be interested. There are plenty of good, sometimes excellent players out there who haven’t pursued a career in music but still look for opportunities to play. For the most part, these guys will be less concerned about being paid for their efforts and depending on what they do for a living, will probably show more interest in becoming a permanent band member. College or university is a good place to source amateur players. Even if they’re studying something time-intensive, students have an uncanny knack for finding time to pursue their hobbies which professionals often loose.

There are dozens of ways to get the word out about your vacancy. The obvious place to start is the Internet – if you don’t have web presence of some kind, you really should. Add your requirement to your website or profile in bold print and post blogs and bulletins. The rapidly growing phenomenon of Twitter is an excellent way to make announcements to a wide and varied audience. You might try making announcements at gigs. After all, you can more or less count on the fact that people in the audience who are paying attention to what you’re saying are interested in your music, even if it wasn’t your band they came to see. If one of them happens to match your brief you may just be onto something. If you’re prepared to spend a few bob on advertising, placing a classified ad in music magazines may drum up some interest. Getting back to the Internet, there are hundreds of sites that offer a free classifieds service and many of them have categories specifically for bands seeking members and musicians seeking bands. Make sure you run a thorough search for musicians seeking bands to play with – you may find the person you’re looking for. Finally, try getting in touch with local string teachers and ask them to inform any suitable students they have of your requirement. You’ll probably find the “old school” types unaccommodating but there are plenty of more open minded teachers about who would be happy to see their students try something different and gain more performance opportunities.

The perfect match

Anyone who has had to search for musicians for their band will know that finding someone who wants to join doesn’t mean you’ve found someone who is going to be a good fit. Music aside, they need to be someone who will get on with the rest of the band and be an asset to the social and interpersonal dynamics of your group. It goes without saying that they need to be a competent if not blindingly good instrumentalist, and a little bit of experience playing in similar genre bands never goes amiss. You already knew that. But what makes a good string player in a non-classical setting?

One of the biggest hurdles string players have to overcome in a band scenario is that of improvising and playing by ear. That is not to say that classical musicians are incapable of these things – many have outstanding improvisational skills. However, there are just as many who can play just about anything you put in front of them but freeze at the idea of having to “make it up” themselves. Not all players who fall into this category will prove to be unable to improvise, but they’ll need a lot of practise and encouragement. If you’re happy to spend a fair bit of time writing and scoring all of the string parts yourself then this won’t be an issue. My advice is to sound out all potential players on this issue and exclude the ones who are not prepared to give improvising a try unless they’re happy and able to write the parts themselves. The other issue that comes with non-improvising players is whether they are able to memorise all their parts for gigs. It really is preferable not to have someone who needs a music stand on stage. It tends to be a barrier between them and both the band and the audience and makes them look more like a session player than a member of the band.

Assuming you take instrumental capability and musicality as read, perhaps the most important benchmark you need to set for your string player is a genuine interest and understanding of your music. Do they know the genre; are they aware of the bands you are influenced by and do they listen to them? They don’t have to be aficionados, and it doesn’t have to be the only music they’re interested in. But if they wouldn’t choose to listen to and know a bit about the music you play, they probably won’t be a good match for your band.

Equipment issues

String players tend to invest much higher sums of money in their instruments than guitarists, bassists or drummers but they seldom have need for amplifiers, effects units or electric/ electric-adapted instruments. Unless your band is semi-acoustic with no drummer, that expensive violin or cello will be a nice ornament that no-one can hear. Electric stringed instruments are certainly becoming more popular and more widely available. 8 years ago most musical instrument retailers didn’t know what an electric cello was, much less stock one. Since then artists such as Nigel Kennedy, the metal cello quartet Apocalyptica, last year’s Britain’s Got Talent finalists, Lascala and hundreds of session musicians seen on shows like Jools Holland have certainly made these instruments more sought after and easier to acquire. But chances are, your prospective string player won’t own one and unless they’re able and willing to invest in one themselves, you and your band are going to have to finance an instrument and amplifier plus any associated equipment.

This is an investment that can run into several thousand pounds, but fortunately there are options available to suit tighter budgets. The first consideration is whether or not you really need to buy an electric instrument. As previously mentioned, your band may be a semi-acoustic setup and if this is the case, an acoustic instrument is not only suitable, it’s preferable. To amplify it, you’ll need to get a good pickup mic designed specifically for use with bowed string instruments and a preamp or – if you’re able to splash out more – an acoustic amplifier. Why not just amplify the instrument with a vocal mic you ask? Because the universally preferred SM 58 dynamic mics used by venues all over the world are not designed to amplify stringed instruments. You’ll experience feedback and monitoring problems that will make your entire set a nightmare, put the engineer in a bad (or worse) mood and the sound will be substandard. As the use of amplified stringed instruments becomes more popular, the range of pickup mics has grown considerably and consequently prices have become more competitive. My preference was always the Fishman C100 made specifically for cellos. It delivers a warm, well rounded sound and is easy to use. They also make bridges with internally fitted piezo ceramic pickups which fully eliminate the possibility of buzzing against the instrument but need to be professionally fitted. Fishman also make excellent preamps designed for use with their pickup mics. Fishman used to be the market leader in this specialised field but as already mentioned, the choice and range of pickup mics is far better nowadays. Other brands worth considering are Shadow, Headway, Super Sensitive, Realist and Barcus Berry. All of these will require either a preamp or amplifier to EQ the sound to your satisfaction, but the overall cost does not need to exceed £350.

