This Freelancer's Perspective: Meet Frank Portolese.

Frank Portolese is a jobbing musician for over 40 years. He shares some experiences and reflections from his lengthy career. Click to read more

Frank Portolese

9/25/20262 min read


So here's what 40 years of tunes, requests, Hora sets, rocking out and creating beauty come down to: We really need each other. We're all we've got. We are a closed society with a ubiquitous skill set and a unique view of the culture. We really are the fly on the wall. And years from now, if we're still around, our lives and our stories will still matter, to our contemporaries, our predecessors, and our descendants.

OK, enough about me. What's your story?

Consider the perspective of a typical freelance musician who lived 40 years of the life in Chicago. Forty years of ballrooms and dives. Parking lots and party planners. Leaders, sidemen, wives and other strangers. Stolen and damaged instruments, vehicles, and souls. Consider the scene before and after cell phones, in-ears, Y2K, 9/11, DJs, CDs, date books, streaming, fax machines, Amazon, AI. Forty years of jobbing. And it was evolving and changing long before me, as it will continue to do long after you. We have much to share between us.

And yet, there are many things that do not change. Waiting for the call, for one. The ups and downs of the business will challenge the most positive self image. We're always unemployed again at 1 am. On the other hand, there's the moment you first walk into the venue and catch the eyes of your comrades in arms. Being around folks that know you in a way that family and closest friends just do not. Catching up during breaks. Who quit which band, who's getting married or divorced, how are the kids, how the new mouthpiece is working out.

"...if we're still around, our lives and our stories will still matter..."

Slowly, we learn the way into, out of, around and through it all. Another year comes along and it's time to learn something new. It might be payroll, or sound systems, or maybe chemo. Perhaps it's time for a new teacher, or a financial planner, or a lawyer. How to convert dollars into euros before leaving for some place you are going to see on someone else's dime. Whatever it is, it's not boring.

Long story short, we don't see things in the same way as civilians.

Ultimately, we all feel an important need, the need to know ourselves. Who am I? Why do I do this? I need to know, if my music, my career, my life is ever going to have meaning. Well, your best chance of finding out is going to involve deepening connections with those who know you better than anyone. That would be those people on the gig with you. That would be the folks you stand around with while the valet is getting your cars at 1:30 am.