[Dixielandjazz] charts

[TCASHWIGG at aol.com]

In a message dated 9/3/04 2:22:46 PM Pacific Daylight Time, 
daveplaysthepiano at hotmail.com writes:

> As a sophisticated listener I'm left shaking my head. 
> 
> If you can't rehearse, use charts, at least a chord chart.
> 
> Dave
> 
> 

I extend that one step further Dave,  "If you can't make the rehearsal don't 
make the gig"
the guy or gal who can't at least put that much into the gig obviously is too 
booked up and too busy to be a contributing member in my show anyway.

If I can't be sure of the band that is going to show up and what caliber of 
show they will put on the stage I put them on, I don't book them, I have always 
had a professional policy to deliver what I sold. Not something close enough 
for Jazz, which is a lazy players way of getting out of being professional and 
earning their money, and has contributed greatly to the downward spire of 
financial respect and remuneration afforded to most jazz musicians today.

There is a time and place for everything and the place for a Jam session is 
not on a Paid gig where the buyer is expecting to get their money's worth and 
what they thought they bought, not just what the group of often unprepared 
misfits decide onstage to pass off on    the unsuspecting audience just to get a 
payday.


In the early days of the Musicians Union when bands almost all worked from 
the bandleaders book of charts they got into the habit of hiring anybody who was 
in the union for the instrument they wanted, because it was generally 
accepted that he was of professional caliber and could read and play the charts.

When it started to backfire on the union is when they started expanding their 
memberships and allowing any person with an instrument to join the union who 
had the initiation fee with almost no regard to his or her actual 
professionalism as a player.

They should have made a separate distinctive category then and there for 
Entertainers, some of whom could play an instrument in total mediocrity instead of 
just sending these folks out as Professional musicians.  Eventually the Smart 
Entertainers stopped playing instruments so much and hired top players to 
back them up and make them sound better.

Unfortunately for many of the musicians, the Entertainers became much more 
popular to the audiences who became fans of the entertainers rather than the 
musicians, which caused a lot of animosity towards Entertainers and Singers who 
could not play worth a diddly.  The war has never ceased to this day.

Good Musicians are a dime a dozen in the eyes of the Entertainers and are 
often treated that way.  The fact however remains that there are indeed far more 
good musicians than Good Entertainers in the marketplace so the Entertainers 
have the advantage of commanding the big bucks while many musicians are 
starving for a gig and undercutting each other daily just to get on a stage and play.


That is why there are so many DJs working what used to be live jazz gigs 
folks.

Cheers,

Tom Wiggins