there - I've said it again

Here he goes again: recently I had an encounter in a charity shop in Sleaford. A solitary woman slouched over the counter looking bored in her job. She was a volunteer and I suppose we can’t expect unpaid staff to look as if they’re enjoying themselves. The charity is no doubt grateful for what it can get to run the place on a quiet weekday afternoon.

To her left, on a shelf below the ceiling, a vibrating loud speaker blasted out heavy rock music. It sounded like 1980s punk, but then I’m not the best judge given that I consider anything recorded after 1935 as modern music. Presumably she was either deaf or inured to the onslaught of unnecessary volume. I would have written immured there, but you’d probably think I was committing malapropism, even though ‘immured’ is probably more apposite.

As I grazed for my jazz LPs, or books not dominated by a photograph of Sharon Osborne, the music began to jar. The shop had about four customers raking through racks of clothes. They were all my age (elderly) or older. Admittedly, I seemed to be the only one flinching.

I bought a book of poetry by Ted Hughes. I’ve never understood much of his writings, but I’m a believer in trying a second time if I don’t at first succeed. As I paid, the music switched tracks to a ballistic attack of discordant guitar and pitch-free shouting.

Unfortunately, I’m generally too much of a coward to complain. But this blast of hot notes was too much. I said to the woman: “I must admit I’m not a great admirer of your choice of music.” She sniffed and replied “It’s not my choice. They insist on playing it.” We all know that ‘I’ am never responsible; it’s always ‘they’ who carry the can. But I could sense she hated me for daring to criticise. I was already identified as the day’s grumpy old man.

But damn it! I’m proud to be a grumpy old man. If we had more grumpy old men and women, albeit braver than I, this country would be a more pleasant land. Instead we accept whatever is thrown at us. I responded “Well please tell them that I find the music very off putting” and I walked out, unfortunately tripping over the doorstep as I went. I think hubris is the word; my dignity trailed limply behind me.

This is an appeal. I made the same appeal last year i.e. in the approach to Christmas. The situation seems to have deteriorated in the past 12 months. Loud inappropriate music is now becoming endemic in shops, malls, stores, narrow streets, pub, restaurants and most public places. STOP. Switch off your boring, insensitive, infuriating mechanical music and save those inevitable and unwarranted payments to the PPL and the PRS.

Shopkeepers and publicans – the fact is that the majority of your customers don’t even notice whether the music is on or off but we who are aware of it detest our lives being invaded because you are under the false belief that loud music improves trade. It doesn’t.

Let me prove it. A couple of Saturdays ago we ate at the Ebrington Arms in Kirkby-on-Bain. We heard no music at all. And the pub was heaving with customers of varying ages, all spending good money on food and drink. This amiable experience was repeated in the Wig & Mitre in Lincoln; the peace was almost sublime. On the other hand, musically-explicit pubs were standing empty, except for the ubiquitous young lad feeding a juke box over a single Diet Coke (£1.50) while his girlfriend allowed the baby to crawl all over the floor.

Peace be with you.

if silence is golden, you ain't worth a dime, 'cos your mind is on vacation but your mouth is working overtime

A few years ago I went with a couple of musicians to a big-band jazz concert in a public hall near King’s Lynn. During proceedings, one of my companions asked a particularly vocal lady to keep her voice down. She objected and a brawl almost ensued. We were asked to leave to forestall trouble, a little unfairly I thought. I missed more than half the programme of a superb swing band, but all my teeth were intact.

Live jazz in pubs and clubs can be a tricky issue. The good manager will be aware of the need to maintain a fine balance between the wishes of those there to listen to music and have a drink at the same time and those there to drink with a background of music. Sometimes the two groups can’t be reconciled easily, especially in pubs; they are there for different reasons and often mingle uncomfortably.

A pub near Norwich ran Friday lunchtime jazz sessions, presenting such local luminaries as Stella Goodey, James Goodwin and Derek Cubbitt. The music was played against an unremitting soundscape of chinking plates, scraping chairs on a tiled floor, repeated creaking of a servery door and buzz of conversation.

Yet neither musicians nor audience complained about background noise. They knew they were in an environment where about half the audience were there to hear them, the other half out for a pleasurable time. Nobody competed for ears. Somehow everyone found what they were looking for. And the same applied in most pubs dishing up successful live jazz.

I was reminded of this when I listened recently to a CD – Charles Mingus on Charles Mingus. In the introduction to the singular “Folk Forms No. 1” he appeals for quiet. “Restrain your applause… in fact don’t even take any drinks… or no cash registers ringing etc.” This was Mingus pretending to be recording in the electrifying atmosphere of a club, when in reality he was in the studios. He wanted the musicians to play as if they had the stimulus of an audience.

Some of the best jazz recordings are live in front of a vociferous audience – tracks by Wynton Marsalis, Chris Barber and Roland Kirk to name just five (Marsalis and Kirk should be there twice). I actually relish LP tracks reverberating with the rattle of ice in a glass, the murmur of voices at the bar and the thunder of rapturous applause. (That’s a Jungian slip – who talks about LPs these days?) Let’s never forget that our music was conceived and nurtured in drinking houses and dance halls and came of age in clubs and bars. Some will argue with justification that jazz started to decline the day it moved into the concert hall. In my view, jazz, and perhaps music generally, should be heard only with somebody shouting “Nigel” in the background. (Mercy, Mercy, Mercy – Cannonball Adderley – at least it sounds like Nigel to me).

In my modest opinion, if Mingus had really wanted his musicians to relax as if they were in a club atmosphere, he should have invited an audience to dance, holler and start fights. Or maybe supply his men with viper, but that’s another story. We need a campaign – more live music in front of audiences prepared to demonstrate their enjoyment of what they’re hearing.