[Dixielandjazz] YOUTH

[steven yarbro]

I know it seems like the youth aren't interested in hearing "OKOM," but in
my experience it's more like they just don't know about it.  Our little
band, The Primate Fiasco, is introducing traditional jazz to people of all
ages with lots of success.  Check out these pictures from our show at the
Iron Horse in Northampton, MA:

http://www.theprimatefiasco.com/photopages/HappyPillCircus1.html

We are always told that we have a very original idea, but what no one seems
to know is that we are doing the same thing as our parents, and our
grandparents, but we live in the 21st century, and so does our music.  This
may seem like blasphemy to some of the traditionalists, but what do you
think the original cats were doing?  There were no hip-hop beats in their
music because they were a hundred years before hip-hop, not because it
doesn't fit in the music.  And the reaction we get when we do it is always
the same: they love it!  Compare these two recordings of "Alabama Song"
(made famous by the doors) where we are playing the same song for two
different audiences.  The first is from a nursing home, for folks no younger
than 70 years old.  The second is from our show at The Iron Horse for a much
younger audience:

<http://www.theprimatefiasco.com/marathon/whiskeybar.mp3>
http://www.theprimatefiasco.com/music/marathon/whiskeybar.mp3

<http://www.theprimatefiasco.com/music/happypill1/whiskeyironhorse2-10-07x.mp3>
http://www.theprimatefiasco.com/music/happypill1/whiskeyironhorse2-10-07x.mp3

This is a great kind of music, everyone loves it, but for some reason it
keeps getting forgotten and rediscovered.  The question is not why doesn't
the youth like "OKOM," it's why doesn't the youth know about it?  We are
discovering that Our Kind Of Music is Everyone's Kind Of Music!

Steven Yarbro
www.theprimatefiasco.com



=====QUOTED TEXT=====
>
>Date: Sun, 4 Mar 2007 11:19:43 -0600
>From: Andrew R. Cooper <andy_cooper at chatter.com>
>Subject: Re: [Dixielandjazz] Dixielandjazz Digest, Vol 51, Issue 8
>To: dixielandjazz at ml.islandnet.com
>Message-ID: <bba715f288ba5cf1a192f716fe6f5535 at chatter.com>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed
>
>Everything except... Steve asks:
>
>Everything except the YOUTH... maybe in your corner of the world OKOM is
>hot with youth. Over here, only us old folks know how to play it, and
>are
>interested in hearing it.
>
>Still, we could have a revival with us old folks, and besides we have
>tons
>more money than youth, anyway.
>
>I vote we book a cruise ship for a week
>long event filled with customized dixieland and 30's-40's music venues.
>They
>already have these for hard-core jazzers in Europe. Why not the cruise
>ship USS-OKOM?
>
>===== From the desk of Andrew R. Cooper =====
>
>On Mar 4, 2007, at 10:58 AM, dixielandjazz-request at ml.islandnet.com
>wrote:
>
>> Why not an OKOM revival along the same path? We've got youth bands,
>> we've
>> got jazz camps, we've got everything it takes to bring the music into
>> today's scene, in place . . . except?
>