The Steel Guitar Forum

So, I've played more than a few bar-mitzvahs in the past with a variety of bands, but I have to say, this is a first.

The 'alter-ego' of my band Wholly Cats, which we call Haole Kats, was called a few weeks ago and asked to play for the adults' cocktail party for a young man's bar-mitzvah down in Boca Raton, Florida. Seems since he was three, they've gone to Hawaii every year, and it's one of his favorite places. It was at the Congregation B'nai Israel in Boca, and HOLY MOLY -- what a spread! They're were over 200 adults there (and a gazillion kids in another room with a DJ spinning whatever it is 13-somethings listen to these days). They must have dropped $20K, I'm guessing.

We decided to just go backporch style, so I just took my frying pan and my 5-watt Crate VC-508, and we had the upright bass and a uke. No P.A... we just played old hapa-haole tunes, and where there were vocals, we just did the old-fashioned "field holler" technique. It turned out to be just perfect, because they were all into talking/eating/drinking, and those that wanted to listen to a tune we did, just stood right there in front of us to listen. Got a ton of good comments from folks. Way cool to load in and out in 5 minutes!

And no -- there was no roasted pig or coconut shrimp.

Did you play Mauna Nagila?

And no poi but plenty of "oy." Rimshot please, Howard.

Playing a Bar Mitzvah - chump change.

The real money is in playing for a Bris. The "tips" are incredible!

Did you hear about the Rabbi who saved the foreskins from all the Bris' he performed? He sewed them together and made a wallet. When he rubbed the wallet it turned into a suitcase.


Rimshot!

Ha! Gerald, that's a long stretch of the imagination.

They could have hired these guys for the 13-year olds.

I'd love to see the groupies for this guy's band.

RIMSHOT!






Did you know that Don Ho, was actually Don Horowitz?

Ok Howard!! I knew you would come thru!!

BILL

Herb,

What a great video! You made my day.

One Bar-mitzvah that we played sticks out in my mind. Same deal, piles of kids somewhere else listening to "their music". We had gone over ahead of time several Jewish folk songs that we'd thought that the older crowd would want to hear. But our knowledge of them was limited and we would really be faking it. But then, what's new?

Anyway, while we were tuning up, an old man sitting in a front seat said to me, "Say young man, do you know the Wabash Cannonball?"

Wow. With that we knew we were home free. So we just did our regular line up and it worked fine.

It turns out that the man who was paying the bills had a daughter who wanted to be a country singer and she got up and did a few numbers. As I recall, she was quite good. She said it was the first time she ever sang with a band.

So even though the bash was for the son, it turns out that we were there for the daughter!. In fact, I don't think I ever saw the son.

My favorite part was hearing people greet each other with "Aloooooha!" and sounding like Fran Drescher.

They don't call Florida the sixth borough for nuthin'.

...and I thought the coal miner's wake I played at was unusual.
Nu...any yentas in designer grass skirts?

I won an old National tenor on ebay recently. It arrived today and what did I find in the case pocket? A yarmulkah. I wonder what job that guitar was last used on!

That wasn't a yamulkeh.

It was a liner for a coconut bra.

Only one side though!

The other side was given away as a souvenir.

There's that great scene in "Bird" where Charlie Parker plays a Bar Mitzvah. I was at an upscale Bar Mitzvah in L.A. and the entertainment was a large scale soul revue with multiple singers, a horn section, a B3, the whole enchilada. They were covering Sly Stone, James Brown, Motown stuff, etc. A high dollar band. When it came to the ethnic segment of the party (hora, lifting the chair and so on) this predominately African American group broke into their Klezmer set and it was like being in Poland in the 20's. These guys could play anything !!!

Marc Weller wrote:There's that great scene in "Bird" where Charlie Parker plays a Bar Mitzvah. I was at an upscale Bar Mitzvah in L.A. and the entertainment was a large scale soul revue with multiple singers, a horn section, a B3, the whole enchilada. They were covering Sly Stone, James Brown, Motown stuff, etc. A high dollar band. When it came to the ethnic segment of the party (hora, lifting the chair and so on) this predominately African American group broke into their Klezmer set and it was like being in Poland in the 20's. These guys could play anything !!!

Cool story. A very wise older musician told me way back when I was a kid to learn to play all styles, and never turn my nose up at any genre, because knowing the vocabulary of that genre might come in handy someday.

I think the mark of really professional working cover bands that play a wide variety of events is that ability to play in a multitude of styles, and do them justice.

I would guess most, if not all of those cats were busy working as studio players during the day, were great readers, and knew how to cover about any style, and sound authentic.

TJW

Todd,

Not to change the subject, but I have two of your CDs and noticed that one is almost exclusively Reso steel while the other (I'm guessing since the timbre is slightly metallic) is more Rick.

Are you also playing jazz NP in Wholly Katz with the same instruments?