Auditioning for Tina Turner
I've been seeing lots of articles lately about how to ace a job interview. Perhaps because the economy is improving and hiring is up? Or because so many Millennials don't stick with the same gig? Either way, if you're dusting off your resume and re-entering the hiring process, I thought I'd dust off this article I wrote years ago and re-post it for you.
In the rock world the job interview takes the form of an audition. You come in and play, because if you can't cut it musically there's nothing to talk about. But the principle's the same: you want to make a killer first impression.
This was a lesson learned the hard way for me thirty-five years ago when I was making a living in music. I had heard that the Ike & Tina Turner Revue—one of the hottest R&B groups on planet Earth at the time—were looking for a drummer. I was playing piano in honky-tonk bars at the time but drumming was what I did best, and somehow I managed to get an audition.
I remembered seeing Ike & Tina open for the Rolling Stones at the LA Forum when Tina upstaged them with a wildly feverish performance that forever put her on the map as a powerhouse singer. The Ike & Tina Revue were scary-good.