Question of the Day:

Hi Everyone! I hope everyone who celebrates had a great Christmas yesterday, and everyone who doesn't had a great Friday!

Today I just want to take the time to urge everyone to go back and answer some questions from days past. There are a whole bunch that nobody's talked about yet, and it would be great to get the conversation going. Jump in! Be the first to talk about something! If you do, I'll give you a cookie.

As for a new question for today - what is your band's relationship with the audience like? Do you have fans beyond you family and friends? How do you interact with the people who come to your shows?

Question of the Day:

How do you write music? Do you do it collaboratively, as an entire band? Do just one or two people write? Do you think of writing as a group process or an individual one?

Question of the Day:

Hey everyone! I'd love to hear your feedback on the questions - if what I'm not asking a question you feel needs answering, please bring it up in the comments! Even if it's completely off-topic, I would love to hear your thoughts!

Today's question, how do you present yourself as a band? Or as a member of the music scene? What are the things you want people to know about you?

Question of the Day:

Since I missed posting a question yesterday, you get two today!

How did your band form? Share how you decided to form a band, how you found each of your members, and what other things you had to do to get your band started.

Question of the Day:

Today's question is about audiences. When you play shows, who is in the audience? Are there more men or women? Are most of the people in the audience in bands or people who want to be in bands?

Question of the Day:

I set up a twitter yesterday! Follow me at twitter.com/chirocksurvey. I plan to keep it low-volume. I'll be tweeting a link to the question of the day, once a day, but won't clog up your feeds beyond that. I'm more than happy to help any of you trend a topic there to plug a show or album or other event.

As for today's questions: What are your goals? Tell me about short-term, long-term, personal goals or goals about the kind of impact you want to have. What do you want to accomplish with your band? Or in music in general?

Question of the Day:

This isn't really a question. I'm just asking for thoughts, reactions, positives or negatives.

Question of the Day:

I'm so glad that we've got two more voices joining it! Quick note: Anonymous posting will always be available, but it would be great if everyone could sign their posts somehow. Either select the Name/URL posting option and enter whatever name you would like to use here, or simply sign your name somewhere in the comment. I just want to make sure we don't get a lot of anonymous voices that are difficult to distinguish from one another. Thanks!

So today's question sort of piggybacks off of yesterday's. I want to know about personal experiences you had getting into the music scene. Were older, more established bands helpful towards you? Did you get encouragement and/or guidance from school, parents, peers, or other sources when you were learning to play? Did you do it all on your own?

Question of the Day:

Adrian said the following in Tuesday's post

I think it's a matter of support, we need to support arts/music education in schools and promote music as a non-gender specific outlet for expression

So today's question is about support. Do you make an effort to support music education, to encourage young people or people who are just starting out? What are some of the ways you offer support within the music community and/or reach out beyond the music community to support and encourage musical outlets?

Question of the Day:

Hey guys! So glad that Adrian has joined the discussion - just jump in anywhere if you're just joining in!

Anyway, Adrian brought up the social aspect of going to shows and being in the music scene. How would you describe the social and/or community aspect of being in a band or being part of the music scene? Do you see the scene as a community that you're a part of?

Question of the Day:

Ok, guys! New question today. I'm going to keep posting questions every day, but if you have something to say about an older question please speak up!

What is your main motivation for playing music? What is your favorite thing about being in a band?

Question of the Day:

Couple of notes before the question:
The conversation is just getting started, so feel free to jump in anywhere and talk about anything. This is meant to be open to anyone, so anyone you know that might want to share an opinion about the Chicago music scene is invited to jump in. If you have an opinion about even one of the questions, I want to hear your voice!

As for today's question:

When did you first start playing instruments, and how long after you started playing did you join your first band?

Question of the Day:

We're still trying to build up the conversation, so please jump in, but Joliet Dave brought up an interesting point in yesterday's post, suggesting that there are men who prefer to keep performing a "boy's club", especially around playing instruments.

Have you had experiences that suggest a "boys club" in the music scene? Do bands looking for a new member often have a gender in mind for the position? Do you find that there is a difference in attendance for all male versus all female bands or bands with men and women?

For women - have you ever felt as if you've been passed over or not included because of a boy's club mentality among other performers? When you're in a band, do you prefer to be the only woman or do you prefer performing with other women?

For men - Do you find yourselves engaging in a boy's club, preferring to be in bands with no women members? Are there reasons you might prefer a male band member to a female band member?

Today's Question!

In looking at the surveys, I noticed that a number of people felt that men were more likely than women to play a number of specific instruments (especially guitar and drums), yet many people felt that men and women were equally likely to appear on stage.

In your experience, do men and women appear on stage as performers an equal amount?

-If so, are there specific roles that tend to be more often men or women? And what are those roles?

-If not, what are some reasons that either men or women would appear on stage more often?

Intro Post

Welcome to the conversation! I'm a university student in Chicago doing a research project on the Chicago rock scene. I am trying to understand how men and women participate in the scene. I'm asking you to help me by telling me about your experiences in the Chicago music scene. What do you do? What have you seen?

Before you begin, please take a moment to take the intro survey! It's 10 short questions, it takes less than 2 minutes to complete.

Once you've done the intro survey, start answering questions! There's a new question every day, but I encourage you to jump in anywhere. Respond to the questions you think are interesting, or that you have something to say about.

When you answer a question, PLEASE IDENTIFY YOURSELF! You don't need to use your real name, but please don't leave me hanging with a bunch of people signing their opinions anonymous. Whatever you decide to put as your name in the intro survey, please use it here to sign your comments.

I am hoping to develop a well-rounded understanding of participation in the Chicago Rock Music scene through the discussions here, as well as providing local musicians and other members of the music scene with a space to network and talk about their experiences in the scene with one another. I encourage you all to respond to one another as well as responding to the questions I post each day.

Thank you for your participation! If you have any questions, you can reach me at chicagorocksurvey@gmail.com

More about me:
I'm a local student finishing out my last year of undergrad. This research will make up my senior thesis paper. I am a student of cultural anthropology and other social sciences, and I am very interested in learning about the ways people form cultures and groups within cultures.