The MoneyGigs
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The MoneyGigs
Phil Carillo - Me No Play, Me No Roof
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Phil Carillo has spent 45 years gigging in Southern California on steel pan and vocals — and he's the rare working musician who figured out the business and won't apologize for it. We get into why he charges $3,500 for a two-hour wedding, how he runs a band nobody burns out of, the time he got banned from the Orange County Fair for making too many people dance, his surprisingly balanced take on AI, and the "Free Expression Sessions" that taught him quality is the enemy of a finished idea.
If you've ever wondered what your time is actually worth on a gig, this one's for you. In this episode: - Why "no playing equals no eating" — and how to price like it - Running a band: pay for everything, but never be late once - Banned from the OC Fair for making too many people dance - A 45-year veteran's honest take on AI in music - "Quality is your enemy": creating without fear
Guest: Phil Carrillo — Steel Parade steelparade.com
TikTok @philj.carillo
00:00 Meet Phil: 45 years gigging, steel pan & Long Beach roots
09:21 $3,500 a gig & the worth of your time
14:47 "What is this burnout?" + how he runs a band
21:36 Banned from the Orange County Fair
27:25 Phil on AI & the future of live music
33:01 Free Expression Sessions: "Quality is your enemy"
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MoneyGigs is supported by trifloral.com. T R Y F L O R A L dot com forward slash the money gigs to get your discount. Trifloral produces THC beverages. They come in 2.55 and 10 milligram varieties in all sorts of flavors. I have one prior to my gig, and everything is so smooth. Visit T R Y F L O R A L dot com forward slash the money gigs. That's trifloral.com forward slash the money gigs and get your discount. Hey, it's Cliff. Welcome back to the Money Gigs Podcast, the show where I sit down with working musicians and talk about the part the money put in the brochure, the money, the venues, the logistics, the anxiety, the actual business of making a living playing music. My guest today is Philip Carrillo. 45 years gigging out in Southern California. LA man steel panel posts the whole thing. He's the rare musician who figured out the business side and isn't the least bit shy about it. We get into why he charges $3,500 for a two-hour wedding and refers you to a competitor without blinking. The time he got banned from the Orange County Fair for making too many people dance. And somewhere in the middle of all this, he flips it around and starts interviewing me. I met him on TikTok. This one runs deep. Let's get into it. So let's just start with your baseball card. And where are you from?
SPEAKER_00I am originally from the LBC, Long Beach, California, born and raised.
SPEAKER_01Okay, where are you now?
SPEAKER_00I am in the LBC still. I have moved around so cal in my life, but uh I find myself living um close to where I was born. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Well, we share that in common. I've done my best to try to get out of Cincinnati, but I can't seem to do that. You are done because the schools are here, you're really good. It's a good place to be a parent. But okay, so I did a little homework, and and this is interesting. You've got steelparade.com. And so I know you you play the steel drums and you've got lots of projects around that, but you started off with the clarinet.
SPEAKER_00Yes. I was a clarinetist on a clarinet scholarship in a college. I played clarinet from uh elementary school and um studied with people and took it seriously, quote unquote. And that was my main instrument, which I always uh believe gave me a leg up when I switched on over to percussion and and drums.
SPEAKER_01And how did that happen?
SPEAKER_00Uh how did the switch happen? Yeah. Okay. Well, uh I was young when I graduated, I was pushed up a grade. When I was younger, um, that's a whole other story because I was a smart kid or whatever. And uh when I got into college, looking back at it now, I was not ready for it. Um, I had zero guidance. Um, I was not mature enough, and but I was a player that was able to ace out the first clarinetist at the colleges I was playing. So it really thrusted me into a position I was not ready for. The reason I share this is because I became very unhappy with the clarinet and the whole culture of it. And in the midst of that first semester of college, there were the drummers, specifically the drummers, um, that were also struggling. And I had that realization of like, you know what, I can walk back there and do that better than them if I had to. Because I had I was already playing drums for this uh youth organization that I was involved with that was ran kind of like a DCI group or military style. We were the state champion youth band in California called the Long Beach Junior Concert Band, ran by director Marvin Marker, an institution here. And I went through all the ranks and I was president of it, and I was the one and only single drum set player out of 150 musicians at the age of 15.
SPEAKER_01We have another thing in common. I got into college on euphonium scholarship, I and also marched in a marching band that won a state championship uh with a Beatles show. Thank you very much. And and it was because the jazz department already had like seven or eight piano majors, and so they didn't have room for me. And so at the time, the deal was hey, if you play in the symphonic band on your euphonium, uh, we'll give you uh scholarship to study jazz here, which was wound up really interesting because then I got to play in John von Olin, he's a famous Stan Kenton uh jazz drummer from Cincy. I got to play in his lab band on euphonium. He just loved the sound uh of it. So yeah, so we have that in common too.
