Tip Jar Jam #39 : Taking One For The Team

Murphy Henry

Today’s title is courtesy of Bob A. Last night he wanted Scott to sing Long Gone–so he (Bob) could play his recently-polished guitar break. I said, “What if I said you can either have Scott do Long Gone or you can sing Life’s Railway To Heaven? We don’t have time for both of them.” I thought for sure he would choose Life’s Railway To Heaven. (Which is what I would have done! Why do I always think people will react like me???? Hmmmm….Don’t answer that!) Instead Bob replied, “I don’t mind taking one for the team!” So we did Long Gone.

Later at the end of the evening, when we had time for one more, I asked, “Does anyone have a song they are just dying to do?” Bob A spoke up and said, “What about Your Love Is Like A Flower?” To which I asked, “So you can sing it?” To which Bob answered, “Well, yeah.” So I said, “Okay, this time the team will take one for you!”

Bob has been working hard on Your Love Is Like A Flower. This is the first guitar break I’d asked him to pick out on his own, from listening to Lester Flatt sing it. This was not an easy task for him, or anybody, but he was persistent as the devil. We’d been working on it, with him also doing the singing, in the Key of G. And week before last he pretty much had the picking and singing down pretty well. They just needed a little polish.

At this week’s lesson he comes in and says, “I’ve been working on Your Love Is Like A Flower. But I think I sing it better in D.”
And I will be durned if he didn’t capo up to the second fret and pick his entire break out of C position. Maybe you have to be a guitar player or a guitar teacher to realize what a monumental achievement that was. He played the whole break in a different position. And he’s only been playing guitar for a little over two years. I was so impressed and full of joy that tears came into my eyes. I was crying over a guitar break!

NOTE: I can’t resist this aside. And I realize I’m preaching to the choir. What Bob did–transpose a break into a totally different key–is where learning by ear will get you.

Unfortunately, Bob was wrong about the key. He sang it better in G. When you are practicing at home, especially if you are sitting down and casually playing, without a full head of steam, you can usually sing in a LOWER key. (Bob was singing in Low D.) But when you are on stage or in a jam, that low key that seemed so comfortable at home is usually too low, and sometimes WAY too low.

I made this painful discovery for the first time when I was in college. My roommate Sarah Lanier and I had worked up a few songs (two guitars) and had gone to a local pizza parlor to sing them, standing up, on a tiny stage. As soon as we started singing I’ll Fly Away, in the key we had rehearsed it, I realized that that key was WAY TOO LOW. So I actually had to stop the song and move the capo on my twelve-string to a higher key. (Embarrassing, but no one was listening so it really didn’t matter.) You really don’t know your key until you sing in full voice, standing up, preferably with other people playing with you.

Bob also sang New River Train, in the key of C. (Different songs require different keys.) That’s the one where the verses go: Darling you can’t love one. Then Darling you can’t love two. Then Darling you can’t love three, etc. As I mentioned in an earlier blog, I told Bob to keep his eye on Janis (the Janis Joplin poster across the room) which makes him hold his head up so we can hear him. He did fine except for slightly forgetting the second verse. But he did the Right Thing, which was to keep the rhythm going until he thought of the verse. Then he came in singing, “Darling, you can’t love two…

At the end of the song, I told him he did a good job. “Janis messed me up,” he said. “What do you mean?” I asked. “She made me forget the second verse,” he replied. “Oh,” I said, “I thought you were trying to remember what number came after one!” Bada bing!

There were other exciting moments in the jam: Kasey played her high break to I Saw The Light (in C, capoed 5) for the first time and nailed it. I thought Ben was going to burst with pride. Scott asked me if I wanted Bobby to sing Iron Curtain and, without even thinking, I said, “God no!” Thereby starting a long conversation on why I don’t like the song Iron Curtain. Even if Lester and Earl did do it. (Listen to it and see what you think. Even the “hook” of the “iron curtain” is outdated, left over from the Cold War.) Instead I got Bobby to sing You Go To Your Church And I’ll Go To Mine which everyone agreed was a Good Song. Almost everyone improvised a banjo break. The “short” two-beat D chord in the middle gave trouble, so we decided we would play the break with a “long” four-beat D, which is a perfectly acceptable bluegrass way of tweaking the break.

I could do on, but I’ve got to pack and get ready to drive to Georgia. Family business. This will be the first time I’ve seen all four of my sisters in a long time. I’ll be listening to some good bluegrass music on the trip down. The Daughters of Bluegrass have released a 3-CD boxed set which is delicious–great picking and singing. And Laurie Lewis has produced a new CD of excellent original songs from Alice Gerrard. The production work is magnificent. And to balance out all this bluegrass, I just picked up a Motown compilation at Starbucks. Next to bluegrass, I like Motown the best!!! Aretha, Otis, Percy Sledge…..great stuff. “Sitting in the morning sun / I’ll be sitting when the evening comes / Watching the ships roll in / And then I watch ’em roll away again / Sitting on the dock of the bay……”