[Dixielandjazz] Re: Simultaneous Appearances - Was Riverboat Schedule

[Stephen Barbone]

Jazzjerry at aol.com wrote:

>    Steve,
>
> Unfortunately popularity does not necessarily equate with quality.

How can you claim people have contempt for the audience, and then state
the above which is pure, elitist, contempt for the audience?

> I have
> visited the Preservation Hall website and indeed there are excellent
> musicians
> listed but I found the whole site extremely depressing. It appeared to
> me to be
> a calculated and rather cynical attempt to cash in on the great stars
> of the
> past. I have only visited Preservation Hall once and that was back in
> 1987.
> Even then I was dissappointed at what I found. It simply seemed to be
> a tourist
> trap rather than a place to hear high quality music. I also heard the
> 'Preservation Hall Jazz Band' when it toured in the 1970s with the
> Humphrey Brothers,
> Cie Frasier etc. and it was a good band.

Why not visit them in Pori (where the heavy hitters of jazz go to
perform) before you show your contempt for them and the audience?

> I admire a number of the musicians who play in the band such as
> Wendell
> Brunious (who has just had an excellent album issued here on which he
> plays with
> Lars Erstrand, Totti Berg and Jan Lundgren), Michael White and Freddy
> Lonzo but
> somehow I cannot help feel that the perpetuation of a myth is the
> object of
> the whole Preservation Hall organisation.

Is that "perpetuation of a myth" not what "traditional" jazz, OKOM, is
all about?

> I would ask a fairly simple question. Is the PHJB 'popular' because of
> the
> name and the myth or because it plays good jazz? I suspect that
> irrerspective of
> the quality of the music which might be very good it is simply the
> name which
> makes it The MOST POPULAR DIXIELAND BAND IN THE WORLD.

What is the difference? between "name" and "quality". Who defines
quality? You, or the rest of the world? What about most bands that play
"British Trad"? Who defines that from a quality point of view? NAME
recognition is exactly why Barbone Street is able to book multiple
bands. Basically the clients say, "I heard about you and want to book
you." When I tell them that I personally cannot be there, they yawn and
say: "So what? Your band has a reputation for delivering client
satisfaction regardless of who is in it."

That basically is why Preservation  Hall, or Barbone Street (to a much
lesser extent) is able to successfully multiple book. Because I do not
sell Steve Barbone and his band, I sell Barbone Street as an entity. We
are a collection of "working" band units, not individuals.

Sooner of later, if a band delivers crap, it will fade away.
Preservation Hall is not fading away. Far be it from you or I to
categorize that band as "quality" or "crap". Especially in light of all
the mediocrity that does exist musically in OKOM performances that
people go to see.

If you book PHJB to perform at your place, they will deliver an audience
and get a great audience reaction. Do you then wish to tilt at windmills
and tell the punters that they don't know the difference between good
music and crap? Methinks you are saying that the audience does indeed
not know the difference. Doesn't that show more contempt for the
customers that that of which you accused me? Isn't that "elitism" like
in hey folks, "I know, but you don't, you ignorant fooloish, customers?"

Cheers,
Steve