SPEAKER_00Okay, enough about me. No, to follow up with that though, really quickly, just real quickly, you have seen the Long Beach Junior concert band. You've seen it many times on TV. We're the go-to band for things for we're for Disney, we're on the movie King Kong, uh Donnie Marie Show, all of these things that I was actually on, and they were the final band that uh every year for the Hollywood Christmas Lane parade, also in the Rose Parade, every year. Um, so it's a very red, white, and blue patriotic band. Played the governor's uh inauguration, all of that stuff. I feel it's important because of all the the training I had in my life, that one director had the single most impact on me and carried me through to who I am now. That was your next question. Like, who am I? Where am I next?
SPEAKER_01I was gonna say I have to follow up on that as well because I think having exposure, all those students and all those young kids having exposure of bigger things. Oh, yeah, yeah. You know, it kind of takes away any sort of being daunted about getting in in the midst of all those things. And we don't have that kind of thing here in the Midwest.
SPEAKER_00So you know and and that's something I've become aware of as I've gotten older, when I when I started going out into the world, even in the United States, that you know, and I'll say this, and it'll come out sometimes arrogant, but I don't mean it that way. I mean it in identifying it. We're the West Coast, music comes through here. This is Los Angeles, baby, and I know you might be from somewhere or whatever. I it's a cliche, an absolute cliche in my life to watch people come from out of town, come into this town, make a big splash about something, and a year or two later they've left with their tail between their legs, whether that be usually musicians or an actor, actress, that type of thing. And I share that because I just assumed everyone was doing radio and television by the time they were 13, 14. I just assumed everyone had these uh things that were almost annoying. Like, can't we just do something without being pushed into some movie, being pushed onto some recording thing? And it's a it's a common thing out here on the West Coast. I even witnessed it with my uh two stepsons who are both full-time musicians and in in production. It's an industry out here. Now, as I speak, it's all being broken up and and rightfully so, and and everything happens everywhere now. But growing up, this was uh the place. Uh, I can say that wholeheartedly, not to denigrate or say other places weren't, but LA is definitely has been uh uh uh an industry. I mean, once again, everyone comes through here at some point.
SPEAKER_01Let's use you as the as the sample metric. So, what kind of things are you involved in now and things that are upcoming? What's going on in Phil's life?
SPEAKER_00Okay, well, I'm an old dude now at 59, I'll be 60 this year, and things have slowed down uh because live music has changed, as you know. There was to be a time uh where I was managing five bands simultaneously. I had two people working for me full-time. We were booking shows. I could have two of those bands. I wasn't one of them. We we peaked several times over 200 shows in one year. That's completely changed now. Also, what has changed for me too is is me. I'm way more particular about where I perform. We're not the most expensive thing in the world, my product, but we're not cheap. You're gonna pay for our expertise, and if you don't want it, then you don't get it. You go get something else out there. If we're out of someone's budget, I have a whole list of other people that are similar to us that are maybe fit into that budget. It's I'm totally okay with it. I want everyone working. So, to answer that question, where at where am I right now? I'm a numbers person. I'm gigging at about 60 to 80 gigs a year the past two years. Of course, this is coming out of pandemic. I probably could have increased that by safely 40 more gigs. But my ideal life, what I'm aiming for right now is I'd like to perform two to four times a month and have three months off and have that cover all the bills and do everything. And it's actually very doable given where I'm positioning ourselves and everything. But you got to get work and you have to be good and you have to be consistent, and there are no excuses, and you must deliver when I'm charging $3,500 for my trio for two hours for your wedding. Um, that's how it works. That's my that's where I am now. Uh and I and I get mixed feelings about it sometimes, but um I'm very What do you mean? Well, uh you know, uh I think it was last July or one of the busy months, one of the months where we're usually slammed. I worked four to six times, I think the number was like six gigs in that month. And we could have worked 60 times in that month. We could have worked 30 times, 20 times, 10 times. And I have these feelings of like, should I be working more? Should I have taken that one gig that the guys would have got paid more or whatever? I wonder, you know, when when does it become a breaking point where maybe my numbers can be increased because I'm actually working more? You understand what I'm saying?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, well, I mean, it's it's it's kind of a byproduct of Gen Z. Uh, there's there's lots of open question around you know, grinding it out at all costs, and balance is now kind of the new real flex. Uh, I think you were doing something like 140, uh your info. But yeah, how do you sustain that, like physically, mentally?
