30s, 40s, 50s….jazz, swing….upbeat for dancing….. romantic and smoochy…we do it all!
John came along last night with his bass guitar, and showed us all up by sight reading all our prices rather better than we play them after having time to learn them! He says he enjoyed himself, and is coming along next week to meet, and play with the rest of the band – we were three down last night.
And what a difference he made to our sound – I’d have hardly believed it. Right from the first few bars of Tuxedo Junction, we sounded more complete, somehow. He’ll be a definite asset.
We had a full house last night, all the regular members were there, and David too, trying out as second alto sax (it’s a sort of two-way audition!) Anyway, both auditions must’ve gone well, because he’s decided to join us!
This is great, as we have a lot of good music for alto sax, and it’ll help Mark out too. I had to turn my vocals pa up a bit…they’re getting louder!
All we need now is a bassist (preferably double bass) who can commit to being at most rehearsals – so if you know anyone, sing out right away! (Wait…I’ll just rig my pa so you can be heard…)
Solo, for one night only, by command performance(!) it’s the Pat Jones show!
Yes, even though room 10 is on a break over the holidays, the music goes on! I’m singing at a New Year’s Eve party tonight and it’s great fun!
I hope you all had as fab a Christmas as I had, see you soon!
No practice tonight, due to ill health and unavailability of members – and I must admit I’m actually quite relieved – high winds, deafening thunder and torrential rain don’t make for a very enjoyable or indeed safe trip across The Bridge!
As our rehearsal rooms are closed over Christmas, this might mean a bit of a hiatus now – but you never know, there could still be occasional news to share!
Friends always ask me when they can come and hear room 10. And I can never answer them! The thing is, I didn’t join a ready made band; we’re all new to it, we’ve still trying out players (why are double bassists so hard to find?!) and sourcing suitable music, then we’ll have loads of practicing to do before we’re at a good enough standard together to entertain paying customers! But rest assured, we definitely will! Some of that long-awaited music has at last arrived from the States, so our repertoire is building nicely now.
Patience!
Lasts night’s practice was another humdinger, but it definitely showed me I need to practice more during the week! Some of the numbers we’re now starting are hard; tricky rhythms and difficult key changes – I can’t be relying on Emma to give me the note in a performance! But how great that we’re not taking the easy road, but trying to make good music, not boring music….!
We were talking about this the other night. So often we hear people saying “I love any music…except jazz…” This always surprises me – who doesn’t like Ella Fitzgerald, Susan Vaughan, Etta James, Peggy Lee, or even Amy Winehouse? But I think lots of people picture the discordant, rather self indulgent music style that they occasionally hear, and mentally switch off.
Of course, we’re not about this at all! If you can’t hum it, we won’t be doing it! We want our audiences to be dancing, not leaning their head on one hand, tapping a finger and nodding wisely…
At last things seem to be shaping up well. We tried the new arrangement of ‘Fever’ tonight, and although it’s tricky (HOW many flats?!) it sounded great! I also tried singing ‘Tuxedo Junction’, which the band had being doing as an instrumental, and it was great fun – I love it!
We deconstructed (now, there’s a modern word…or is that just in posh restaurants…?) a number of tunes we’re doing already, and fine tuned them – very satisfying.
Mark recorded some of our practice, so who knows – there might be a snippet or two appearing here soon…..
Well, I can’t claim my voice is completely recovered, but I couldn’t miss another practice! It was just brilliant being back with my room 10 friends, who were very patient and generous with my ‘breaking teenage boy’s’ voice!
The musicians have clearly been working hard in my absence, so well done to them – I enjoyed listening to them.
We worked on a couple of new numbers tonight, one I’d not heard before, but was a great success, the other….? Well, the least said about that the better – we’ll try a different arrangement next week…!
I’m absolutely gutted to still have no voice, so can’t sing at practice tonight – I’d been so looking forward to it. My speaking voice is beginning to return, thank god, but my singing voice is a lovely combination of unpleasant and nonexistent….what do you mean, no change there?! But no sympathy required, I feel fine, my throat’s been better for a week now, this is just my fairly usual aftermath of a cold. I still get a surprise when I try to talk to people, especially on the phone, as nothing comes out!
I particularly wanted to attend tonight’s practice as there are new musicians coming along to try out…I hope none of them are replacement singers!
Enjoy the peace, you musicians….I’ll be back very soon!
room 10 