On Warrandyte -

What is it with Warrandyte? - full of fading hippies who didn't quite achieve the mudbrick nirvana that Australians know and love as Eltham, but settled for the lesser 'burb, whose citizens only move in their own elevated social circles, and as a result end up dizzy and still in Warrandyte. Such a plethora of ageing university lecturers, lesbian potters and slightly louche middle-aged men in green shorts and whiskers suggests that if the world has not already passed them by, it soon will.
Whatever - Warrandyte was recently host to the 23rd most important Recorder Master Class in the civilised world, an event which, had you known it was to occur, would have had you drooling with anticipation. Drooling being a feature of the recorder apparently, and possibly of the lesbian potters as well, I wouldn't know.
I am deeply indebted to Marion for some (almost none) of this information, which made the pleasure of hearing her play piano at the Sunday arvo jam all the greater. Stinking hot (the weather, not Marion, but then again still waters run deep) and an afternoon of gentle ballads from the likes of Col (Capo di capo), Frank, Taariq, Glen on drums, Debbie (on gin and tonic), La Stewart on tonsil (a rare and radiant foray due to her having a private gig next week), Jack the Lad on trombone, and Kevin on guitar.
Highlight of the day, for me, was Taariq getting the groove going for Feelin' Good. We agreed at the end that it almost sounded like real music. Not like yer average jam at all really.
Apparently POCKOTL*   turned up late, having been mysteriously delayed by traffic in Warrandyte or somewhere, and clutching a magnificent glazed pot. Or not as the case may be, I wouldn't know, I wasn't there




* POCKOTL: Princess of Cool, Keeper of the List

I still don't like Mondays

Who invented Mondays? Someone must have - miserable bastard.

Still, if we didn't have Mondays, Tuesdays would be much, much worse. And if your birthday fell on a Monday, and hadn't been invented, you would miss all the presents. But you wouldn't get any older.

Everything has its pros and cons.

Especially Silvio Berlusconi's barbeques, I gather.

Still don't like Mondays.

JAMMIN'

I couldn't resist posting this from the La Pena sessions: nervous singer approaches the piano player: 

“I want to sing a song “

“Okay, what do you want to sing?”

“Straighten up and Fly Right”

“Do you know what key you sing it in?”

“What's a key?”

“Well, how high do you sing it?”

“I'm in Grade Three”

“Right, lads, Straighten Up and Fly Right, in Grade Three..”

And that is what Cassandra sang. She was 8 or 9 going on precocious.

The Jam Session Review that wasn't...

The Leinster Arms Jam Session Review

There wasn’t a jam session last week, and it wasn’t at the Leinster Arms, as is so often the case, or not as the case may be – so here is the review. No one turned up, no one played a bum note, and all the singers were note and word perfect, young, talented and glamorous. There were free drinks at bar prices as usual.


The Saxaphones: Ah, the saxaphones – did they notice there wasn’t a jam session? Of course not -being saxaphone players, they didn’t turn up, but would have stood at the front and played too many choruses if they had the chance. And let’s face it, if you had the chance , you wouldn’t have been a saxaphone player in the first place.

The pianists: They turned up alright, but in a parallel universe. If you are not good,children, they might come back.


The brass section: all brass players were warmly invited – which is about all they need, usually.


The drummers: What? What??? Whatawhatawhatawhat??!?? Oh never mind, I’ll have a beer thanks…


The bass players. What is the point of turning up anyway. Always stuck at the back. Could have turned up, but who would have noticed? They only notice when the bass player is not there…


The singers: just before the jam session we didn’t have was about to not finish, three singers turned up,…. no-one listening to meeee!  …so they all flounced out, sulking, never going to sing again unless asked really nicely… well, nicely would do… well damn well ask willya…well I might just get up and sing anyway…

The guitarists: of course they turned up – to 11

Remember to take your medication, or some-else’s if that works better for you, stick to the black notes, they’re cheaper, and turn up at the jam next Sunday – see ya there!

A brief and splendidly inaccurate history of the Blues in Australia:

Blues music started in the Untied States of America when Blind Big Willy from way down somewhere else fell into a dumpster and came out clutching a ukulele with three broken strings and a bottle of Drano, which does something to the voice but I am not sure what. 

Blind Big Willy could only count to three, so that setled the question of which chords to play. Almost every blues song begins with "woke up this morning" , followed by a litany of daily catastrophes that is so inevitable  one wonders if waking up is in fact a bad career move. The Blues should have quit whilst it was still ahead ...but instead it developed into a dubious art form, requiring its exponents to (a) shoot a man in Memphis, (b) hitch a ride on the Midnight Special and (c) get done left by their woman on a regular basis, before dying of consumption, a broken heart, and a lifetime of luck, all of it bad....

 

At this stage it was brought to Australia by a travelling snakeoil salesman, where, in Melbourne at least,  it was enthusiastically adopted by Madge from Altona, Robbo the postman from Preston and several people mostly called Eric who saw it as a preferable alternative to paid employment. Disguising their middle class origins with such names as Fat Mama from Altona, Freddie the frontloader and the blind drunk boys of  Upper East Doncaster they would take it in turns to bemoan their fate and cadge drinks from an unsuspecting public due to the inadequacy of their non specific performing arts grants, received on a weekly basis in exchange for forged documentation suggesting they were actually applying for work in the field of brain surgery or some such.

 

And so it thrives, every week at the Leinster Arms, Gold Street Collingwood, on a Friday night, and a Sunday arvo.

 

Next week I will definitely attend something. Maybe, a jam session. Maybe you should too..