gocsick wrote: Tue Sep 01, 2026 8:03 pm
No joke... just a lady who used to come into the local man and would always do a song then ask band to do it in E or B. Fine for serious musicians, but it would always give us amateurs fits.. especially when you are not particularly familiar with a song, the only tuba and reading from a real book.
A whole bunch of the time when I'm on short, medium, or long road trips - and this has been the case throughout my life - when I'm driving (and I don't subscribe to any fancy radio services) the only stations I can pick up are country or rap or pop. (That said, sometimes I just don't want the radio on at all - even if I'm driving around locally... The Republican talk jocks get pretty tedious and redundant pretty quickly, and the commie narratives on the so-called "public" stations are similarly tedious.) Whether it's driving the car or sitting around waiting for something (such as killing time between two rehearsals out of town) or whatever, I've had a habit my entire life of ghost playing songs in screwball keys (pretending to play a song - all sorts of songs and all sorts of styles - on an F tuba, a C tuba, a B flat tuba or E flat tuba with my fingers against the steering wheel or resting against my thigh. It tends to be pretty complex songs that go to bridges in not particularly related keys such as III, etc. also having played a bunch of jazz jobs on all four of those lengths of tubas, (now that I'm old and having done this for so long as a nervous past time) I'm pretty good at "capo-ing" the tuba (most any song in most any key). My mind seems to learn/remember chord progressions much more than it remembers any specific chord names. ... I know that I told the story here about getting pushed up on the stage at an out-of-town jazz club one time by my so-called friends - along with a bunch of drunks clapping, the "name" band playing a familiar song at quite a clip in F sharp (which I'm sure was their tack for embarrassing people who asked to sit in, which I did NOT do), and me playing along with them on their tuba player's crappy (and smelly) tuba, and crappy mouthpiece - in addition to being pointed to for a couple of choruses.
I believe I also told the story about a two-man gig at an old Memphis traditional May festival called the Cotton Carnival (which used to be a huge huge city-wide deal and now it's sort of hidden behind rich people's houses with large tents thrown up). We are trying to brainstorm songs we could play, and I suggested Sousa's "King Cotton March". (We had absolutely no sheet music.) He was a jazz musician who had been in a Navy band, so he knew all of the marches. I started it off with that little intro that everyone recognizes, and we played through the entire thing - all of the strains with the repeats, the dogfight, everything. At the end he looked at me funny and told me that I was crazy. (I started it off and totally the wrong key, and we played the entire thing in the wrong keys.)
The thing is that I'm fine with G-flat or B or whatever... but I'm sure it's due my nervous habit that I described above in this post. (Maybe that nervous habit has been due to me - particularly dating back to when my primary income was freelancing - never wanting to get caught at a gig not being able to play a song, my primary goal - when playing jobs - is to be asked back...??) Even when falling asleep - and maybe my hand is resting on Mrs. bloke's shoulder or on her hand - she will feel my fingertips moving against her shoulder or hand and mumble "Are you playing your tuba, again?"
...so... Do you agree with me that each of these sets should have a couple more tunes added to them?
also:
Am I the only one, or is anyone weary of ending most dixieland jobs with
The Saints Go Marching In ?
