[Dixielandjazz] Pigeon holes

[David W. Littlefield]

At 09:07 AM 9/11/2002 -0500, Patrick Cooke wrote:
>I can't understand a group playing an entire gig trying to sound just
>like someone else.

Like other matters of personal musical taste, it's a waste to try to
"understand it". Just accept that some musicians enjoy a particular style
well enough to want to participate in it by emulating it. 

>My fondest wish is that my playing were unclassifiable. Then I would be an
>innovator!
>    But an innovator is usually a pariah, until one or more respected voices
>say "I like it".

The urge to innovate is strictly a personal matter. In the music market
where one is trying to make a living, bandleaders innovators to be a pain
in the buttox, because those with the urge to innovate usually display
obnoxious egotism, and worse, usually can't/won't conform to the band's
style sufficiently to play so as to make the band sound good...

--Sheik