The Gigs! The Good, The Bad and The Ugly

This reminded me of a jazz gig I had through college. I was not a great jazz player, but I had an upright. Our drummer was not a great jazz player, but the two of us were available and didn’t demand any money.
The guitarist knew what he was doing and - somehow - suffered his rhythm section.
BUT… because we were rookies, he would play little tricks on us. The meanest/best trick was with the drummer. Whenever there was a drum solo, we would start the solo by playing a nice chord on the downbeat of every 4 bars. Very nice, very helpful.
About half way through the solo, he would turn to me (the drummer would be deep in solo land, oblivious) and say “hit on the 2” or sometimes “3”…
So there this poor drummer is, slamming and jazzing away with his helpful band pleasantly reminding him of his 4 bar phrases… and then we’d move the beat.
Oh.
I’m not sure the true delight and evilness of the trick comes across here in this post… But know this, readers: It was both delightful and evil.

6 Likes