SPEAKER_00It's actually easier to gig. I have found when you're got a a lot of them. Uh, some things don't leave the van or the car. Like we're all packed up, we're ready to go, we're in striking distance. It turns out I'm a very good director of information. Uh, maybe that's the control freak or whatever. Uh, there's no guessing. If you play to my band, you're gonna know everything. You're gonna have everything ahead. Uh I just need you to show up and perform, do a little bit of homework. That's how we sustain it. We sustain it by being very prepared. And then, you know, and then in the physical aspect of things, I use the lightest and cheapest equipment I can possibly find. I encourage that with everyone else too. I know that it's 99% the player and not the tool. I've had that thrown in my face. And I'm talking like drum sets and sound systems. You know, the majority of my gigs, if there's no backline or anything, I show up with uh what is it, like a little five-channel board, 500 watts with two tan speakers. And I've done literally thousands of gigs that way with hundreds of people dancing.
SPEAKER_01And you're on the steel primarily, right?
SPEAKER_00Yep. And vocals. I'm the lead vocalist, and uh, we do a very interactive performance. I reach out to the audience and you don't just sit there and watch us. It's I'm gonna make you dance.
SPEAKER_01I'm curious, were you always like that? Because I wasn't. I I in my 20s and 30s, I think I wandered into gigs and just hoped that I I didn't screw up the notes. And now in my 50s, it seems like a requirement that I reach out to audience members. Were you always like that?
SPEAKER_00No, absolutely I was not like that at all. In fact, I was very quiet and straight out introverted, to be honest. But I was very fortunate to be picked up and start working with a fellow at the age of 15. I had just turned 15, and his name was Eric Strom. I like saying his name, Eric Strom, because he's the other person very responsible for my career. Uh, he was this wonderful, flamboyant man uh out here on the West Coast. And when I had met him, by the time I had met him, he was 10 years older than me, he had already performed and toured with uh Barbara Streisand, Cher, um, worked in Vegas. He was larger than life, and I'm sharing all this because I backed him up for uh I estimate about 300 shows. He was also a theater director. And everything I do to this day, and I have done over the last uh 40 years, is either mimicking him, modeling after him, or modeling after Marvin Marker, the director I had mentioned earlier of the youth band. I had very, very good models. So when it was time for me to go out in front and do something, I had from behind the drum set had seen him perform in front of a thousand people, two thousand kids. Got to go to school. Yeah. Not even realizing at the moment, even saying the exact things he would say. You know, yesterday I was the Master of Ceremonies for a celebration of life, and we had about 200 people there. And they didn't let me know I was going to be this person until the day before. They were like, Oh, by the way, you're on the mic and you're gonna do this whole thing. And I'm like, because I'm known around here, like the guy who can do that. I was like, Oh, okay, thank you for letting me know. There were things I was doing, and there were phrases I was saying that were literally word for word verbatim, what Eric Strom would say. Wow. 30 years ago. Wow so did that answer the question? That was a very long-winded answer, but no, I I'm not that way. When I'm uh not performing, we have this running joke in the band, like after we've done like three or four gigs in the week, say, like, okay, I'll see you next week, the next gig in a week or two, and I don't want to ever see your faces. And I'm gonna talk about everything about other than music in my life between now and then, and I'm gonna hang out with people who are not musicians. So that's how maybe you avoid burnout. What is this burnout with musicians? And I can think of one time specifically that I I looked at my band and went, I realized that if I was to book 500 gigs over 300 days, they would just say yes. I work with only good people. So it was my responsibility as director to go, although they'll do these gigs, I'm going to make sure that they're balanced. And by the way, with my band, they all know this. When you're on my gigs, I pay for everything. I pay for all the meals before and after, I pay for all the parking, I pay for all the gas to and from, it's all budgeted in there. That's why I get paid more. It's my job to do that. So I think that prevents burnout too, because I'm always looking at it like, how would this gig be better if I was the musician and someone else is the director? I bring the sound system, I expect no one to ever help me, ever. And these days I bring oftentimes the bass system and always the drum set for the drummer. All you have to do is walk in and play. Okay? Here's the flip side of that spectrum. I will fire you immediately with no nothing. We'll still be friends, everything's cool, but I need you to perform. You're not allowed to be late once. Not once. Um, this is showbiz, folks. That's how it works. I don't make the rules. If we want to work, if you want to keep it going and everything, we can't. That's the way it is.
SPEAKER_01I always think it's so easy for them, too. I mean, you're really facilitating a lot of aspects.
SPEAKER_00So there's really aside from you know, a hurricane or some some I just want it to be fun while I'm here on this planet. And everything is always set up so negatively, so against musicians at every single turn, at the clubs, at the orchestras, at the pay, at the everything. And I just um am not about that. I want to operate at the 1%. I've always had that mindset.
SPEAKER_01You do a lot of stuff in sort of the private event world, playing for celebrities, staple centers openings, international wedding show. What does that market look like sort of from the inside? Like, how do you get in and stay in and get paid fairly?
