In this episode, Jared shares his first-ever bar mitzvah performance as an electric violinist. He recounts the full production setup, the excitement of collaborating with DJs and MCs, and the challenges of making it all come together. Jared also highlights the lucrative potential of the bar and bat mitzvah market, offering tips on how musicians can tap into this niche. Listen in to learn how to make your performances unforgettable and elevate your music career.

"I had such a fun time playing it. In case you're curious about the Bar Mitzvah market, it is huge... At the end of the event, I got a lot of really nice compliments. The MC and the dancers and the DJ were like, dude, you are so talented. And it was awesome feedback."

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What's up, renegade musicians? Welcome back to another episode of The Gigging Musician Podcast where we look at what the majority of musicians are doing and how it brings failure to their lives and we do the opposite.

That is why we are renegade musicians who have more success, more happiness, more gigs, higher quality gigs, and we have a lot more fun doing it. Alright, so I know I promised you guys a dramatic episode after the last one.

You know, I recorded the last one Saturday morning on the way back from a gig that I played at the Flagstaff house in Boulder.

And I told you that something dramatic happened and I would record an episode on the way to my next gig that day, which was a bar mitzvah down at the two penguins tap and Grill in Centennial, Colorado. And unfortunately, I can't give you that episode yet.

There's still some ongoing things I will let you know. Things are looking pretty good for my end, but it's still unresolved and therefore I'm not ready to reveal the deets. But you'll get it one day, I promise.

Anyway, I did want to chat with you guys about that evening gig I had, which was a bar mitzvah. And it was my first ever bar mitzvah performance as an electric violinist.

And I say that because many, many years ago, maybe like seven or so at this 8 years ago, I actually was working for a dj company where I had Djed maybe five, four or five weddings. And one of the gigs that they'd asked me to do was to dj for someone's bar mitzvah. And I said yes.

And I did not do a great job because I am an introvert. And being a dj for a bar mitzvah, especially when you're wrangling kids, especially, requires you to put on that DJ voice and that smile all the time and get kids on the floor playing fun little games like Coke and Pepsi. Guys ever hear of that game? I totally forgot about that game.

But apparently that's a game that DJ's playing at bar mitzvahs and other kids celebrations, where you get two groups of people lined up on the dance floor and then you call out like, nook and Pepsi.

And it's kind of like playing Red Rover, which if you ever played Red Rover, you know, is when you call out Red Rover, Red Rover sends Sydney on over and then Sidney has to run over and then a group tries to block Sydney, but Cocoa Pepsi is a little bit different. Anyway, I'm getting way off track here.

So I had not done a bar mitzvah since eight years ago with that one where I felt like I did a bad job. This one was different. I was not djing, thankfully, but this was a full on production.

I was hired by a DJ company that they had hired a DJ, a separate mc who ran the event, which that was a really good choice because there was a lot going on, a lot of moving pieces to that. They hired me, the electric violinist. They hired a production company to provide sound system, dance floor.

There was, like, four dance floor boxes, elevated stage kind of thing, lighting and all that. Jazz, wireless mics. It was a big production.

And then they hired two dancers as well, who kind of kept the action going. Now, outside of that, they also had an airbrush station where you could make t shirts and, you know, brush your name or brush the event on it. And then I think there was also a candy bar where you can make little to go goodie bags of your favorite candy.

So they went all out. It was awesome. And I had such a fun time playing it.

And in case you're curious about the bar mitzvah market, it is huge. I have another DJ friend, different dj than the one that hired me, who is launching his own. Like, he's done a lot of DJ's as a.

Or a lot of bar mitzvahs as a DJ himself, and he wants to even expand his services. So he's launching, like, a full on bar mitzvah planning service. I say Bart mitzvah, but obviously, I mean, bar and bat mitzvah, boy and girl.

And so it's a. It's a big market, and it can be pretty lucrative, pretty high end, if you're willing and able to entertain a bunch of 13 year olds, which I am. I have no shame about that.

I think my music is a good fit for every. Everyone. And so, yeah, this.

I'll tell you kind of how. How it went for from my end. You know, we get there pretty early and load in.

I connect with the production people, and we had to figure out a couple things because the mixer they brought was, like, pretty old. It was. It looked like it was a relic from the eighties.

It literally just had volume for each channel. It didn't really have anything else. And so I'm my electric violin.

I like a very wet reverby sound. And so, luckily, I bring with me, like, a gator case full of a bunch of sound equipment, including a mixer, the Yamaha ten x u. If anyone has that board, you know, it's a good board, and it has built in reverb.

And so I said, let's plug my mixer into yours. And they tried to plug. I have the licado guitar, wireless guitar system.

And so we tried plugging in the receiver into their Di box, into my board, but for some reason, it wasn't getting any signal. And I'm not a sound engineer, but it was like, let's try it without the Di box. And they took the di box out of the.

Out of the chain, and all of a sudden, it worked. So, I don't know. Never really used a di box.

Not really sure what they're for. If anyone wants to educate me, let me know. So, yeah, I figured that sound set up got my wireless in ears set up, and I was connected my in ear monitors.

You know, I need those because I'm completely wireless, and I can't really hear well. I could hear from the mains, but also the mains are very loud, so I want to protect my ears and use my in ears. So I plug my in ears into the monitor that the DJ was using for his setup.

And then for the first part of it, like, you know, they just play kind of open music while everyone's getting settled, and it's a good time. They jam along a little bit, and it's good. And then they do, like, a grand entrance of the mitzvah kids, and there were three.

