Music Jokes
You know you’re a
musician when...
Your phone is unplugged for 2 hours or more a day so
you can practice.
You are more worried about breaking a finger then
breaking a leg.
Bach is not just a funny sound you can make in your
throat.
Practicing chromatic scales becomes more fun then
bowling.
You spend more money on books, instrument supplies,
private lessons, and classes then rent, food, and bills combined and, you have
more then one job to pay for everything.
You dream about little sharps attacking flats and
whole notes falling in love with quarter notes.
The thought of taking a break, if only for a week,
sounds crazy and suicidal.
You listen to PDQ Bach and get all of the jokes.
That irritating song that's been running through your
head for two weeks is by Mozart.
You notice you are drumming your fingers on the table
to the rhythm of the classical music being played at the restaurant.
You walk down the hall singing Beethoven's 7th and
you wonder why people look at you funny.
You know and can recite all the musician jokes and
derivatives in score order!
Getting the sniffles is a true catastrophe.
You walk around conducting the Verdi Requiem, Dvorak
Requiem, Bruckner e-minor Mass, Beethoven 7, etc.,
and wonder why people are looking at you funny.
You can roughly translate any Latin text, but you've
never taken a Latin class.
Your co-workers can tell what you are listening to on
your headphones by the way you are typing.
You’re willing to shell out $16 for a score to
4'33".
You know what 4'33" is.
You know Tchaikovsky's full name AND all its
spellings.
You have played more instruments than the average
person can name.
You own
more in sheet music than CDs
You can define the difference between a sonata and a
concerto.
You know 101 jokes involving violas, French horns,
sopranos, or percussionists.
You know any jokes about players of any other
specific instruments or singers of other voice parts.
You took more semesters of foreign languages, which
you hardly ever use, than English.
You have expelled more hot air than your average
politician.
You actually cheered on the marching band in high
school.
You have ever played anything by Bela
Bartok.
You had carpal tunnel before computers became
popular, or have injured yourself more times sitting down than standing up.
You think
Someone hits a flat note and it causes you physical
pain.
You think triplets are cool. (They are!)
You actually notice the music in movies, and talk
about it more than the actual movie.
The person that you idolize lived in the 16th or 17th
century and is now "decomposing"
You try to figure out what note the school bell is
playing so you can tune your instrument.
You go to the Choir or Band Room before and after
school and during your lunch period just to hang out.
The custodian is working on the fire alarm and you
time it with your metronome.
You realize you can play your solo in time with the
fire alarm.
You hear a song you've played before and
automatically do the fingering.
You write alternative lyrics to the songs you play,
and the lyrics you write proclaim your Music Dorkiness.
You realize that although you know none of the
guys/girls in the school, you have 'gone out with' every guy/girl in the
Band/Orchestra/Choir.
You'd rather spend two and a half hours in the Choir
Room just waiting for your Rehearsal to start than go home and take a nap.
You go to the media center to cut out hearts for
Valentine's Day and you spend twenty minutes cutting out flutes, trumpets,
treble clefs, bass clefs, and musical notes.
You start to walk with someone and you fall into step
with them.
You carry a metronome, your sheet music, valve oil,
pitch pipe or drumsticks in your backpack.
You see other Musicians more than you see your
family,
Your online screen name involves the instrument you
play or the part you sing.
You beg your director for a tape of your pieces (and
end up waiting three weeks for it and subsequently turn cartwheels around the
room when you finally get it!).
You automatically know when a non-Band/Choir member
is in the band/choir room, and you'll stop at nothing until they get out.
You skip your lunch period to watch a year-old
You skip your lunch period because you
“need” to rehearse
You’ve ever appeared on stage in a
costume/outfit held together by safety pins and a hot glue gun
Someone comes to school Halloween carrying
newspapers, dressed in a green vest, khaki pants, and an old fashioned cap, and
you automatically know they're a Newsie. And you
start singing the songs from the movie.
More Music Jokes
What do you call a soprano who can sight read? An
Alto
What is the difference between a soprano and a rotweiller? Jewelry!
What is the difference between a soprano and a
terrorist? You can negotiate with a
terrorist!
What is the difference between a musician and a
savings bond? Eventually the bond will mature and earn money.
Q: How many sopranos does it take to screw in a light
bulb?
A: None, she'll stand at the piano drinking a diet
coke while she has her accompanist do it!
Q: How many
sopranos does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: One, she
holds up the light bulb, and the world revolves around her!
What's the definition of an optimist? A choral
director with a mortgage!
Why are conductor's hearts so coveted for
transplants? They've had so little use!
How do you know if a soprano is at your door? She
doesn't know when to come in!
A Beginner’s
Guide to the Choir
THE SOPRANOS are the ones who sing the highest, and
because of this they think they rule the world. They have longer hair, fancier
jewelry, and swishier skirts than anyone else, and they consider themselves
insulted if they are not allowed to go at least to a high F in every movement
of any given piece. When they reach the high notes, they hold them for at least
twice as long as the composer and/or conductor require, and then complain that
their throats are killing them and that the composer and conductor are sadists.