SPEAKER_00Well, it it has shrunk. Uh, it's not as easy to get those gigs. There was a time. Let me back up. I live here in LA. I live here in Soquel. We've got 30 million people over the four counties. Surely I can, even if we had just a million people here, I could tap into one percent of that, the businesses and everything. To answer your question, you know, we have the convention centers here, we have several of them. We have literally thousand hotels, and all of them are doing something every week, every weekend, Wednesday morning, whatever. So you contact them, you let people know your services, and you remind them. And I'll say this very quickly: I pride myself on my marketing skills. Marketing is not a bad word to me, like with musicians, like, oh, I got into this not to be a marketer. Well, okay, then you go ahead and live and die by those words, man. I'll just sit here and watch. Because it doesn't matter if you're doing music or if you're doing real estate or if you're a plumber or you're whatever the heck you're doing, at some point you're going to have to let people know your service. Don't take it so seriously. Just do what you gotta do, and uh the work will hopefully come.
SPEAKER_01I almost believe, and I'm experiencing this both in music and in app development, is that your product almost doesn't matter now. It's a whisper and a forest of screams. And uh but I agree with you that there's a there's a natural aversion to anything quote unquote business from some musicians, as if it's going to encroach upon their product and their creativity, and all they want to do is focus on this. And my advice would be go hire someone to be your rep and to do all that stuff for you if you really want to create that moat around your creativity. Otherwise, you have to somehow mentally craft that moat yourself and say, Okay, I'm in, I'm putting on the marketing hat now or something like that, because it's not optional, especially now.
SPEAKER_00I'm calling it marketing in this moment right here, but the key for this podcast, but what we really call it here is community. And I have a community of people, contractors I I know on a first name basis who like the contractor for the Orange County Convention Center or the Nam show is, you know, it's in my best interest and and hers and everyone else's that we're friends because we're of service to each other. There's nothing deceitful or sinister about that, or I'm any my integrity's being lowered, or whatever. And there's some people that I get to know that like, you know what, I don't want to perform for them for whatever reason. It's too far, or their budgets are too strict, or whatever. I think it's a healthy thing. And I've always I've always had an attitude about that for whatever reason. I'll I'll get in someone gets in my face about something that's going on, and I will immediately go, Well, did you mark it correctly? Did you get a contract for that gig? Did you secure the deposit? Did you have an attorney look over that stuff? Because if we were selling insurance right now, this is stuff we would do the first week, but because we're doing music now as a business and you want to get paid, you want all your dreams to come true and all this stuff, you're not willing to participate in that thing that every single other service industry does from day one. It's absurd.
SPEAKER_01I've always been in that position as a keyboardist. I feel like it would be different if I was like a solo trumpeter, but the keyboardist is always something of the quarterback of the situation, and so I'm always kind of in that situation. And I often wonder with musicians if it just feels like a mountain to them, and so you know, they they take that sort of form of indignation against it because they personally can't see themselves handling it, they just want to do their thing, but yeah, it it there is an aversion.
SPEAKER_00I I get it then to that to that thing, I would say, well, show me how it's done. And um, if you're not willing to do these things that are pretty clear out there that kind of be done, then maybe you don't want to like get paid or you don't want to be able to sustain yourself. And I mean that, like honestly, like you know, you just play your instrument, that's cool. Go play it for free at the church or the carnival or whatever, and it'll be a beautiful thing. My thing is different. No playing equals no eating. It's I don't know how else to make that any clearer. Me no play means me no roof over the house. My head, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_01Well, but I I think it's also there's an opportunity I think that most musicians miss, and that is you're in you you become in more control of your own destiny when you participate more in it. If you're giving away 50% of the experience of the execution to other people in other circumstances, you're gonna get not paid. Uh, you're gonna have negative experiences, but. But just a modicum of more control is offered when you make the simple choice to say, I'm going to participate in the marketing, be aware of my financial situation and work it. So we talked about this private event world, but I need to hit this story before we forget it. Um, I've got this bullet point in my list of things to talk to you about. You got banned from the Orange County Fair for making too many people dance. Can you can you unpack this for me?