It was triplets, one family, three kids, and they were all got their bar bap mitzvah. And so they did a grand entrance, which was. I totally forgot that they did this where they had the other kids form, like, a tunnel, you know, put your hands up and let the three mitzvah kids run through it as they introduce each one.

And, yeah, that was fun. Exciting. And then they went into, like, an hour of dinner, and that was when the DJ just played, like, open format kind of background music, although it was more upbeat.

It wasn't like Sinatra jazz. It was more pop top forties type stuff. And that was my time to shine.

So I get up on those dance floor boxes and do my thing, play with the DJ. And while we're doing this, I hear the DJ scratching. You know, DJ's, like, to scratch.

Some of them do. And so I kind of, kind of riff off of the rhythm that the DJ's scratching, and then we make eye contact, and then that's when we realize that we've got some musical chemistry, which is fun. And so we kind of do a bunch of scratch and violin duets while I'm on the stage, and we have a good time, and it was awesome.

We had such a good time. Then afterwards, after that hour, they bring the kids back onto the dance floor and do some of those games like Coke and Pepsi. I forget some of the other games, but that was good.

And then they transitioned to open format dancing, which is also another great time for me to shine. Yeah, I just jam along with the top forties, play a lot of rhythm guitar style stuff. I've talked a lot about that.

On the last episode, I think I kind of mentioned how I approached that. It is great. And then for bar bat mitzvahs, they always do, or not always, but most of the time they do what's called a hora hora.

And that's when they play Havanagila. And then they put the celebrant on a chair. This happens at bar bat mitzvahs and at weddings, so bar mitzvah, they put the kids on the chair.

Weddings, they put the married couple on the chair, and they have like, a bunch of adults just lifting that chair. And everyone dances around in a circle around the chair as it's being lifted up and pushed up and down, which is kind of fun. So during Havanagila, I was playing some, like, klezmer style fiddle along with Havanagila, which is super fun.

And then, yeah, they kept going with some games and dancing and, yeah. So I did a mix of, like, going on the stage and then also being on the dance floor with the kids and their parents and kind of playing nearby them and dancing as well. It was fun.

And so at the end of the event, I got a lot of really nice compliments, like, the MC and the dancers and the DJ were like, dude, you are so talented. And it was awesome feedback. Like, we're getting a lot of that lately, and it just feels really good.

Like, you guys probably know how that feels. And then got tipped. Got tipped $100 bill, which was nice.

And then I went and thanked the family. The family said, you are incredibly talented. You made the night, which was awesome.

And then the next day, also the owner of the DJ company was there, and she was also very appreciative and grateful. So the next day, I get an Instagram message from the MC saying like, it was a pleasure working with you. And I said, thank you so much.

It was pleasure working with you, too. And then just being the music marketer that I am, I replied to their Instagram, DM, said, hey, would you mind leaving me a quick review on Google? Put my Google review link, Google Business Review, into Instagram. And then within five minutes, I got an email saying, you've got a new review, five stars.

And in addition to that, they actually sent me like three video clips of me playing, which is awesome. And they attached two of them to the Google review, which that's so incredibly effective for garnering trust for potential high end clients. So, yeah, it was a really good stuff.

And my first foray into bar mitzvahs as an electric violinist, I'd say was a success. I definitely would like to do more of them. And I mentioned the other friend who does djing, who's looking to get into the bar mitzvah event planning scene quite a bit more.

He's putting together a new website that is just for bar and bat mitzvahs. And of course, he's planning on getting that to rank very highly in search engines. And one of the things he's doing is he's putting together a list of preferred vendors, which, as you all know, I preached this whole preferred vendor list concept.

And so I had reached out to him like maybe a week ago, saying, hey, I'd love to be on your preferred vendor list. And he said to me, yeah, man, if you could just get me a video or photos of you playing with kids in the background, that'd be awesome. I was like, hey, I'm playing a Bar Mitzvah next weekend.

Let me make that happen for you. And I asked the DJ, hey, could you take a couple photos of me from your perspective? The DJ booth looking out at me? I'll face. I faced the DJ and their kids behind me, and he took some, and we got the money shot.

So I sent that to the DJ, and now the next step is for him to add me to his website. So that's kind of it. I'd say that's like an intro to the bar by Mitzvah world.

I probably should have led with, like, what is a bar or bat mitzvah? Because, you know, not many people know what that is unless you're from the Jewish culture or you have been around it since you were a kid. So bar, bat mitzvah is a. Well, maybe you all know this.

I don't know. It's a rite of passage in the Jewish community when you turn 13, where that's when you officially become an adult member of the Jewish community. It involves a religious service at the temple where you get to read from the Torah, which is the Bible, in front of the whole congregation.

And yeah, it's very much a big deal. And then it comes with a lot of partying and presents and that kind of thing. So I played the party and it was a good time.

So highly recommend checking that out considering that as a possibility if you're willing and able to entertain 13 year old kids because it does take a very different skillset and that MC did an incredible job of managing the kids and keeping them entertained.

That is absolutely the skill that I would be awful at because you know, I was an elementary school music teacher for a couple years and it just wasn't the right fit for me. A little bit too introverted for that.

So much respect. Mad props to those who can but if you could wrangle your way into a position where you don't need to do any like talking, like playing electric violin with a DJ then that might 100% be a good fit for you. Alrighty, well that's all I got for you guys today.

Thanks for tuning in to another episode of The Gigging Musician Podcast. Remember, "You are your music will not market itself!". Bye everybody.