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Live Gig: The Gettys
One of the privileges of belonging to a large church is I often get to play guitar for thousands of people in a single day. Another is the occasional opportunity to play with well-known musicians of the highest caliber. This past Sunday night I had just such an opportunity and I thought I would share that experience with you.
Keith and Kristyn Getty are Irish songwriters who are well known in Christian music circles. Keith is a classically trained pianist and successful producer. Kristyn writes lyrics and has a truly beautiful voice. Their music has been recorded by hundreds of artists in addition to themselves.
The Gettys arrived Saturday afternoon and the concert was Sunday night, so there would only be one practice with the Gettys. I arrived for the 3:00 rehearsal at around 2:30 on Sunday. After setting up my pedalboard, tuning my Epiphone Elitist Sheraton, and doing a quick sound check, Keith Getty arrived to start rehearsing the band. He introduced himself to everyone and we began right on time. While Keith was always pleasant, it was strictly business as we had only two hours to go over 15 songs.
We would run through a song and Keith would point out parts he want each instrument to play, often using phrases like “Give me a little Braveheart on the drums” or “I wouldn’t mind a little B.B. King during these eight bars.” One song required the piano, electric guitar, and bass to play the same riff together — a series of triplets — to end a song. So we sent a few minutes practicing the riff over and over as Keith repeatedly said “Again.” until he felt it was good enough. After practicing a song a few times he would ask everyone if they were happy with the song. If we needed to go back over something, we did. If not, we moved on to the next song.
At 5:00 the backup singers and Kristyn Getty arrived. We ran through some of the songs with them and made arrangement changes as necessary to work with the vocals. At 6:00 we broke for a quick dinner. At 6:30 the concert began. The concert went very well, even though I did play a couple of “clams.” Afterwards I thanked Keith and apologized for the flubbed notes. He said “No, no. It was great. I fact there were several good bits.” He then went on to tell me specific parts he liked in a couple of different songs. Of course, this made me feel good, and it also shows how a good musician is always listening to the other musicians he plays with.
Keith mentioned that the short rehearsals were a trade-off. He said he could come in three days early and get things perfect, but then he would only be able to do a third as many concerts. In fact, he said they were putting a touring band together and that we were the last church band they would be using. It was a great blessing for me to have had a small part in the concert and I won’t soon forget it.