It’s a stress-buster, a passion, a creative outlet, and sometimes it’s surprisingly similar to practising law, according to members of the Soul Practitioners – a group made up mostly of lawyers, who turn into crooners and musicians whenever they manage to synch up their busy schedules.
“This is how I stay moderately sane,” says 55-year-old labour and employment lawyer Sean McGee. He is the de facto leader of the group, its keyboard artist and also its technician. “I love the practice of law, but I also love the creative side of making music.”
Seven years ago, McGee and a colleague at Ottawa law firm Nelligan O'Brien Payne LLP put a call out to form a band for a charity event. McGee was surprised by the number of closet musicians who were keen to drop their legal briefs and grab their musical instruments.
Now 31, Erin Callery was articling when the call went out for singers and musicians interested in forming a house band.
“It’s fun to do something that is less serious and certainly gives you a chance to socialize with your peers,” she says. “From the broader legal community perspective, it’s kind of neat to see what other hidden talents your colleagues have.”
She says singing with the Soul Practitioners has also helped hone her legal skills.
“Having the courage to get up on stage in the context of the band or the context of the court room, getting up on your feet in front of a judge and jury requires some level of confidence. It helps you build confidence in both spheres.”
“Certainly in litigation there’s the idea of thinking multi-dimensionally and being able to react to things as they happen,” McGee says. “There are a lot of things that would be compatible with both a litigation job and getting up and performing musically. There’s also a creative side to law that people don’t often identify.”
“In a band, teamwork is everything,” says drummer Steve Waller, 61, a labour lawyer. “The band only sounds really good if everybody is clicking. And you have to be sensitive to what everybody else is doing. If someone is singing a more gentle passage, then you have to cut back on your volume. In law, for many cases—particularly bigger cases—you’re also working with a team of people. That’s just one similarity.”
Labour law also takes him into a lot of courts, hearings and tribunals which he notes all require a certain level of performance skills.
And nothing compares with playing music to alleviate the stress of his day job.
“For me, there’s nothing like a good public performance or even a good practice to keep your head balanced or to give you perspective.”
Waller plays in three bands including The Soul Practitioners. In his younger days he considered becoming a professional rock musician, at one point playing in Air, a band that got top billing over those now rock legends, Rush.
“I almost put off undergraduate university to go full-time with a band, and I came very close to doing it,” he recalls, “but most bands don’t make very much money, most bands break up after a while and it was always my plan to get a university education. Then when I looked at the schedule of the band I would have ended up with, I thought, ‘I don’t really want to do that’.”
The other members of the Soul Practitioners are: Ray Murray on sax and vocals and twice nominated for a Juno award; bass/guitar player Julian Walker who used to work at Nelligan’s and is now at the Library of Parliament; associate lawyer Leanne Storms on vocals; and respirologist Steve Pritchett, the only non-lawyer of the group. They play a blend of soul, rhythm and blues, urban rock and pop music. Their biggest challenge remains trying to find time in everyone’s schedules to practise and perform.
Steve Waller says it’s worth the effort of keeping a foot in both worlds, personally and professionally.
On one occasion he was involved in a dispute between two unions where the opposing union official attempted to discount Waller’s representation, by arguing the lawyer had no idea what it means to be a union member.
“He was suggesting my argument should be discounted for that reason,” Waller remembers. “As he said that, I took my musicians union membership card out of my wallet and slid it across the table to him. Then there was a long pause...that was sort of fun.”
Erin Callery has moved to a competing Ottawa law firm, Gowlings, but she still performs with the Soul Practitioners. She says the prospect of meeting up with her band mates in a courtroom doesn’t faze her.
“Any activity that helps to build civility in the profession is good,” she says. She also figures there are advantages to meeting in both forums.
“It gives you an opportunity to do something fun with your colleagues when a lot of our work tends to be rather serious and we have to put on stern faces and act like we’re very tough. It gives us a softer side,” she says. “It’s also a great fun activity that gives you a chance to highlight other skills and talents outside of just arguing and advocating for your clients.”
Sean McGee likes band work for the opportunities it affords to do community outreach.
“It’s one of those things where you can take something you love to do and use it to help people,” he says. “It’s great.”
And there’s no sign of slowing down, legally or musically, at least as far as Steve Waller is concerned.
“My philosophy is all I have to do is look at the Rolling Stones. They’re about 10 years older than me, so if they’re still going I’ve got 10 more years to go.”
Becky Rynor is a freelance journalist based in Ottawa.