SPEAKER_00Oh my gosh. Uh and I like the Orange County Fair. I attend it every year, but this was years ago. And um, I had a very heavyweight band. Uh you may you brought up something that I've haven't revisited in a long time. Yeah, we made a lot of people dance so much that they were dancing um in places that they shouldn't be dancing. And you know, Orange County, California is just like a turn, oh Southern California. Attorneys are everywhere, and we don't move or think or whatever. They rule us because everyone's gonna a lawsuit, lawsuit, lawsuit, lawsuit, lawsuit. Maybe that's true everywhere for that for that matter, but it's heightened in Orange County. And they were like, hey, people were dancing on stage, and and someone jumped on top of that, you know, truck and started dancing. And we can't have that. And I was like, I'm the performer, I'm not, you know, okay, I'll make an announcement on the second set. Like, but you know how this works. The minute you say you can't do something or ask for people to do it, so that went on. Then they moved us to a different stage the next year, and it just got bigger. And um, we were opening up for like uh Setzer Brian Setzer Orchestra and some other groups, like what was another one that already had a big crowd. One time we were talking to the contract, uh, to the contractor, and this is a true story because the person who brings it up is um, well, I won't say his name, but he was the guitar player for Zappa, and then he had his own band that was playing over there, and he was in the room, and he and after that, they told me, like, we don't want to hire you anymore because you make too many people dance. He just would always rid me about it for years after the like, hey Phil, make sure you don't make everyone dance too much and have a good time. You might get fired again. You know, I was like, I was like, it's fine, man. We don't play there. We just moved on to the LA County Fair at that time.
SPEAKER_01Well, it's just an interesting dichotomy for me between the private event world and and then this sort of extreme public performance story. I mean, I believe your band is performed for uh all sorts of people. I'm listing Brad Pitt, Kobe Bryant, Spielberg, Tom Cruise, the Kardashians. So you do all that private event stuff. I wonder, you know, if if that helps with public performance or what the relationship is between those two different situations.
SPEAKER_00Well, I've I'm weird in the sense that uh I never really cared about public performance. And even to this day, I do it out of necessity. I like playing private performances. Private performances are great. We create a moment, we're good at it, I make it as personable as possible. Those names you said, like, yeah, that's for advertising, it's true, and they're advertising purposes, but it's still the same thing. If we're playing little Susie Durkin's pee patch parade in the backyard, we're giving it the same intensity. If you have an attitude about that in my band, you're not in my band. We're honoring everything we do. It doesn't matter. We just happen to live in the land of celebrities. So of course, word gets out and they they want to hire us. So when I play publicly, it's much easier. It's not as intense. To me, even to this day, the most intense thing you can do as a musician is play in a wedding. There's a lot of room for things to go wrong. You're a pianist, I'm sure you've had moments, man, where you had to back up someone or the power goes out, or whatever. The rent, you know, and that and that's someone's moment. I mean, that's they still they spent the money for it. I don't sleep the nights before weddings. Um and I'm there hours, if not the day before. That you know, and I charge a lot. This has to work. This and you get one shot. There's no like, oh, I'll make up for it tomorrow. So I honor private events. I know some musicians really poo-poo on things like that, but I could really care less if I'm playing for 20,000 people unless I'm getting paid. Well, um, it's like it's the numbers doesn't validate this thing anymore. I think it's the intimacy and the exchange between people's memories, if you will, and creating that space and atmosphere for people to really enjoy themselves in the moment. And live music can do that in a way that canned music cannot.
SPEAKER_01That's right. And and I appreciate, I think what I love uh about you is the is the steel pan. Uh it it's like to me, a wonderful sort of analog, right? It's yeah, totally. I play a keyboard with sounds on it, um, and I stick to piano sounds, and and uh for me that's the best I can do because I can't lift a piano, you know. But I really love uh the the analog, and there's a huge sort of push toward that now.
SPEAKER_00Um I hope so.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, well, we can dip into that for a second. Can I get Phil's take on AI and its influence? And has it hit you yet in some way?
SPEAKER_00Okay, to lead in that real quickly, like I said, I I ended up before this life celebration yesterday with my 21-year-old nephew at a bar at a having a drink. And he's graduating college, and he was asking, When are you performing again? When are you performing? Because he's been showing up with the friends, and I'm like, Oh man, it's funny that you want to go hear these uh jokingly, like, oh, the boomer music, you know, as the kids say or whatever. And he says, No, no, my friends and I, man, if it's live music, if it's live, we want to be there. Anything now, like a DJ or anything's like, we're not about it anymore. Live music to it. Oh, wow, okay, very wonderful to hear you say that, my my nephew, because uh that has not been the case, the way things have been going. So, yeah, maybe it's going over that way now. Getting to AI, um, AI and to itself, I know this is gonna rub people the wrong way. I mean, I I get it, but I'm not I'm not thinking like normal people by habit. I'm always just trying to think critically for my own self. The tool itself is undeniably incredibly impressive. It's it's it's out of the bag, and every industry is dealing with it. I mean, we could have a whole podcast on that. I'm even working with somebody as a tester who's created an AI platform. It's not being released yet, but he is all he's a very good person, absolutely not motivated by money. One of the few people on the planet I could say that. I've known this person when he had no money, and he's now a very, very wealthy man with his everything he's done. I'm gonna keep him nameless right now. Uh but he's trying to save music through AI. He is developing a system where everyone gets paid instantly through AI, specifically musicians. And he's like on the third leg of like uh five leg uh you know project uh steps of how he's doing it. I'm I'm uh glossing over it. So the AI music itself, it's just depends on how you're using it. I personally don't use it at all. I'm trying not to use it at all. I'm old school, that's who I am. I don't really find the need to do it, but I have seen some things demonstrated for me that were absolutely phenomenal. For example, I saw a very proficient and full-time orchestrator in in in LA who's been in the studio and very successful. His name, I won't drop his name, but he had the idea and then said, create a full orchestral arrangement for this, and it did it in about 30 seconds. And then he said, I'd like the parts please print it out, or or you know, PDF'd out and sent to fourscore, and it did it all in about two minutes. If I would have access to that analysis w in college, I I mean, I can't even I'd be a different human being right now. So that's my long-winded answer to the AI thing. It's I know that 99.99 uh musicians hate it, percent of musicians hate it right now, and rightfully so. Okay, for a lot of the stuff it's doing, um, the garbage. We've got to protect the artist, of course. Absolutely, 100%. But I just happen to know someone who's actually using the AI onto itself to protect the artist. Uh, so I'm in the middle there with no judgment on it on either way.
