[Dixielandjazz] Humor in music

[Dan Augustine]

Bill and others--
    Yes, i remember being at one of the Boondocker's shows a couple of weeks ago in Sacramento.  It was hilarious, but musically well-done (no intentional wrong notes, etc.).  I don't think i've seen any of your shows that have the violin and trumpet behaving badly (but it sounds great).
    One of the problems with trying to be humorous ("Measure your humerus and divide by two.") occurs when people don't expect humor.  Two weeks ago our Wurst Band, in honor of all the highschool and college graduation ceremonies happening, played about 30 bars of Wagner's "Pilgrim's Chorus" from _Tannhäuser_.  The first 16 bars were fairly well in tune, but our fearless leader Jim Bryan (or sometimes, 'learless feeder') told us to start playing wrong notes in bar 17.  We did, and there was no reaction from the audience, until we just ended suddenly.  Last week, one of the more classically knowledgeable friends of the band commented that the tune didn't sound very good, and i had to explain to him that it was, in point of fact, intentional.  So be careful out there....

    Dan
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
>From: "Bill Gunter" <jazzboard at hotmail.com>
>Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] RE: Wow on WING...; humor in music
>Date: Mon, 09 Jun 2003 16:42:35 +0000
>
>Listmates,
>Dan Augustine askes:
>>Lots of bands (in fact, some of the best bands) use humor, but do any deliberately play badly for a comic effect?
><snip>
>I play the violin (having taken violin lessons in my youth) with just enough accuracy to make the tune recognizable but with enough bad intonation and bowing to make it absurd. It always gets a big laugh.
>Also, Gary Church (a Boondocker sideman), who is a fine cornet/trombone/keyboard/guitar player who spent years on the road with Merle Haggard and also in Branson with the Mel Tillis band, does really funny things with the horn (reaching for impossibly high notes with disastrous results in the lower intestinal tract, making his horn sound like a car with a dying battery in the song "I Can't Get Started" etc.).
>Generally speaking, however, we play fine dixieland what with the likes of Jim Maihack, Gary Church, Bob in the band and we normally play our music straight but we have been known to digress for the sake of a laugh.
><snip>
>Bill "Perfect Pitch" Gunter
>jazzboard at hotmail.com

--
**----------------------------------------------------------**
** Dan Augustine - ds.augustine at mail.utexas.edu             **
** Office of Admissions, University of Texas; Austin, Texas **
**----------------------------------------------------------**