[Dixielandjazz] 4th of July - Jonathan Russell - Dancing Kids

[Steve barbone]

Saturday night, Barbone Street performed a one hour pre-fireworks concert on
the Riverfront in Wilmington DE. Jonathan was on violin, playing lead with a
trombone & clarinet front line.

Great time was had by all. The old folks applauded wildly. But best of all
were the dancing kids. At least 60 of them because I ran out of beads at 5
dozen. Enlisted my wife Martha to hand them out because we were besieged
once I started draping them.

We were in an open sided 40 foot trailer with self contained sound. Really
neat staging set about 4 feet high. In a plaza with a 60 by 30 foot dance
area in front of us and then benches for the listeners.

The kids danced from the first tune. They were mixed races, from about 8 to
12 and just had a ball. Everybody dancing with everybody else. Beautiful.
Better yet were the kids still to young to walk, held in their mom's arms
while the mom's swayed to the music.

Great crowd, great kids, great bands and Jonathan was roundly applauded when
he played solos and sang. (as were all of us)

Yep, give me a jazz oblivious, young, regular folks crowd anytime. They just
love the music and free dance like nobody was watching.

Cheers,
Steve Barbone