[Dixielandjazz] FW: A healthy future for classic jazz?

[Jim Kashishian]

Marek Boym wrote:

>Have you ever attended a jazz festival of club without a lot of
conversation?
I have always wondered why these people pay all that money in order NOT to
listen to jazz, when they can do so for free in their own homes or a
neighbourhood park - or pub!

Marek, audiences at concerts, particularly in concert halls, tend to be
quiet.  In fact, if it is not a jazz orientated audience, the audience can
be too quiet & then it is a job to get the audience to interreact with the
band, something that is so vital to the success of a gig.

However, in a club you will find all sorts of people.  There are those that
came to hear the music & those that just fell in off of the street.  

Once again, it is up to the band to catch the attention of the audience.  To
expect complete silence in a club is sort of silly, and in fact the club
loses its atmosphere when a complete "concert silence" is attained.  

The aim, in our case, is to maintain a level of audience chatter somewhere
below that of the band.  A very animated front table will draw audience
attention away from the band, which is detrimental then to the music.  The
attention of that particular table has to be drawn back to the band by
various "musician's tricks", or by an attentive & polite waiter.  Shhh'es
from other tables rarely works.  

I, too, wonder like you, Marek, why people pay more for a drink in a club
with music when they can most likely get a cheaper drink somewhere else &
not have the band distracting their conversation.  Nevertheless, that is the
way things are often.  

Why does the couple that want to smooch sit right up next to the band,
usually where some of the floodlights strike them?  A dark corner would be
more appropriate, but we see this often!

However, thank goodness for all those smoochers & talkers!  At least they
buy drinks & the clubs keep hiring us.

Jim