[Dixielandjazz] Ride cymbals

[David W. Littlefield]

At 10:23 AM 9/11/2004 -0500, Patrick Cooke wrote:
>There is another problem...On the same gig, one guy will want me to
>crank it up, and another will want me to turn it down.  I don't have an
>answer for that one!

The answer is that only the band leader has the right to give the orders,
you take your marching orders from one person only. 

>     I guess you have to be a bass player to understand it fully.  I
>sometimes go on a gig, and before I'm even unpacked, the leader will come
>over and say "Don't crank up the amp, in fact you really don't need
>it...it's a small room."  I know I'm in trouble, because I do need it and
>tell him so.  As a drummer, I'm sure you have been told to keep it soft
>before you have even set up.  Its in the manual titled "How to be a band
>leader."  Bass players and drummers are always being told how to play by
>people who don't play either instrument;  yet I don't remember having ever
>told or even suggested how a horn player should play.
>     Pat Cooke

It's the band leader's *job* to determine the requirements of the gig and
client preferences, and then to instruct the band as to what these are.
When a leader tells you to play softly, he's not telling you HOW to play,
but WHAT to play, and that *is* his prerogative. If he tells you to play
straight 4/4 or 2-beat, that's telling you what, not how, to play. Same for
telling the drummer to play mostly brushes, and percussively rather than
soup-stirring; or hi-hat rather than riders, and simple straight 4/4 swing
rather than 50s Count Basie style. It's the leader's job and right to
determine the sound and feel of the band, which means manipulating the
individual pieces. You don't like being told what to play, ask the leader
how he wants it played before you accept the gig. And if you haven't asked,
then play it with a smile, and when you get your pay, tell the leader not
to call you again...

--Sheik