Playing the saxophone Please share your first open mic stories!

[Pete Effamy]

Yeah, time can be a drag. In the jam last night, the trombone player and I discussed whether there was a magnetic anomaly under the floor of the joint that always drags the tempo of a swing tune down to about 140 bpm. Doesn't matter where it's counted off, that's what it will get to in the first couple of choruses. This is with the sitting in bassists and drummers of course...

I actually tried in one tune to get the drummer to start pushing (he was the one most affected by the tendency to drag), so I turned toward him and played simple rhythms for 8 bars, rushing, to try to get him to speed up, but it didn't work. Oh well....

Good to hear that this affliction is universal, and not just Blighty. Although here it can take as little as four bars, or for the more talented, pretty much from the off.

 

[Grumps]

The King of France Tavern. Great jazz club back in the day. They had a proper jazz open mic hosted by a fairly pretentious piano player who was like their house guy for some time. I was young and really had no business being there and for my song request I asked them to play something funky in E. Only the bass player had fun with it.