Tony Gabriel

The Solo Adventure

Doing a solo act has always been something that I wanted to do but until now have never had the nerve to try.  Every time I told anyone that I was nervous about it the reaction was always the same… “You gotta be kidding me!  You’ve been singing and playing in front of people since you were a kid, how can you possibly be uncomfortable about it?”  I know it sounds silly but the idea of getting in front of a crowd of people all alone with just a guitar (for a whole four hour gig) was just terrifying to me.  But I was determined to overcome the fear and try my hand at the whole singing troubadour thing. 

 Well, I’ll tell you what; I am really glad that I did.  Playing solo is a complete blast!  First of all I get to sing all of my favorite songs and to pick ALL of the songs that I’m going to play without having to agree or compromise with three other people; I like a song, I learn it, I play it - its that simple!  Another thing is that I don’t have to worry about communication with other musicians during a song if I want to shorten or extend or even throw some wacky unpredictable changes.  Then there’s the interaction with the people, now that’s where it gets really fun; if someone wants to sing a song I just have them come on up and do it.  They are either going to sound good or not, usually they sound pretty darn good.  If they’re good… people applaud, if they’re not so good people will either still applaud or their friends will tease them and laugh – remember there’s usually alcohol involved so the crowd’s feeling pretty good and everything seems a lot funnier to them than it might really be.  Either way, the end result is just pure fun

 So make sure you check out my dates and come out and have some fun with me at a solo gig!