What does it take to be a professional musician? Rich is the right person to
ask - he has been making his living off music for the past twenty years. But
there's a difference between being a professional musician and being a rock
star. How big is that difference? And does Rich have what it takes to make that
leap?
Rich is well-known in the professional music world. He is a member of Michelle
Shocked's band, mainly as a trumpet player, and plays regularly with the groups
Cold Blood and Wall Street. He's also shared the stage with Bruce Springsteen
(last year at the New York Guitar Festival), and has toured with Boz Scaggs and
the band members from Mariah Carey and Janet Jackson. Soft jazz king, Terry
Disley, regularly calls on Rich as a guest performer at his weekly show in San Francisco. Rich knows
lots of stars.
In late August, Rich ran into Donna, the lead singer from the Waifs (a top five
folk-rock band from Australia)
in the parking lot of the Great
American Music
Hall just before a performance, and got invited
to come in and rehearse with them. With only five minutes practice time, he
found himself on stage with the Waifs and Paul Kelly, performing five songs in
front of a packed audience. It pays to know people in high places. He recently
played with Steve Miller and Kenny Wayne Shepard.
It sounds like a dream life getting to perform music with famous people and get
paid for it. Has Rich achieved his life ambition?
No. He wants to be more than a well-respected support musician. He wants to
make it big, as a solo musician playing his own original music, with his own
record label. So what keeps him from achieving his goal?
It's not that he doesn't work hard enough. He takes every gig he can squeeze
in, including this one, running the sound board for the Drag show. The high
cost of living in San Francisco
makes it necessary for him to say yes to the work that comes his way. Sometimes
he has up to three gigs in a day, and has to drive hours to get from one to the
other.
Rich has a lot going for him. He's energetic, motivated, and versatile. He
always shows up to rehearsals. He practices ahead of time and arrives with the
right music in hand. He gets opportunities because people know they can count
on him. Besides his signature instrument, the trumpet, he can play percussion,
guitar, and sing lead. He has his own sound equipment. If he cancels a gig, he
always gets a replacement.
"I know forty trumpet players," he explains. "Last week I had a
conflict and couldn't make my gig, so I called twenty of them before I found
someone who could sub for me." Then he leans forward. "But you know
what? There's only one of those forty trumpet players who does vocals. The rest
just do trumpet. No one goes for versatility. I don't know how they make a
living."
Doing many different things is a key factor in Rich's ability to support
himself with his art. Most of those focused trumpet players have day jobs.
"I haven't worked as a busboy since I was nineteen," says Rich
proudly. "Since then, it's been all music."
In one sense, Rich's wide range of skills makes him good value for the money. A
couple of weeks ago I watched him play with the Terry Disley Experience. He
switched smoothly from trumpet solo to backup percussion. His shakers and bells
and other unnameable percussive instruments were all lined up neatly on a
little platform he set up next to him on stage. When he played the drum, they
quivered and inched closer and closer to the edge of the platform, but never
quite fell off. He's very cool as he catches an eye signal from the band leader
and picks up his trumpet for a solo.
But in another, very real sense, Rich's versatility may not be doing him any
good.
"Some people don't know how to categorize me, so they don't call."
And maybe the calls he's missing are the ones that would lead him along the
path to the fame he craves. Not to mention the fact that he's working so hard,
he may not have time to become famous.
"I've had record companies call, asking if I wanted to do a contract, and
I couldn't respond because I was so busy."
There's something else working against Rich. He's a family man. Not that he has
a wife, or even a serious girlfriend at this point, but he does have a beautiful
daughter, a five-year-old named Anika who loves life, and who lives with him
three days a week. She also happens to be a classmate of my four-year-old
daughter's.
Anika looks like Rich, and she's full of life. Whenever she sees her Daddy
coming at school, she runs over, screaming his name, and throws herself into
his arms. It's obvious that these two have something special.
"If I went to LA, I'd be snapped up right away,"
Rich opines. But going to Los Angeles
would mean leaving Anika, whose mother lives in the Bay Area (although she and
Rich are no longer romantically involved.)
Rich goes all out on the parenting thing. For Halloween, he and Anika carved
pumpkins. Every Easter, they color eggs together. They go to the zoo every
other week in the summer. And for Anika's birthday, she found her bedroom
transformed into a fairyland, painted in bright shades, with flower lights on
the walls and billowy clouds on the ceiling.
