Fw: [Dixielandjazz] Re: Mardi Gras

[Tom Wood]

Hi All,

In reply to the Stephen Barbone Mardi Gras comments from Dan Augustine we
can agree and identify with all counts except we are not familiar with this
"beads" thing.  Has it got anything to do with Doctor John and/or voodoo??
In USA last year when playing 'Yellow Dog Blues' we also experienced the
audience response (a new thing for us in this number) in the breaks which
encouraged us to play it more often.  We agree that presentation also is
important.

The Sydney-Zenith do not use any tip jar and we agree that some fans come up
with money requesting specific numbers but we have not matched US $100 yet,
only AUS $100 which seems to be rapidly approaching the US amount.

Our front line always does a walk through the audience which not many other
local groups seem to do.  When playing at the Montreux Jazz Festival in
Switzerland we did this and the highly professional Germanic sound engineers
went berserk but the waterfront audience loved it!  However, they still
provided us with a live recording on CD minutes after we completed our
performance.   We have just finished a Strove (Pancake) Tuesday gig this
week in our local Hyde Park beside the fountain (Sydney City Centre) raising
money for a charity organisation (Rotary selling hot pancakes) and had a
couple of camera crews crawling all over us for the local TV station news
which we attempted to ignore much to the enjoyment of the large impromptu
audience, most of whom have no idea of the type of music it is that we are
playing, yet they loved it. (again younger people mostly).

The main test for us (as I think I once said before) is CD sales and our
audiences always grow towards the end of the gig which means we are holding
their attention - this is the "Thing" we are used too, whenever we play.
The average age of the band now approaches 70 so for the Sydney-Zenith I
disagree that "Things Ain't What They Used To Be".

Cheers,
Tom (was that my turn for a band plug?) Wood
_______________________________________________
Dixielandjazz mailing list
Dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com
http://ml.islandnet.com/mailman/listinfo/dixielandjazz