SPEAKER_01I think AI is going to be more affected when it's wielded by people who have seen things. So I'm not gonna put an age number on it, but if you've got a ton of experience in music, uh decades of experience in several situations over several genres, uh different group types, you're gonna know how to prompt. I'll just say it that way. You're you're gonna know how to guide it in in the way it needs to be done, versus someone in in maybe their teens or 20s who are just gig hungry trying to get experience and you're trying to push things out, you know.
SPEAKER_00I think people will collectively decide, as anything else. I feel like it's being shoved down our throats right now. Um, time will tell. Uh I don't have to have an opinion on everything at every moment. Uh, so uh, but I will say that I'm not 100% against it, like the majority of my musician friends are in this moment, understandably. And I'm not 100% for it. I'm somewhere in the middle here. Uh, life is bigger than me. And hey, look, if we collectively reach a point where there are no live musicians and AI's taken over everything, and everyone wants to do that, and that everyone's happy with that kind of thing, then there that's where we're going. I guess I can't stop it. But I believe that as long as there's somebody like me, at least one person who's like, hey, it's Sunday, let's go out and hear something live by a talented person. Hey, Clip is playing solo down over there at the Pier Redondo Beach, man. Let's go check that out. Let's go drop a hundred bucks in drinks.
SPEAKER_01I think it's kind of back to what you said about marketing, and and you you talked about it as though it's community. And as long as that community thing is wanted, I think AI has a a short runway in terms of achieving that. Now, if you're using AI to somehow achieve that community, it's different. But I I really feel that you're you're hitting on it. It's still about connection. People want to see people uh to to try. Um, and and I think that's uh that's really important, which is something you do, I think almost every day on TikTok. I see um your steel parade at philj.corillo. You do the free expression session. How how long have you been doing that? And and why do you do that?
SPEAKER_00Okay, so this this comes out from Mike Monday splurges. His name is Mike Monday. I want to give credit where credit is due. And he calls these splurges, and it's just basically a technique where you create something not pre-planned. I've taught this at the college level now, and it's a way of getting everyone off their butts and creating instantly. I've been doing it for about five or six years. I recently changed the name to Free Expression Session just because the common public seems to understand that if I say the word splurge. So I sit, I go into the studio, and I just do something for 30 seconds, a minute. I'll do a shaker, I'll play a drum, I'll hit my steel drum in some weird way, not concerned with any form, any key, any idea, whatever. And then I just start layering around it and I put it together, and whatever comes out comes out. And a lot of stuff is really crappy, and there's a lot of stuff also, too. Much to my surprise, if you do this, it's like, wow, that's really good. I've sold work, I've published stuff because some of these ideas are like, Oh, we want to use this for this commercial and wherever. And like, yeah, okay. And it started out literally something I was doing while the dog was at the vet or something, and I had like a half hour to kill. It, you know, there's more to it than that. Let me let me ask you this right now. If there was something you were working with, either musically, technically, anything related to music, there was something if we were that you like right now in your mind, what what is it that Cliff needs to work on or learn or study or review? What would you say right now?
SPEAKER_01Oh, that's easy. Uh my own work. Like I'm 52 and I haven't put out anything. Okay, so that's so yeah.
