Why do musicians play too loud on social gatherings?

Question

For example on a wedding, restaurant,etc. so that guests can't talk to each other because it's too loud. Even when people ask them to turn the volume a bit down, they turn it down for a couple of songs, then they will turn it up again.

Answer 1

Restaurants are where most folk go to eat, and chat. Weddings are where a lot of folk are given an opportunity to catch up with old friends and acquaintances. Both situations really don't need any more than background music, to cover any awkward silences. So any band playing under those circumstances needs to be aware that it's there as the secondary part of the proceedings, not the primary.

Been in that situation hundreds of times, and understood that the band's place then was to provide background music. Not difficult - play more gentle, slower, peaceful stuff, at a lower volume, until those proceedings have finished, at which point the band can open up, and be the centre of attraction for the rest of the evening, or whenever.

It's not difficult, provided placing of the p.a.speakers is carefully considered. Playing at lower levels with those behind or level with the band never caused any feedback problems, and they could be moved forward if needed later. Good drummers can and do play quietly - or should be sacked !

The question says 'why?'. It's the same at rehearsals a lot of the time - I've walked out of auditions because the rest of the band wouldn't turn down to a sensible level. Partially it's the 'more of me' syndrome, where everyone wants to hear themselves more than the others, and the vicious spiral is made. Partially it's the 'I can only sound good when I'm loud' syndrome - guitarists and drummers in particular. Some of which can be alleviated by use of monitors, which can aggravate the situation by increasing the sound pressure on stage. Got round that on occasions by only using the monitors when the band was background music providers! Partially it's a purely selfish power game where 'I can play louder than you' come into play, literally.

Bottom line - hire a band of maturely thinking musos, who can get as much enjoyment from playing quietly as they can from belting it out, (someone will be listening, and appreciate it) or just go back to boring old wallpaper music.

Answer 2

Blame the booker, not the band.

A restaurant is a different kettle of raspberries - there what you want is a solo electronic keyboard player or a guitarist with a volume control, not a band with a drummer, trumpeter or saxophonist & an absolute minimum volume they can feasibly play at.
It's really, really uncomfortable trying to play below minimum volume in a venue that would rather you weren't there at all.

So, if anyone books a 5-piece live band for that, they need their heads testing.
If you want to be a rock venue, stop trying to be a restaurant.
There is no 'long plot' to a restaurant. Every customer is there for an hour or two & no two sets of diners are in the same frame of mind at the same time. Each set of diners wants their own individual experience & usually doesn't want to be subsumed in an overall melée they did not ask for. [Of course, they ought to have checked the restaurant was of a similar mindset to them before booking, so some of the onus is back on the diners. You don't go to Hooters or TGI Friday for a romantic dinner for a middle-aged couple, live band or no live band, in the same way you wouldn't go to McDonald's either. Pick your venue, people.]

A wedding, on the other hand, has the same group of people all day, then they double the numbers at night as the party proper starts. It clearly has a set plot, known in general to all the attendees. It's not a dinner out, it's not a brief social gathering, it's a day-long celebration. It's not a sprint, it's a marathon. It has a long-plot, something for everyone, hopefully.

Let me take mine as an example - after all, it's the one I remember best & also had the biggest hand in organising.

For the 'service' a classical pianist, opera singer & a string quartet. Everybody had to damnwell shut up & listen, then applaud afterwards. Done. Thank you.

For the 'breakfast', nothing - speeches & stuff, you don't want music over that.
As everyone settled into their 5th glass of champagne and got on with the serious business of getting drunk & catching up with old friends & relations, a couple of pianists, one classical the other jazz, swapping duties every so often while the other got caught up with the drinking, making some very good muzak in the background, which few noticed at all. Those who did were impressed.

Later, as we get into 'evening' then all the big, sprawling 12-seater tables are cleared, replaced with fewer smaller tables - making some gather in different groups, others head for the quieter main lounge bar & leaving a very large open space in the middle. The last until now hidden segment of the room is opened up too, to reveal a stage, set & ready to go.