Sopranos have varied attitudes toward the other sections of the chorus, though
they consider all of them inferior. Altos are to sopranos rather like second
violins to first violins - nice to harmonize with, but not really necessary.
All sopranos have a secret feeling that the altos could drop out and the piece
would sound essentially the same, and they don't understand why anybody would
sing in that range in the first place - it's so boring. Tenors, on the other
hand, can be very nice to have around; besides their flirtation possibilities,
sopranos like to sing duets with tenors because all the tenors are doing is
working very hard to sing in a low-to-medium soprano range, while the sopranos
are up there in the stratosphere showing off. To sopranos, basses are the scum
of the earth - they sing too damn loud, are useless to tune to because they're
down in that low, low range - and there has to be something wrong with anyone
who sings in the F clef, anyway.
THE ALTOS are the salt of the earth - in their
opinion, at least. Altos are unassuming people, who would wear jeans to
concerts if they were allowed to. Altos are in a unique position in the chorus
in that they are unable to complain about having to sing either very high or
very low, and they know that all the other sections think their parts are
pitifully easy. But the altos know otherwise. They know that while the sopranos
are screeching away on a high A, they are being forced to sing elaborate
passages full of sharps and flats and tricks of rhythm, and nobody is noticing
because the sopranos are singing too loud (and the basses usually are too).
Altos get a deep, secret pleasure out of conspiring together to tune the
sopranos flat. Altos have an innate distrust of tenors, because the tenors sing
in almost the same range and think they sound better. They like the basses, and
enjoy singing duets with them - the bass’s just sound like a rumble
anyway, and it's the only time the altos can really be heard. Altos' other
complaint is that there are always too many of them and so they never get to
sing really loud.
THE TENORS are spoiled. That's all there is to it.
For one thing, there are never enough of them, and choir directors would rather
sell their souls than let a halfway decent tenor quit, while they're always
ready to unload a few altos at half price. And then, for some reason, the few
tenors there are, are always really good - it's one of those annoying facts of
life. So it's no wonder that tenors always get swollen heads - after all, who
else can make sopranos swoon? The one thing that can make tenors insecure is
the accusation (usually by the basses) that anyone singing that high couldn't
possibly be a real man. In their usual perverse fashion, the tenors never
acknowledge this, but just complain louder about the composer being a sadist
and making them sing so damn high. Tenors have a love-hate relationship with
the conductor, too, because the conductor is always telling them to sing louder
because there are so few of them. No conductor in recorded history has ever
asked for less tenor in a forte passage. Tenors feel threatened in some way by
all the other sections - the sopranos because they can hit those incredibly
high notes; the altos because they have no trouble singing the notes the tenors
kill themselves for; and the basses because, although they can't sing anything
above an E, they sing it loud enough to drown the tenors out. Of course, the
tenors would rather die than admit any of this. It is a little-known fact that
tenors move their eyebrows more than anyone else while singing.
THE BASSES sing the lowest of anybody. This basically
explains everything. They are stolid, dependable people, and have more facial
hair than anybody else. The basses feel perpetually unappreciated, but they
have a deep conviction that they are actually the most important part (a view
endorsed by musicologists, but certainly not by sopranos or tenors), despite
the fact that they have the most boring part of anybody and often sing the same
note (or in endless fifths) for an entire page. They compensate for this by
singing as loudly as they can get away with - most basses are tuba players at
heart. Basses are the only section that can regularly complain about how low
their part is, and they make horrible faces when trying to hit very low notes.
Basses are charitable people, but their charity does not extend so far as
tenors, whom they consider effete poseurs. Basses hate tuning the tenors more
than almost anything else. Basses like altos - except when they have duets and
the altos get the good part. As for the sopranos, they are simply in an
alternate universe which the basses don't understand at all. They can't imagine
why anybody would ever want to sing that high and sound that bad when they make
mistakes. When a bass makes a mistake, the other three parts will cover him,
and he can continue on his merry way, knowing that sometime, somehow, he will
end up at the root of the chord.
Yogi
Berra Explains Jazz
Interviewer:
Can you explain jazz?
Yogi: I can't, but I will. 90% of all jazz is half
improvisation. The other half is the part people play while others are
playing something they never played with anyone who played that part. So if you
play the wrong part, its right. If you play the right part, it might be right
if you play it wrong enough. But if you play it too right, it's wrong.
Interviewer: I don't understand.
Yogi: Anyone who understands jazz
knows that you can't understand it. It's too complicated. That's
what's so simple about it.
Interviewer: Do you understand it?
Yogi:
No. That's why I can
explain it. If I understood it, I wouldn't know anything about it.
Interviewer: Are there any great jazz
player alive today?
Yogi: No. All the great jazz players
alive today are dead. Except for the ones that are still alive. But so many of them are dead, that the ones that are still alive
are dying to be like the ones that are dead.
Interviewer: What is syncopation?
Yogi: That's when the note that you should hear now happens either before or after you
hear it. In jazz, you don't hear notes when they happen
because that would be some other type of music. Other types of music can
be jazz, but only if they're the same as something different from those
other kinds.
Interviewer: Now I really don't understand.
Yogi:
I haven't taught you enough for you to not understand jazz that well.