[Dixielandjazz] Summertime

[Robert Ringwald]

My opinion, follow up on Dan's comments:

Having played music for 55 years, you eventually learn to hate certain songs.  This can happen for several reasons.  

One reason is because it is a rotten, dumb, badly written song.  Having been chained to a piano bar 6 and 7 nights a week for years, with my job being to keep the customers happy, I learned to hate "Tie a Yellow Ribbon" and "Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head."  You can tell how long it has been since I have played an actual piano bar steadily...  

I also learned to hate "I Left My Heart IN SF," even though it is a very nice song.  It is that I just had to play these songs thousands of times.  Of course I made a lot of tips playing them.  

Also, while playing piano bar, with customers thinking I am a human karaoke machine, I learned to hate the song "Summertime."  It is probably the #1 song that bad girl singers want to sing.  

Another thing about a lot of amateur singers, both male and female is, as Dan says, they don't know their keys. 
So, they get up on stage, sing a little of the song softly in the piano player's ear to establish their key.  It is established that they are singing the song in say B flat.  Then they step to the mic, after 3-miss-starts because they can't tell where to come in and then proceed to belt out the song in a totally different key.  Thus, I have learned to play in most keys such as A, D, G flat, E,B, etc...  

Of course, that is the reason why we get paid the big bucks...  


--Bob (Now where'd they put that damn piano) Ringwald
www.ringwald.com
Fulton Street Jazz Band
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