news/blog

week 12, The final

Sat, 17 Dec 2011 09:11:38 +0000

Blackpool in December is not the warmest place to end the series, but I think it’s only right and proper to have the final of this series in the home of ballroom dancing.
Our rehearsal and sound check started at 8am this week and it was freezing in the ballroom, but it certainly heated up as the day went on.
We had played some of the songs during the series so it was just a matter of reminding ourselves of those and going over the new one’s a few times. Sounds easy, but it is a very challenging gig, but we all love it and are very proud to be apart of this wonderful show. It’s also great Strictly was the highest rated show on TV this year. Forgive me while I go off piste for a moment. It’s one of my bug bears that the show on the other side being a music show doesn’t have live music, I wish the producers would change the format to make the whole show live, they have the budget to do it and it would be amazing. There are enough great musicians out there that would love the gig and it would also give the contestants the experience they need to sing with a band, live, the energy and excitement would be incredible, and real. But until such a time comes about that they do make the whole show completely live, Strictly will fly the flag and be the only show to include live musicians and singers, even as a support for the main theme of the show, dancing. Good old Auntie, we salute you.
Sorry about that. Meanwhile, back in the ballroom…….. I can’t say enough nice things about the three finalists, they all have worked so hard and been so focused. They have all turned out phenomenal performances and become real dancers. Jason seemed really intense throughout, but I can tell you he always had time for a laugh and a joke. Chelsee was just beautiful and such a natural dancer, you were hard pressed to believe she hadn’t been ballroom dancing all her life. Much credit had to go to the pro’s on this, in fact nearly all the credit really. They have turned these none dancers into championship contenders, Len said so and who am I to disagree. Kristina deserved a good partner to work with and once she had one came up with stunning choreography that showed him off perfectly! Pasha on his first year showed what class he has, a gentleman and a brilliant dancer who always put his partner first.
And to Harry, a musician, well drummer, they hang around musicians, I’m joking, calm down! Harry is one of the nicest, most talented guys I’ve met. A real gentleman who always has time for everyone even though he’s in the middle of the strictly madness. He is a great drummer, a great cricketer, if you didn’t know already, and now a great dancer and worthy strictly champion. As I’ve said, much credit goes to Aliona. Another wonderful choreographer and beautiful person, inside and out. Like all the pros, a perfectionist and extremely focused. But also one of the most ‘chilled out’. Well done champ.
The Tower ballroom looked amazing, the set dressers and designers, lighting designers, wardrobe and our mates in the sound department have been incredible. The production team have put together the most amazing series and I hope get the recognition they deserve.
The Pro dancers are always fantastic, and the opening dance was brilliant, what a great idea to use the gladiator theme! I think it was the lovely Karen Bruce who did the choreography, forgive me if I’ve got that wrong. I loved the chariots, not easy to pull them about without something happening, well done to Artem, Vinnie and renta pro Brendan. Well done to Chris Madin on vocals, ‘living on a prayer’ is in a really high key, and it’s not a song you can change they key on and still have the same sound. If you did change the key it would change the character of the song and it would also be impossible for the guitars to play without detuning, which is in turn, impossible to do on strictly as the songs come about so quickly. The guitarist have 3/5 instruments each and we don’t have tech’s, so have to change instruments ourselves, which is fine, until you have a problem with an instrument or there are quick changes. So poor old Chris had to rock out singing top c’s and did a great job.
I didn’t make the rap party this year, got back to my room and had a lay down and before I knew it the morning arrived. We were tired bunnies. But I hear it was good fun.
Lastly, I would like to mention the amazing comments and appreciation we have had from our twitter friends. I would love to re-tweet them all so everyone can see them, but fear it would seem rather undignified. So I would like to say a huge thank you for the support from the bottom of our collective hearts. We see our small part in the show as a supporting roll. The show is a dance show and it’s all about the dance, but dance and music go together, without one, the other doesn’t breath and live in the same way. So for anyone to notice our part in Strictly and say such nice things means so much to all of us. Sincerely, Thank you. xxx

See you on Christmas Day.

Merry Christmas to you dear reader.

Picture above: Trev (the hat and bass player, he’d like to point out) and Harry the champ