SPEAKER_00We would do a free expression session where I would just say, Okay, so you've got um three minutes right now, that's all you got. And just go ahead and play something that's your original thing right now and record it really quickly. Just real quick. Don't worry about mistakes. Quality is your enemy. We just need this thing done. Just go ahead and play the idea. Don't worry, go ahead and start playing it, even if you don't know how it's gonna end up, do 30 seconds of it, and then you would do it, and then we would build from there. Wow, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Well, I I think both your free expression and your and your approach here, you know, I think that cringe is valuable now. Cringe cringe means to try. And so if there's little mistakes and little cracks in the arm or little chinks, it's not perfect. But I need to go back because you started with clarinet, where generally the objective is to get, I'm assuming classical. So generally the objective is to get all the notes right. And yet here you're saying it's okay to mess up. And I think rote music education sometimes it did it with me. Like I studied classical for the longest time, and I my hands couldn't do it anymore. Um, my attention span couldn't, and I switched to jazz, which was far more freeing. What was your early, like I don't want to talk about parents and things like that, but what was your early disposition with music? Has it always been that way? And then and now you're you know you've kind of grown through experience, right? Um, but were you a get the notes right kind of guy initially?
SPEAKER_00Let's be very clear with this. I am studied classically, both in voice and in percussion. I am surrounded by classic, full-time successful classical musicians. My stepson, his wife, the other stepson. Uh, I teach, I have taught theory, classical music theory at the college level, uh AP level. Um, so I know classical, rote by rote, Western civilized music, whatever you want to call it. I am of that ilk. It is one of my strengths, and I love it and I enjoy it to this day. Okay. But I also grew up at West Side Long Beach. Everything was funk, everything was urban, that whole thing. And I'm proud of that. You know, I don't want to get into that whole background because it's something whatever, but let's just know I know Long Beach music. Yeah, I don't want to be narrow-minded about anything. Uh, so that was really kind of early on, even going through stuff. And I walked away from a major symphony that I was actually starting to play with just because I didn't like the energy of the people there at the time. And no regrets, they told me I would I would. But I think it's about balance, getting into that you're saying the free expression thing. Um creation comes from planning something. I have an idea, I'm going to do it. I have the song, I'm going to do it. This is something express, and that is 100% valid. Of course, that's how things are created. But it is not the only way creation can happen. There is spontaneous creation. Frank Zappa speaks into it, you know. And if you watch videos, uh, continue like we can create on stage, we'll be mystical, magical. I'm paraphrasing, but we can't comprehend it in this moment. But lo and behold, watch me tonight, and you will see it happen within some parameters. So that's always interesting to me as well. I'm always inspired to see the the fourth grade beginning band. You know what I mean? Like, I want to see it. Any any new kids doing anything, someone, some kid wrote a song and they're giving it their 100%. I'm not some trained classical snob teacher, whatever. I don't care. I don't care if they miss the notes. It's all love, it's all pure heart. And that's what connects with people. And people can be transformed through music in a way that nothing else hits that way. And if we limit ourselves to only playing the right notes, and everything has to be perfect, you know, that whole thing. And even getting back to this long-winded answer. But you know, I don't like the word cringe, I don't like uh all these little kind of new phrases that this new generation. We used to call that trying. We used to call that falling on our faces. And I will say that to your face. And I, you know what? Guess what? I can actually back it up. You want to go toe-to-toe, let's do this. Let's start with who you've worked with. Let's see what let's see you play right now.
SPEAKER_01Well, you do something very important in that statement and with free the free expression sessions and and just the way you are, and and that is I think it's a bit of a shepherd of the sheep who are musicians still, God bless them. And they want to be at that level, but they have this thing, this feeling that they're not in a safe place to do that. So you lead by example with your free. That's what I'm trying to get to. Is your free expression session? Even for me, like personally, like I look at that and I go, Hey, he's doing it. Well, why am I not doing it? I'm on my patio, nobody's here. I've got my keyboard with me. Why am I not doing this?
SPEAKER_00You know, everyone's gonna react to things differently. I have family members that are like, Oh my gosh, Phil, I hate those things you create, they're terrible. You know what I mean? They love me, and I and they know that they can say that to me. They're like, I like it when you go into the studio because that other thing, oh, I just want to block you. I'm like, and I love that when someone doesn't like my stuff, which is very rare. I have to, I'm blessed, but when they don't, I'm always like, Oh my gosh, I want to be your best friend. I want to know.
SPEAKER_01You mentioned the school thing. I just did my kids' recital on Wednesday, and it's I saw that video.
SPEAKER_00My gosh, I was you gotta be proud. Well done, father. I mean, I know he did the work. Yeah, my gosh.
SPEAKER_01It's double proud. He's so good. And you know, I bought him a new keyboard last June on a almost on a whim, and and I I did it reluctantly because I'm a keyboard player, and I didn't want to make him feel like he had to do what I do, right? But the keyboard is just such an easy way to absorb all that theory, muscle memory, all those things, and he is just just well, he's doing it, man.
SPEAKER_00Was he playing like it was a little show pan or something? I can't recall.
