Blessings on their heads, one and all. That’s Tamar Korn, vocals, impromptu dancing, mouth trumpet, air violin, percussive effects; Jake Sanders, banjo; Debbie Kennedy, string bass; Marcus Milius, harmonica; Dennis Lichtman, clarinet, electric mandolin; Gordon Au, trumpet.
I cherish them all: their passionate seriousness and rhythmic drive. Jake’s intelligent, quiet way of shaping an ensemble rather than letting everyone take two choruses; his powerful but never noisy playing. Debbie’s swinging pulse; her good cheer. Marcus’s intent candor. Dennis’s big tone and shapely phrases. Gordon, quietly majestic, roaming around in what I think are the most beautiful registers of the trumpet.
Tamar isn’t the only one singing in this band. And look at what a good time they’re having!
A thousand thanks to Paul Wegener for bringing the Cards to the Shambhala Meditation Center on 22nd Street, which will be hosting other swing dance groups in future — with the Cards scheduled for an August return (they’re the toast of Shanghai as I write this!). That’s http://ny.shambhala.org/music.php. The Shambhala Meditation Center Of New York is located at 118 West 22nd Street, 6th Floor, New York, New York 10011. Tel. 212-675-6544 Email: // info@shambhalanyc.org
Now, four more performances from February 27, presented with pleasure:
Here’s the very pretty and optimistic APRIL SHOWERS, a song that inspires Tamar to take chances (as she does beautifully in the last sixteen bars) and there’s a nice extended dialogue between Dennis and Gordon that is reminiscent in spirit of Jimmie Noone and Guy Kelly, circa 1935 Chicago:
I had never heard the verse to SUGAR BLUES. Another thing to be thankful to the Cards for! It’s always a good sign in a band when musicians are smiing at what their colleagues are playing, and joy is contagious here. Perhaps emboldened by Gordon’s utterly perverse reference to “It’s Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas” at the end of his first chorus, Tamar embarks on her own chorus of mouth trumpet, sounding like a particularly expressive Siamese cat:
What happens when the beat gets to you? CRAZY RHYTHM, of course. Honors here might go to Marcus and Jake, as well as the Korn Percussion Section. But be patient: there’s a rocking out-chorus to come:
A jaunty reading of I CAN’T BELIEVE THAT YOU’RE IN LOVE WITH ME, featuring an adventurous exploration by Gordon and Tamar and her Magic Violin (or the 101 Strings, made much more personal):
Delicious! And there’s more . . .
It’s possible that only bloggers will recognize my title, which refers to one of those activities that takes place behind the scenes, where a b logger can see a daily list of those words or phrases someone has entered into a search engine, usually Google, to find him or herself at my blog. 
