Re: [Harp-L] Why Blues Jams are Important

[Ken Deifik <kenneth.d@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

> raucous head-cutting sessions among jazz and blues players

For the Young 'uns:

I'm a constant advocate for cutting contests and competition among 
musicians, as I have posted before.

In Harlem and Kansas City of the 1930's the musicians who put themselves 
through the agony of the cutting contest with the intention of winning some 
day were the ones whose names we remember now.

It's painful to walk into a club or basement thinking you are the King only 
to learn within minutes that you aren't even a citizen yet.  But if you do 
not compete and learn and try really hard to learn how to become a citizen, 
how to keep getting better until you are the best, you'll always be a 
wannabe.  As a musician your best friend is someone who plays alot better 
than you do, who will make you realize you're barely a spectator when 
you're sure you're a gunslinger.

And if you're the best in your neighborhood, you need to do two things:
1. Find a bigger neighborhood, find people who wipe the floor with you.
2. Teach the guys coming up behind you everything you know, because when 
you do that you know they'll catch you unless you keep growing yourself.

When you're inventing yourself getting comfortable is the enemy.

I used to love to watch the guys who were learning from me show up at jams 
thinking they had caught me and passed me by.  I'd let them play first, 
just to see that "Beat THAT, mofo" look they'd shoot me.

I also loved to see their faces fall when I'd school them on all the new 
stuff I'd learned  from guys who were better than either of us.

We became good musicians that way, and the guys who did that get all my 
respect.

The audience loves the competition, too, and learning how to win in front 
of audiences also gives you a great background in thrilling an audience.

Diatonic harmonica players are in the business of entertaining audiences, 
of moving them, of knocking them out.  You learn how to do that by getting 
better than the people who already do that, and you get better than them by 
directly competing with them at jams.