week 11, Alex and Holly

Sat, 10 Dec 2011 17:06:38 +0000

Had to scape the ice off the car this morning and it didn’t get much warmer in the studio for a while. Not easy to play while the fingers are iced up, but we soon got warmed up at rehearsals. Lots of styles to get our teeth into. ‘I’m just wild about Harry’, who isn’t, was great to play first up and gave our brass section a chance to stretch their legs, or cheeks. ‘Time after time’ by Cindy Lauper is a lovely song, Jeff (keyboards 2) has worked with her and say’s she’s as mad as a bag of snakes, but in a good way, which is just how I like singers/musicians to be. I don’t know to many “normal” ones, theres certainly none in this band!
We had a fantastic violin player with us this week for the tango pieces, Andrew Haveron, who played ‘Por Una Cabeza’ beautifully, on the first play through at 20 past 9 in the morning that the whole band applauded straight after, which also helped us warm up.
During the warm before the show we played a big band swinger with Sir Bruce, ‘let there be love’ from his new album. Stu our warm up man did his usual (if there is time) dance off with 4 couples from the audience. We played EW&F’s Boogie Wonderland while they danced furiously round the strictly floor and at the end the judges voted on a winner, although they all got a prize.
Semi final week was a real roller coaster emotionally, we had two of our strictly celebs leave us. It doesn’t matter how many series I’ve done, it doesn’t get any easier to watch these wonderful people leave the show. Holly and Alex have worked so hard, you could see throughout the day they were in pain, in fact all the celebs are hurting one way or another, yet they still performed brilliantly. The girls will be missed but hopefully we’ll see them again very soon, Blackpool I believe!
I must say a word or two about the pro’s, I am staggered by their talent and passion. The way they feel music is exactly like a musician feels it, they express it differently, the language they use is different but the meaning is the same. All of them are amazing and Trevs hat will be taken off to each and everyone of them. They all completely rock!!!
Off to sunny Blackpool for the final. Mustn’t forget the swimming trunks and the sun block! See you there. x

Above is a picture of Robbie showing Andrea a couple of his moves, she seems impressed! hehe

Week 10, Robbie

Sat, 3 Dec 2011 10:33:19 +0000

Apologies for the late blog but it’s been crazy this week and I’ve been helping Santa out at the north pole. This happens every christmas, Santa get’s really stretched what with there being so many good boys and girls he recalls all of us elfs, whoops, i’m not supposed to tell you that i’m moonlighting! Shhh, you’ll keep my secret, won’t you?
The Robsta finally went out this week and he will be missed by all that met him. A genuinely nice bloke, and I now feel bad about shouting at him whenever I saw him play football on my tele, mind you some of those tackles were a bit late Rob! Anyway, thats in the past and we all know him to be a great bloke who did his best at all times. Ola did an incredible job as she always does. Her choreography is fantastic and always shows her partner off at their best. Well done to a great couple.
We had the usual strictly mashup of songs styles, my personal favorite was the Zoro theme for Artem and Holly. Never ceases to amaze me how Dave makes these pieces with 60 musicians on work for 18 of us. I also loved playing ‘pretty woman’ great song by a great singer. I love the bit where he runs out of lyric ideas and sing ‘pretty woman yer yer yer’ brilliant.
It was fun watching Trev, bass player, cut up and stuff a kitchen pan cleaning sponge under his strings to get the sound on ‘little green bag’, couldn’t have done it without the help of Ian, one of our friendly sound guys, what a team!
Dave was off conducting this years Royal Variety show on Monday so he’s had a very busy couple of weeks. Judging by some of the story’s his told me it was a very exciting night and I believe it’s on the TV 14th December. I’ll see if i can get him to give us some gossip, although he did say that the royal guest said to him ‘thank goodness for live music’, here here.

As alway a huge thanks to our twitter friends for your comments throughout the shows.

The pictures above are the curious seen I was greeted by as I went on stage Saturday night. A crew member working with a donkey watching him. Only in strictly land!

Show 9, Anita

Sat, 26 Nov 2011 13:18:49 +0000

I’m all confused, should have done this blog straight after the show and not left it a couple of days. My bad, I believe the hipsters say these days. Problem is, I’m so tired when I get in after the show that I just refuse to do anything on Sundays, terrible, lazy and more things like that I know, but that’s the way it is. Need to be more like our Hayley who writes her blog on Sunday mornings so remembers everything.
This is wot I remember….
A: Miranda Hart rolling on the dance floor with Bruno.
B: Being blown away with Jill-Marie Cooper singing ‘mama knows best’ at the soundcheck/rehearsal.
C: Playing uptown girl by Billy Joel. Don’t ask me why but I remember that!
D: Forgetting to eat anything at all until 4pm and feeling a bit dizzy.
E: That’s enough of this…..

Really sad to see Anita go this week, and really felt for Bobby and Brendan. For Bobby being ill and having to sit at home and watch and worry about Anita, and Brendan, for doing everything in his power but being the one to partner Anita when she went out. All the pro dancers care so much for their partners and Brendan had a tear or 6 in his eyes I can tell you. He is a hero and should have a rentapro superhero outfit made. But, we will be seeing Anita on the tour so there’s a bit of a yeeey as well.
We played another Stevie song during Stu’s warm up this week. As I’ve mentioned in the past he get’s a few couples up for a dance off and we play for them. Wait a minute, I think we just played a number and there was no audience dance off for some reason. See, I can’t remember! I remember the song though ‘signed sealed delivered’.
This week out twitter friends asked us to get a Facebook page, which, being good boys and girls we did. I’m not sure if it’s too much to keep up with but I’m going to give it a go. See if you can find us, SCD band, simples. I like it being like the A team, “A bunch of unschooled renegade musicians, on the run from the authority’s for crimes against sparkly instruments, if you can find them, you might be able to hire the…..” etc. etc.
Again, and sorry if this is boring you, but a huge thank you to our twitter friends for their comments and support on Saturdays, we read them all and reply when we can, but their so many that when I reply to lots I get in trouble for jamming the ‘time lines’. But I will reply to as many as I can. But your support is very much appreciated by us all.

