[Dixielandjazz] the microphone-tease

[ROBERT R. CALDER]

I have had an off-site communication concerning my most recent posting ..  

>Hi Robert.  A fellow  Dixieland List member, I was mystified by you'r reference to Kenny Davern's " Slow Mic " technique.
>                I thought Davern scorned amplified playing.
>                 Am I missing something?. <
                        
Sometimes amplification is necessary!


Mic-tease, I said.  I could have been clearer.  
Kenny made plain that his experience of earlier residence in a bedroom adjacent to the concert venue was not one of unalloyed quiet, far less undisturbed sleep. 
The music he was determined to perform was to be acoustic, and since the microphone had already been set up for him he proceeded to dismantle it, on an artistic model with which the name of Gypsy Rose Lee has been associated, to wit performing a dance and then removing one item, then another dance, et cetera ...  In Kenny's case each item was a component of the microphone, and instead of dancing he played. After an unbroken succession of two numbers there was a shrug and he resumed attending to one of the more troublesome catches, and eventually as planned the mic-tease reached its conclusion with a pile of bits, including all of the stand, lying suitably placed on the floor. I seem to remember that other microphones were also reduced, in an ensemble Ungesamtkunstwerk. 

Now that I think back on it, Kenny had observed on arrival, also, that the windows were closed, and to the puzzlement of an attractive German lady in my company he wafted his hand exclaiming "frische Luft, frische Luft" while a member of hotel staff, duly thanked when he had done his work, opened the windows. The lesson was that not only is acoustic music better for the listeners, it expresses consideration for the wider environment, and for fellow beings not blessed with healthy appreciation of good jazz. 

The acoustic ideal also has its application outwith good music, in its potential to render more nearly inaudible certain noises one would not want to hear. I remember with much amusement the supporting act at a concert whose main performers were blues artists. This band of Englishmen began to thrash their guitars before one then another amp packed in. It took quite some while before the bass guitarist realised that playing three notes repeatedly was no way to make up for  . . ..  even the drums being unwired.

Early on during the second half of the concert, a string on BB King's guitar broke,  and he proceeded to replace it while delivering a monologue on what his guitar, Lucille, meant to him.  Presumably no-one had told him about the band's crash into silence, and that reviews of earlier concerts in the series described him delivering the same restringing and monologue, and that it was thus bloody obvious that he went on stage every night with a deliberately frayed string, et cetera.  Inferior by far to Davern on needless electrica! Indeed artificial.