[Dixielandjazz] No instruments on dance floor, please!!!

[David Palmquist]

I agree with Nancy's concern wholeheartedly.  The Ozzie was an idiot.  The 
musician is there to perform and entertain an audience, and should expect 
some clumsiness, some accidents, and even a few drunks.  Why not?  They 
paid for the privilege.

Steve writes often about going out on the dance floor to interact with the 
audience.  I've really enjoyed reading about that, but if he is playing a 
wind instrument while he's out there, I wonder if he's not risking a few 
teeth?

I like a clear separation between the dance floor and the front row of the 
band.  I don't want someone falling over electrical chords, or just plain 
stumbling, and landing on my saxes.  That's too costly and ruins the gig, too.

David in Delta






At 10:59 04-01-03, Nancy Giffin wrote:
>NOTE -- Dance floors are NOT a place to store your instruments!
>
>One musician learned this no-brainer lesson the hard way, at the same time I
>learned that I should find a new boyfriend. It was Jubilee 2000 in the
>Martinique Room, and some unknown Aussie musician with a handlebar mustache
>did the unthinkable: he left what we later found out to be his "viola da
>gamba" (small bass) standing on-end, against the wall, of a dimly-lit dance
>floor. My boyfriend and I had been gleefully and uneventfully dancing all
>evening until... uh-oh... "you-know-what" happened at the end of a fateful
>dance-spin-gone-bad. The viola da gamba made a slowly-accelerating scraping
>sound as it rotated on its axis along the wall and down toward the floor,
>where it crashed with a bang and reverberated as it lay on its side, in the
>horizontal position in which, perhaps, it should've been stored in the first
>place -- somewhere else!
>
>The scraping and crashing noises were unwelcome percussive additions to the
>ongoing music, and greatly annoyed both musicians and audience alike, but
>none were so red-faced and fuming as the small man with the big voice that
>came running up, yelling Aussie insults in my face. Naturally, I felt
>terrible, and that he had every right to be upset. I clasped my hands
>together and shrank, as I apologized up and down, over and over, while the
>Aussie yelled on and on. At this, my boyfriend exploded into a rage, for in
>addition to being a wild man on the dance floor, my boyfriend was also a
>musician and an ex-Marine who wasn't going to take all the blame for another
>musician being so "thoughtless and irresponsible" as to leave an instrument
>out of its case and in the line of fire, highly vulnerable to vicious attack
>by vivacious, voluptuous villains. No way! A rather unharmonious
>pushing-and-shouting match ensued between the two musicians. I kept trying
>to chime in with an attempt at harmony, but to no avail, as the band played
>on. It quickly degraded into an insult-swapping match: "What kind of a wimpy
>bass is that anyway?" and "Where did you learn to dance anyway?" (ad
>nauseum).
>
>I was sober enough to realize that my boyfriend was ultimately going to pick
>him up and crush this feisty "Oz"-ie (and his little bass, too) into gumbo
>da gamba if I didn't pull him outta there, so I hooked onto his elbow and
>said, "Let's Get Lost," as dragged him away from the scene that was
>beginning to steal the show from the All-Star band on stage.
>
>Basically, it comes down to: Who was the biggest idiot? A) The clumsy idiot
>who did not notice that an expensive and delicate instrument was being
>stored, unprotected, in the dark, near drunken dancers? Or, B) The idiot who
>placed it there?
>
>I'm no longer with that boyfriend ("Just Friends"), but every year at the
>Jubilee, I get "That Old Feeling" and find myself on the lookout for the
>handlebar-moustached viola da gamba player. Would he remember me? Does he
>see me in his nightmares? Will I be hunted down by an Aussie posse if he
>spots me and yells, "I Remember You"? I hope he learned something and is
>singing "There'll Be Some Changes Made." Perhaps one of our Aussie listmates
>will let me know who he is. At any rate, let everyone learn from "These
>Foolish Things": NEVER STORE YOUR INSTRUMENTS ON THE DANCE FLOOR! (It's
>called a "dance floor," not an "instrument-storage floor.")
>
>Love and Happy New Year hugs and kisses,
>Nancy
>
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