Cue the first 'band'; which is me, my wife & a guitarist friend. Couple of songs that everybody crowds in to listen to - well, that's kind of what they came for.
We then swap up to her full-time ten piece function band & the gig proper starts.
Dancing & much revelry ensues. The old folks go reclaim their places in the other bar, where they can talk to their hearts' content.

Three hours later, we swap to a DJ & some old faves for our age group.
Once we hit the hotel's curfew time, we drag back the 2 pianos & let the pianists again take over [with much improv, duels & impromptu karaoke] until the last guest falls over around 4am.

Good time had by all.
Loud enough for those who wanted it, quiet enough for those who didn't.

Answer 3

IMO this is actually an important question to think about. The underlying conflict is this:

• The musicians see it as their job to make the audience feel good by listening to good music (regardless of what kind of gig this is). They can't do that if the audience doesn't really hear the music. In particular, if the ambient sound level of the audience talking is higher than the music level, then even those in the audience who really want to focus on the music won't be able to. And the musicians can't possibly give a good performance if they constantly need to think “how do I deal with this hostile mob” instead of sinking into an actual deep and meaningful act of art.
• Some/many/most of the audience (don't over-generalize!) see it as their “job” to talk with old friends, make new acquaintances, etc.. They're not really there for the music at all, they more accept it as a nuisance that needs to be accepted “because convention dictates there has to be live music”.

Well, force those two groups in an enclosed space and nobody's going to have a good time. Ok, you perhaps think the solution is: “the musicians are payed for a specific job which is to suck it up and just produce some sweet tones in the background, and make the whole event look more stylish than if there's canned music”. In other words, you're reducing the musicians to a better wallpaper. You have to see that this is not a role that self-respecting musicians will ever be happy with. Sure, if the pay is right then many will do it – but seriously, what's the point?

There is a reason why there is music at social gatherings: many people like music a lot – and music is at its most powerful when it's really live, when it really reacts with the audience. But that doesn't work if none of the audience is even able to react to the music, because it's drowned by all the talking.

One solution is, indeed, to make the music so loud that the audience has no chance to drown it out. At least for some styles of music it's technologically easy, and it guarantees that people who want to listen and/or dance can do it. If you don't like it – well, consider that you can talk to your friends any time, really. But the people who like to dance with their friends to live music can't do that any time. Sure they can go to a concert where everyone has payed to listen, but that always has a different atmosphere.

I would however agree that brute force loudness is never a very good solution, even if there is more dancing than eating. It certainly isn't any good in a restaurant setting.

The real solution is that everybody respects everybody else and find a compromise. But the musicians are in a difficult position here: turn the volume down and they disrespect those audience members who want good music. Turn the volume up and they disrespect those who want to be able to talk.

The audience meanwhile has it easier: they can move around. If you want to talk, move somewhere where it's not that loud, and in particular where the noise that you make by talking won't reach the stage. This way, the musicians don't need to turn up the volume. Of course in a seated dinner, this requires planning ahead, which often doesn't work.

So if you find yourself in a situation where you feel you have no option but scream-talk over the music... well, take a pause and look around what the others in the audience want. Are many of them looking to the stage? Then maybe you should as well, and wait until the band is finished for more talkey interactions. Are many of them dancing and only occasionally talking in their neighbour's ear? Then maybe you should as well.
Or are many of them just looking unhappy and screaming in their neighbours' faces all the time? Then I suggest you reach out to those and say, let's move to the other room to talk a bit.

On the other side, I would say that the musicians (and sound engineer, if any) also should always consider what sound level really is appropriate, and not just be loud because they can. If the audience has no option to move, and really mostly wants to talk, then they will inevitably just talk louder and louder, and then turning up the music volume is just an arms race. Ironically, in my experience being quieter is often the most effective way of getting the audience to listen. In particular, playing entirely without amplification can do a lot to gain the audience's respect, and makes it much more likely that loud talking will be effectively hushed down by those who want to listen, whereas those who want to talk can simply whisper in the back or adjacent room. But that does require that everybody in the audience cooparates: just one noisy desk that doesn't even notice there is live music would ruin an unplugged performance. Also, many music styles just don't work without amplification.

