Ragged but Right, pt 4 (jam)

[Wilson Gray]

On Fri, Feb 3, 2012 at 11:06 AM, Jonathan Lighter
<wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com> wrote:

>>>     As a rule most side show managers just want noise from a colored band.
>>> The reason for this is because they don't have a large enough band to do
>>> anything but jam.
>>>
>>>      "Notes from Wolfscale's Band, with Barnum and Bailey", *Indianapolis
>>> Freeman*, August 8, 1914


> In other words, does improvisation equal and explain "noise"?


I don't think that it needs to. It's not necessary, IMO, to interpret
"just wants noise" literally. As presented, I read the quote as
meaning that side-show managers don't care what it is or how it is
that the colored band is playing, as long as it's playing something in
some manner, and not that the managers necessarily regard the
improvisational playing of those musicians as nothing more than
"noise," sensu stricto.

--
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain

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