I wonder what we have in store for us next week? Keeeeeeeep dancing.

Photo of Hayley, Rentapro and Tommy

Show 8, Russell

Sun, 20 Nov 2011 15:03:23 +0000

What a fun weekend. I love playing at Wembley and have been lucky enough to play both the Arena and the Stadium a few times now. Not football unfortunately, which would have been my dream, but just playing a bit of music here and there. The excitement was obvious to all in the arena throughout the day. How the crew moved everything from the TV center to the arena is mind blowing, I raise Trev's hat to them all.
We had a lovely dressing room this week, we had to share, band, singers, Dave, John and Jo (the copyist), Cathy and Isy (contractors) and Stu (warm up guy). It was fun mucking in together and we saw more of each other then we normally do of a Saturday, which was nice. At one point in a break there were musicians and singers all over the floor and settees trying to get 40 winks. You certainly had to watch where you put your feet or risk standing on someone. Word of advice to you, never wake a sleeping musician, it’s like waking a bear from hibernation.
We said goodbye to the wonderful force of nature that is Russell Grant, what a lovely man and so much fun. He really embraced strictly and loved it, and strictly loved him right back. He was lucky to have the amazing Flavia as his partner and I’m not sure I’ve seen Flav laugh as much as I have this series. They were a great team and will be missed very much, hopefully we’ll be seeing them again soon.
The Beatles medley was a high light for me, they we’re the reason I started playing so to get the chance to play those fantastic songs at Wembley was a real treat, I was singing along too, couldn’t help myself. I think Robbie, Harry, Russell and Jason looked brilliant in the mop tops and suits. Whoever put the set together deserves a medal, the abbey road zebra crossing the guys walked up and down was great! So much to look at all round the arena, I wish it could have been a longer routine, looked amazing.
The same thing for the queen medley, How brave is CRH flying all over the place with a guitar, for a minute I think it was the legend that is Brian May! and the bo rap film was inspired.
This week while the crew were resetting the dance floor we had time to play a couple of Stevie tunes. What a blast that was, the audience seemed to like it and for a minute I forget it wasn’t our concert, I remembered quickly as we had to stop mid tune as the director was ready to record!
Special mention to Robbie Savage this week for being so much fun, doing so well and jumping into strictly with both feet, studs down, as usual eh Rob! Top man, doing his best what more could you ask for? respect!
Back home to the studio next week, wonder how we’ll feel.

Twitter friends you rock big time, the support and comments you given us has been incredible and means so much to us sat in the dark. Dave read through your all your comments on the way home last week and sends his love and thanks.

Now for anyone interested in some light techy stuff carry on, bit boring for anyone else, you have been warned……….

I thought this week I’d give any new readers an idea what the sound guy’s have to deal with (regular blog readers will know I’ve covered this in the past, you can look back through them if you wish). Tony and his team in the sound room/truck have microphones on everyone (presenters, dancers, celebs, instruments, vocal, audience) and other things I’ve forgotten. Each one of these mics goes through to a channel on a mixing board or two. They then have to balance out everything so it sounds as natural as possible to the listener. That’s 38/50 channel/mic’s for the us alone, add to that all the ambient mics in the studio/arena (at a guess something like 10/15 in the studio and who knows how many in the arena), then the celebs 14, dancers 14, presenter, 3 (2 each+ plus the back up’s) and you start to see what a task they have.
First they get a mix of the band at soundcheck (Hour and a half for our rehearsal and soundcheck), which they have to change for each style of music and song we do, as we do them. I’ve been up to the sound studio’s and the mixes sound great. I wish you could hear them like it. Which brings me to their second hurdle. To give the TV listener the feel of the atmosphere in the studio they have to leave the ambient mics up in the studio so you can hear the clapping, cheering and booing etc through your TV’s. That should sound great and it all seems sensible. So next, the dancers have to hear us, of course they do, the pro dancers especially feel the music to move, if they can’t hear properly they can’t dance as they want to. So, above the dance floor is a monitoring system for them to get the sound of the band from, as I’ve just said they like to feel the music so need it loud enough through their monitors. Are you still with me? I’m confusing myself! So, we have three things to think about, so far, the real clean sound of the band, the sound the dancer’s need to hear through their monitors and the ambient room sound. The difficulty is the ambient mics pick up the dancers monitor sound so it creates less clarity to the actual sound of the band when it get’s through to the TV even though they feed mainly the clean band sound to you. So as a rule the more clapping and cheering you hear the less likely you are to hear the true sound of the band and music. If you notice on a slow dance or one where no one is clapping along, the sound of the band is clearer and generally better. Can you imagine multiplying this from the size of the studio at the TV center to Wembley arena!!! Wow!!! Also, something worth bearing in mind is, every TV has different EQ settings and speakers so what sounds crystal clear on one TV doesn’t on another. If you want to get a truer sound of the show, and please do just once, have a listen on iplayer through a decent set of headphones, you may be pleasantly surprised. I do it every week to check how we sound. So with all that in mind I would like to give all the sound guy’s, in the mixing booth and down on the floor with us a standing ovation.