"That was the most expensive birthday present I've ever
given," says Rich ruefully.
Last year, Rich went to see his daughter perform in a full-length ballet
production, but had to leave before the end for a band rehearsal. He bought
flowers ahead of time and sneaked backstage at the intermission to give them to
her, then took off for the fifty-mile drive to his rehearsal. He describes the
conflicting tug between parenting and performing as brutal. Most of his work is
at night, so he relies on babysitters when Anika is staying with him. He gets
home at two or three in the morning after a gig, and Anika wakes up wide-eyed
and energetic at seven o'clock. Sleep is a luxury in Rich's life.
As he talks about this, he applies himself enthusiastically
to a plate filled with honey ham, smoked salmon, crab pastries, and all sorts
of subtly flavored vegetables - one of the perks of working the Sunday drag
show. "I can't believe they pay me to be here," he says, indicating
the buffet, which is lavishly endowed. His laugh is hearty and unselfconscious.
A gentleman to the core, he makes sure I am amply supplied with food and drink
from the sumptuous brunch buffet. I can see why Rich is popular with women.
He gets serious about his love life later on, during a
follow-up conversation on instant messenger.
"I have a problem," he types. "I only want
women who don't want me."
He's got his own number - at least part of it. As we talk, I
find out about several girlfriends in Australia,
("I go out with women from other countries so I don't have to deal with
the ones who are here"), two women in Japan,
and a thirty-four-year-old virgin he's dating in Napa. ("It's the ultimate never can have
scenario - a complete romantic relationship with no actual sex. It's playful
and amazing.")
Has he ever been serious about someone?
"I was with one girl. But she was a roiling bitch. I was
working so hard to please her, and it was never enough," he says. She
kept him so busy he didn't have time to pursue other women.
"I figured out it was her [problem]," he says, but
it took a while.
"Right now," he admits, "I'm in love with a
beautiful social worker, who's recently single, used to be with a woman, and
loves me. But mostly it's an internet thing. I've asked her to live with me and
move here, and she's thinking about it."
Where is the beautiful lesbian social worker? In Australia -
where else? He shows me her picture. She's gorgeous and only twenty-four.
"But I'll hate her if she comes," he says sadly.
Recently, Rich bought himself a Harley-Davidson to get him from point A to B to
C to... His favorite pastime - surfing - has had to move over to make time for
fiddling with the bike. There is so much chrome on the bike now that on a sunny
day it's blinding.
"I get parts at amazing prices," he says, "because this guy has
taken a liking to me. We really hit it off. This piece here" (he shows me
a shiny piece of metal whose function seems mostly decorative) "is worth
$200, and I got it for $40."
It seems like there are lots of people who take a liking to Rich - he-s
easy-going and a good networker. Networking is great for getting you in touch
with the big people who could make your future, but it is becoming apparent
that Rich isn't playing his cards right. Something isn't adding up.
Recently, Michelle Shocked agreed to play at Rich's daughter's school for a
fundraiser. A few weeks before the event, she changed her mind and called it
off. When he protested, she told him to call her agent to get a replacement.
Rich is furious about her defection. "She totally left me hanging. And she
has nothing else scheduled for that weekend." From his reaction it's clear
that he would never consider bailing on a gig without a good reason.
Maybe Rich is too nice to be a rock star. Or maybe he works too hard - so he's
too busy to look for the shortcuts to the top. Or maybe his versatility is the
problem: so he doesn't project that set-in-stone single talent that might make
people remember him. Could it be his family values? He doesn't seem to
sacrifice his time with his daughter for his career very often.
But somehow, I don't think any of those things are the real
issue. Talent counts for a lot, and all - both professionals and fans who hear
him play agree he's got plenty of talent. He gets the calls, and he gets the
opportunities to do high profile work.
Rich likes to play the field, and he doesn't like to be put into a neat
category. He's not just a trumpet player, like those other forty trumpet
players - he does vocals, too. He's not just part of Michelle Shocked's band,
he plays with a dozen other different groups, too. Maybe Rich just hasn't found
the right opportunity - or the right girl. And maybe he isn't sure he wants to.
Time will tell how Mr. Rich Armstrong fares in the dog-eat-dog world of popular
music. If you want to find out, you can always go look for him on MySpace, or
check out his website at www.THERichArmstrong.net.
You're sure to find something interesting, because this is one musician who is
full of surprises.