If your line-up is fully plugged in and includes drums, an acoustic instrument with a pickup won’t stand a chance of being heard and you’ll have to look at buying an electric instrument and amplifier. Like all instruments, the prices vary considerably. The cheapest instruments often end up costing a lot more in the long run and the most expensive ones aren’t always the best. Yamaha have been in the market the longest with their range of “Silent” instruments which were originally designed as practice instruments that wouldn’t bother the neighbours. Although their instruments are what you might consider pricey, they are extremely reliable and with the right amplification, sound great. There are quite a few new brands in the market these days with prices as low as £150 and the second hand market has grown recently. In fact, amplification is the key to getting the right sound that cuts through but doesn’t dominate the overall mix. So long as your instrument has a decent quality internal pickup, a good set of strings and isn’t going to fall to pieces, the amplifier is the equivalent of an acoustic sound box. Everyone has their favourite make of amplifier and there are always animated debates between guitarists and bass players as to which is best and why. In the case of stringed instruments the debate is not so much about which make to buy, but what type. With very few exceptions, guitar amps are not a good option. They brighten and accentuate certain frequencies in a way that makes shredding guitar solos sound brilliant but violin, viola or cello sound harsh, shrill and tinny. Your best bet is to use an amplifier that gives a natural-sounding tone. If you want to modify the sound there are hundreds of reasonably priced effects pedals to choose from. Acoustic amplifiers are ideal for higher and lower strings, but aren’t always powerful enough: the lowest wattage you should consider is 60. I have always been sold on the incredible sound delivered by AER amps – especially the Domino, but unfortunately they don’t come cheap and are very hard to find second hand. Fishman offer a massive 130 watts in their surprisingly light and compact Loudbox Performer, which retails at around £500. In the more affordable range, Roland and Marshall have a range of good clear sounding amps from 60 – 90 watts which range in price from around £190 - £450 depending on the wattage you choose.

Lower strings can also sound good through a bass amp but if you have a cellist who likes to play in the upper register of the instrument the sound can get muddy.

If you have more money than sense or you have generous label backing, you might consider the Fishman Loudbox Pro, a 600 watt giant and the most powerful acoustic amp available. It boasts a unique tri-amped design with active crossover and a speaker compliment comparable with world-class monitors. I’m drooling as I type.

How does it sound?

One of the biggest problems I experienced as a cellist in rock bands was self monitoring. More often than not the mix was fine out front but I couldn’t hear a note I was playing. As we string players don’t have the benefit of frets, we really do need to hear what we’re doing. Your songs may end up sounding pretty avant-garde if we can’t. Finding a balance tended to be pretty difficult too – when I could hear myself the rest of the band could too, to the exclusion of everything else. I am not alone in that experience. The reasons for these issues are a combination of engineers who don’t have any experience working with stringed instruments, string players who are unfamiliar and uncomfortable with their equipment and the vast difference between the timbre of bowed strings and electric guitar. The good news is that there are fixes to these problems. For me, overcoming my initial phobia of working with anything that required plugging in was a major step in the right direction. Of course my incredibly patient fellow band members were always on hand to rearrange my patch leads when I was having a nervous breakdown over the lack of sound coming from my amp and explain the importance of turning on my cello. Learning how to get the best sound through EQ, subtle effects and writing cello parts that sat well in the mix was a matter of trial and error.

EQing really depends on the instrument and amp which leaves it in the department of trial and error. Part writing depends very much on the style of music and what role you want the stringed instrument to play. There is still one tip I can offer regardless of these variables and that is to keep things simple. That does not imply that string parts should be boring, but over complicated parts tend to get lost and never have the intended impact. Monitoring remains a tricky business which tends to be at the mercy of engineers and the quality of PA systems but there are a few workarounds. Get good quality earplugs – the type designed to reduce noise and clarify sound. They helped me enormously and probably gave me a few extra years of hearing. If you have a spare few hundred quid in the kitty, consider getting an in-ear monitoring system. I’ve never tried one of these, but I’ve read and heard that they make life a lot easier on stage. Try using the amp as an additional monitor – this way the string player can turn themselves up without affecting the front of house sound. The possible down side to this has already been mentioned – the rest of the band ends up struggling to hear what they’re doing.

To conclude…

So, are you still eager to find that violinist to complete your line-up? There is no doubt about the complications and hurdles you might face if you’re dead set on doing it. But then again being in a band and being serious about it is fraught with complications and difficulties anyway. You know what sound you want and if it includes a bowed string instrument you’re not likely to be bothered about the added hitches. If on the other hand your motivation is more about keeping up with trends and less about a sound you can’t get out of your head, my advice is to save yourself a lot of time, stress and potentially money and stick with what you’ve got. After all, if it aint broke, don’t fix it. Oh, and one last thing, cello is always a better choice. Not that I’m biased at all. My husband suggests that I should also mention what divas we string players are and how much we need our egos stroked and our backs patted. Lies. All lies.