[Harp-L] Re: Never Call Out Stevie Wonder at a Blues Jam

[Joe Lempkowski <mr_jlemko@xxxxxxxxx>]

Why would you even consider playing a non-Blues tune
at a Blues jam?

a. It pisses off people that are there to listen to
and play Blues.  Big time.

b. The people there to hear Blues will remember you as
that jerk harp player that came to their jam and
wanted to play "I Just Called To Say I Love You."

c. Unless you have a track record of playing Blues
well, you will come across as disrespectful to the
Blues tradition, i.e. "I'm not going to play this
Blues stuff, I'm going to play what everyone really
came here to hear, a good old fashioned Stevie
Wonder-tune."  Not a good thing.

d. Your song choice is guaranteed to be a trainwreck
every single time.  Quite frequently, the bond that
brings people to a Blues jam is oddly enough Blues
music.  Of course, there are some people that think it
would be cool to play non-Blues songs at a Blues jam
and act all surprised when it doesn't go according to
plan.

e. If you have to describe a song to a bunch of people
that are there to play Blues, most of the time, your
description is going to go in one ear and out the
other.  If you're lucky, one person out of the four of
five onstage will remember/understand/apply your
instructions, the rest will just want to get the song
over with ASAP.  Hence, you will have a sonic
trainwreck.

Plus, in the amount of time it takes to describe the
song, the audience is getting impatient and begins to
expect great things making a small trainwreck appear
monummental in nature.

f. Playing Blues and having it sound good at a Blues
jam is challenging enough when the players all know
each other and know their strengths and weaknesses.  

For a variety of reasons, playing non-Blues music at a
Blues jam is very, very ill-advised.  








       
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