Notes_Norton

But more musical than Lil Yachty. No offense intended. Rap is more poetry than music.

As guitar is my 7th instrument, I only use standard tuning. Anything else would be an invitation to play even more wrong notes.

Great Balls Of Fire — Jerry Lee Lewis

Me too! And I especially love all the Louis Prima LPs. The music was fun, and Sam Butera was a great sax player.

We do it in D, Mrs. Notes sings it. I put the guitar arpeggios on the backing track, as cues for her. I make my own backing tracks from scratch, and always try to put cues in. Why? Because the backing track won't follow us, and if someone comes up and distracts us, requesting a song or anything else, it's too easy to lose your place. The cues for major parts help. It turned out nice, and we got a great appreciation from the gal who requested it. I don't mind playing requests, and I, too, have had the same request more than once a night. As long as I'm gigging, I'm having fun, and making mortgage or dinner money. Live is good. Insights and incites by Notes ♫

We save that for after work. BTW, for quite a few years, a few times each year, and until a hurricane destroyed their clubhouse, we played at a nudist camp. Lots of ta-tas, but we didn't play naked. When we did our first gig there, we asked, and she said most of the bands don't play in the nude. I asked if they had a sense of humor, and the response was definitely yes. So Mrs. Notes bought a flesh colored unitard, and she dyed one of my t-shirts and a pair of skivvies to match my skin color. Then we cut out black cardboard rectangles and put them over our 'private' parts, and around sunglasses for our eyes, and went as censored nudes. It was a hit. After the initial, unusual moments, playing for naked people became quite natural. Insights and incites by Notes ♫

My dad, who played trumpet, violin, ukulele, and after he retired organ, loved all the big bands. He had an LP collection of Glenn Miller, Count Basie, Artie Shaw, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, and many others. Definitely Wonderful stuff. Insights and incites by Notes ♫

Me too. But it beats the alternative Insights and incites by Notes ♫

Harper Valley PTA — Jeannie C Riley

What? Over indulgence of intoxicating substances? Live music? Ladies flashing their ta-tas? What's not to like about that? OK, I live in Florida, so we don't OD on it. But I do get Mardi Gras themed gigs. Play music with my best friend and get paid at the end. What's not to like about that? Insights and incites by Notes ♫

Gee. And I thought I was being original. Oh well, late to the party again. Notes ♫

Thunder And Lightning — Chi Coltrane I've always liked this one. Anyone know the session sax player?

Money, (That's What I Want) — Barrett Strong (and plenty of covers)

We play dead people's music. When the then future Mrs. Notes and I started this duo in 1985, we picked the retirement market, which is big in our area of Florida. So we played songs by Glenn Miller, Duke Ellington, Frank Sinatra, and people from our parent's and grandparent's generation. Years later, same audience (grey hair and glasses) but it was Elvis, Beatles and those from our own generation. The only dead ones were the tragic losses from accidents, like Otis Redding falling from the sky in a plane crash, Hendrix O.D.-ing, or John Lennon getting shot by a crazy person. We're still playing the retirement audience, but now we're seeing so many of my peers going belly-up from old person causes. Although we learn new material, Adele, Zach Brown, Bruno Mars, Chris Stapleton and others, more and more of our songlist is filled with dead people's music. So I thought of a new name for our band, “Ghost-Buskers” (Who ya gonna call?) But we're well established under The Sophisticats and I paid for the trademark, so I guess we'll leave GhostBuskers to someone else (be sure to give us credit). Insights and incites by Notes ♫

As time goes on, I'm playing a lot more music made famous by people now dead.

I'm a ho. But a darn good one. The only song I really dislike to play is Yakety Sax. I learned it on the 1960s but after +60 years, and a generally boring piece of music, I'd rather not. But if requested, I'll shtick it up a bit, pretend the fingerings my body knows so well are difficult, and do a stage wipe of my brow when done. I'm a musician, and I'm an entertainer. When the song is interesting, I put on my musician's hat, and when it is not, I put on my entertainer's hat. But often, I've got them both on. Playing music should be fun, and it is. I goof off, play music, and get paid for it. Fortunately, Yakety is finally ceasing to be asked for. As I grew up, 2 songs were requested of me as a sax player. Yakety Sax and Night Train. I prefer Night Train for 2 reasons. (1) It's more of a song and leaves me room to improvise in the middle, and (2) tips. Night Train requesters tip better and more frequently. Yakety requesters seldom tip, and if they do, it's usually $1. Night Train folks typically do, and it's more like $5. I made a $60 tip for playing Night Train many years ago, best tip for an instrumental song that was requested to date. Insights and incites by Notes ♫

I Wanna Be Rich — Calloway

We just learn Neil's "Harvest Moon". And we haven't recorded it. We'll play it in public the first time tomorrow. It wasn't my choice, but a gal who comes to see us almost every week requested it, and if she supports us that much, we're happy to return the favor. We do have "Brown Eyed Girl" in the songlist. "The Girl From Ipenema" doen't get much play anymore, but we can still do it. If you're curious, an almost complete songlist is here: http://www.nortonmusic.com/cats/songlist.html Probably 80% are from requests. It keeps us working.