Generally, and probably most effectively, there are a couple of things that party organisers should think about, which can help a lot:

1. Try to not trap two “hostile armies” in an enclosed space. In particular not a space whose acoustics carries all the sound everywhere. Select a venue where there's either a “music room” and a “talking room”, or where the sound from the stage-end won't reach the rear-end too much and vice versa. Don't select an concert hall that's designed for quietly listening to delicate music, and definitely not an echoey sports hall with no acoustic treatment at all.
2. Make a proper programme, where it's clear when the audience is meant to eat and/or talk, when they're meant to listen to music, and when they're meant to dance. Try your best to ensure the audience respects this, and to ensure the musicians can focus on when they really have the audience's ears.

Answer 4

You don't need musicians to have this effect: within a social gathering of certain size, conversations create a background noise and people raise voices to get over that background noise in their conversation group. Everyone does it, so that raises the background noise.

This kind of escalation also happens within a band itself but musicians tend to arrive at some kind of balance during practice. The background din of people trying to talk over the band disrupts that balance, so band members raise their volume to hear themselves over the others.

The solution for that in large concerts is monitoring: there are speakers directed at the musicians (or earphones) that give them a satisfactory feedback of what they are playing. Very large acts may provide a personal mix for each player via their own sound technician; more common is one technician for both a monitor and an audience mix.

Weddings/restaurants tend to be venues where musicians (when amplified) just work with stage amps rather than a monitoring/PA setup. That's more susceptible to loudness wars.

However, in my experience it is even tricky to get a DJ to keep the music at background levels in social gatherings, presumably because they take pride in their work and want it to be heard.

Answer 5

I can't see the obvious answer spelled out yet:

Musicians enjoy playing together; they generally enjoy hearing themselves and their bandmates make music, and so there is a natural tendency to play loud enough that they can hear themselves well.

And a related reason: some musicians can play effectively only when they can hear themselves and/or each other well. (Obviously, this depends on the instruments, and probably the style of music. But I've had a couple of occasions when I really couldn't hear what I was playing, and it was really hard work and not at all enjoyable.)

Now, a good band (professional or not) ought to a) care more about the needs of the event than about their own enjoyment, and b) be able to adjust their volume level to suit (subject of course to the minimum possible volume level that most mechanical instruments have). But not all bands care enough and/or are skilled enough to do so.

Also, there may not be complete agreement between whoever hired the band (and/or is paying them), and everyone else present (whether listening and enjoying, ignoring, or enduring patiently). If some have asked for it to be quite loud, and then others ask for it to be turned down, they can't please everyone.

Similarly, those desires may not be communicated well. If one person asks for it to be turned down, but it looks like many other people were enjoying it a little louder, then there's a judgement call to be made.

Either way, I guess it's natural for musicians to err on the louder side, because that's what they themselves want.

Answer 6

They can't hear themselves.

Many rock and pop musicians who are always loud (esp. drums) have damaged hearing from playing loud. They can't hear themselves play, so they play louder. Then the guitars etc have to turn it up because they can't hear themselves...

This is true in all genres where I have played. In Blasmusik brass bands the trumpeters are always too loud, and everyone else has to blow harder to be heard. You need a really authoritative conductor to keep the lid on 40 determined polka hounds. Also they are used to playing outside or in beer tents, where you do need to be louder than inside a building.

In jazz bands and big bands it is common to have monitors so the band can hear each other. In some venues the acoustics are so bad you can't even hear the drums. We saxes in the front row have no problem hearing the trombones, who are trying to fry our brains from behind. But we need to hear the lead sax or we are lost. Thus we tend to use those deflector things, in case you wonder what that's about.

So basically it's

• lack of discipline; The band leader has to keep it down.
• combined with bad acoustics (oh, the awful village halls and churches we've played in)
• not enough kit. You need a monitor for bass and keyboard.