SPEAKER_01And he was hiding and supplementing. Yes, and at the end of the video, he kind of he he he hits a spot that he this is what he did that blew me away. He hit a spot that he likes. There was an accidental or some sort of key change. I don't I can't remember specifically, but he kind of turned his face toward the audience and said, like this expression on his face was, isn't this some cool shit? Yeah. And I have never I have seen kids' piano recitals, and I've never seen a kid do something like that. It's like, holy cow, we have a problem. I feel fortunate because, like you, I feel like I can, like I said in the video that I made, I can see it. I'm not just hearing it and I'm not just going for notes. I'm looking, I'm looking at all the kids. And first of all, I'm thankful that there are 20 kids that are trying to learn how to play music. One, I mean, amen. And number two, all of them kind of messed up in a little bit, a little bit. And for me, that's the entertainment. It is how do they push through? It's that mental muscle of the show must go on, and they all did it, and it was really miraculous.
SPEAKER_00Well, you're hitting upon a part, it and you know, let me add this right now. So, my partner of 23 plus years or whatever, she's a full-time artisan and artist. Um, has the whole world clamoring for her stuff. I'm very, very fortunate to be with this woman. And while we may disagree on a lot of things, we always meet on this uh conversation of creating art or craft, you know. And we say that around here, her sons know it. And anyone who enters these doors or works with us is like, you know, the the end result is just kind of a byproduct. We just want to focus on the process, it's everything that kind of happens leading up to there. If you do that performance and you suck, then you know what? You'll get it the next time. But did you do the the work in between the Did you struggle? Did you try again? Did you get so mad that you swore you're not gonna create that thing or play that instrument again? Guess what? That's part of it. We're smiling. You know what I mean? Like that's that's it. And some and sometimes you get lucky and and sometimes you don't, but you're doing it and you're fine, you're in touch with yourself in a way that no other thing can bring out. I was speaking at the services yesterday to a long distance runner, and she was telling me how when I'm at that 20th mile, I'm in a state where nothing else can make me feel that way. And I totally understood. I'm not a runner, but like, yes, you're doing it. Now, maybe you didn't have the best time, you didn't do it. It's about doing it. And if you do it enough and you enjoy it and allow yourself to not enjoy it, you're gonna have a beautiful life. You're gonna do this thing, okay? If you're not, if you're cringe, if you're afraid you're gonna be bragging, if everything I put out there has to be perfect, I'm going to guess you're never gonna put anything out.
SPEAKER_01Wow, wow, good stuff. Um, we're coming up on the hour. Um an hour. I want to thank you. So it's a great, great way to cut that right there. It's a really good message. Um, I think we've talked about a lot of really good things. My goal here, it's funny. I use uh AI every morning. It's a product called Rosebud, it's an executive function app sort of journal thing, and um I pay for it, and it actually talks to you when you pay for it. And it's like I'm I'm I'm not alone. And it actually quoted the the Gandhi, I think it was Gandhi who said something like, you know, something about living life in service to others. And uh you know, that's really what I'm trying to do with everything I'm doing now. I do need to make money, uh with the University School of Music, but scared. But every time I lean into that, things go really wrong. And anytime I lean into what can I do today to help Phil? And how can Phil and I help musicians, uh, you know, what can we talk about today that helps get even beyond the music world to other people? Things start to open up a lot more.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think I think everyone's well, yeah, uh yeah, we can end it on that. I like what you said service. This applies to music, but applies to everything for me. But this is my belief system that it doesn't matter if you're selling cars or playing music, if you're coming from service, I feel like you're kind of in an abundant state that things will somehow mystically, magically work out. If it's all about you and everything, and I'm not to say not to say that that that doesn't have some big part in the universe, but in my experience, it's just very difficult to um be abundant if I'm not coming from service.
SPEAKER_01Thank you so much. I came upon you TikTok, and you were surfing and uh and and all this other stuff, and then steel pan. I'm like, this guy is really living like a very content, dynamic life. I had no idea what I was getting into, zero clue from that. You are literally an ocean of information and experience. So thank you so much. I'll go. Uh enjoy your your California dreams, and uh we'll talk again. Okay, sounds good. That's Phil Carrillo. You can find him as Steel Parade Music Creation over on TikTok, and the surfing plus steel drum content is exactly as good as it sounds. The thing that stuck with me from this one, quality is your enemy. Phil's whole message is that the work happens in the trying, the falling on your face is showing up, coming from a place of service instead of scarcity. That's the trend. Whether you're booking weddings or building something from scratch, if this at home, do me a favor. Follow the show wherever you're listening, and send it to one musician who needs to hear it. You can even monetarily support the show. There are links in the description for that to join the support crew. And hey, if you've ever handed someone your set fee and quietly wondered what your actual hourly rate was, or you've showed up at a venue not knowing the things you needed to know before you walked in the door. That's the whole reason I built MoneyGigs. Free download, and there's a code in the description that gets you into the venue database. Thanks for listening. We'll talk soon.