The Boys in the Band

There’s an old Henny Youngman joke – ok, they’re all old, at this point – that goes something like this:

A violinist in an orchestra was playing a solo when a member of the audience stood and yelled, “Tell the sonofabitch to stop playing!”

The conductor turned and said, “Who called the violinist a sonbofabitch?”

And the man answered back, “Who called the sonofabitch a violinist?”

Anyway, I half-expect someone to yell out something like that whenever I tell anyone that I’m a guitar player. I’m just not very good. I try. I enjoy it. I know many of the chords. I could knock out “Michael, Row the Boat Ashore” at a campfire. But that’s about it.

However, recently me and the boys have been getting together to play music. I use the term “boys” loosely since I’m often the youngest one there, and I’m about as old as the Cuban Missile Crisis. On the other hand, I’m not nearly as old as any of the Beach or Oak Ridge Boys.

It’s a pretty eclectic group – some of us have facial hair, some of us don’t. But we all have guitars, a passion for music and free time on Friday nights, at least until about 10, when we all start to get sleepy.

Our friend Millard hosts the party in his converted garage that has enough equipment to take The Who on tour. That’s the beauty of your kids growing up – disposable income.

We play a pretty wide range of music – anything recorded between the years 1973 and 1974 is fair game. Just kidding – we go back into the 60s sometimes.

Here’s how it works. Someone will suggest a song, and then someone will ask the key question – “How many chords does it have?” If the answer is 4 or fewer, then we give it a shot.

There’s a large screen TV, and the words and chords will scroll by as we play along. If it’s a song I don’t know by heart, I’ll sometimes forget to put my glasses on, which means that I can’t really see which chord to play, which means that I’ll just guess or try something, which means it will sound like badgers fighting because I almost always guess wrong. And the beauty of it – we don’t let it stop us. We just keep plowing through. Every now and then one of the better musicians in the group will look over in my direction with the same facial expression you get when you’re trying to figure out who just farted. It was me. I emitted a guitar fart. I’m sorry.

I’m thinking we should give this musical enterprise a name. I’ve suggested “Below Average White Band” but it hasn’t caught on.

I’m having a ball. It’s a healthy mid-life crisis activity that doesn’t carry the risk of jail time, barring the passage of a new noise ordinance. Some times I’ll even jump behind the drum kit for a song or two and bang away, until somebody yells, “Who called that sonofabitch a drummer?”

I own a very nice guitar, which I realize is not unlike Helen Keller owning a Coupe De Ville. But I don’t care. I’m going to show up on Friday nights and bang that sucker and play the wrong chords and sing like a cat in heat, until the cops shut us down or I just fall asleep. Rock on!