A musical faux pas

[USMC1960s]

I don't know why I happened to think of this after so many years. A friend of mine in Massachusetts was from Center Point, Texas and had a country band. Merle Haggard was his specialty. He had an old pedal steel guitar that didn't sound like one. Somehow it had been tuned to sound like several violins in an orchestra and not at all like a regular steel that you'd hear in a country song. So we'd practice at his house. One Saturday night we happened to stop by a small club in Somerville, Mass, just outside Boston. Johnny D's. It was very crowded. There was a country band on the stage. Now, out of courtesy, any band seeing a fellow singer in the audience,  would invite him or her up on stage to do a couple of tunes. Everyone in the place had been drinking quite awhile and my friend jumped at this invitation to take the stage. And he insisted that I take the stage with him and play the steel guitar. But this was a regular normal one that did NOT sound like orchestra violins, and I knew it would be embarrassing if I tried to play it. But everyone insisted. So I climbed up on the stage and sat behind what to me was a very foreign instrument. They might as well have asked me to play a Mozart concerto on a piano. I sat there desperately thinking as the song went on. When it got to my steel guitar solo part, I had no choice but to reach around and unplug the steel guitar from the amp, under the guise of adjusting the sound and volume. So when my solo began I was picking and grinning like crazy, bobbing my head back and forth lost in the rhythm. But not a sound emanated from the instrument.  But here's the thing---the crowd had imbibed so much by that time that no one in the entire place even noticed that no sound at all was coming from the steel guitar. And not only that but the inebriated crowd applauded loudly after the song was over.

 

[Karl Henning]

I don't know why I happened to think of this after so many years. A friend of mine in Massachusetts was from Center Point, Texas and had a country band. Merle Haggard was his specialty. He had an old pedal steel guitar that didn't sound like one. Somehow it had been tuned to sound like several violins in an orchestra and not at all like a regular steel that you'd hear in a country song. So we'd practice at his house. One Saturday night we happened to stop by a small club in Somerville, Mass, just outside Boston. Johnny D's. It was very crowded. There was a country band on the stage. Now, out of courtesy, any band seeing a fellow singer in the audience,  would invite him or her up on stage to do a couple of tunes. Everyone in the place had been drinking quite awhile and my friend jumped at this invitation to take the stage. And he insisted that I take the stage with him and play the steel guitar. But this was a regular normal one that did NOT sound like orchestra violins, and I knew it would be embarrassing if I tried to play it. But everyone insisted. So I climbed up on the stage and sat behind what to me was a very foreign instrument. They might as well have asked me to play a Mozart concerto on a piano. I sat there desperately thinking as the song went on. When it got to my steel guitar solo part, I had no choice but to reach around and unplug the steel guitar from the amp, under the guise of adjusting the sound and volume. So when my solo began I was picking and grinning like crazy, bobbing my head back and forth lost in the rhythm. But not a sound emanated from the instrument.  But here's the thing---the crowd had imbibed so much by that time that no one in the entire place even noticed that no sound at all was coming from the steel guitar. And not only that but the inebriated crowd applauded loudly after the song was over.

 

What a great story! I feel for ya.

[Szykneij]

Sadly, Johnny D's has recently closed its doors.

[USMC1960s]

Thanks.