I' Hab' der Rhythmus

Some years ago I was living in Regensburg. One night, I went to see the World Saxophone Quartet perform at a local club. The place was packed.

At different points of the show, each member of the quartet would do an unaccompanied solo. When it came Julius' turn, he got the crowd clapping a simple beat, then started playing over the claps so that they came on beats two and four. And it swang.

But it apparently also confused the audience, and soon you could hear feet subdividing on one and three, with hands soon joining then supplanting the feet. Finally, the claps sounded all and only on beats one and three; the backbeat had been vanquished.

So, yeah, those Germans can be pretty square. Still, how cool is it that in a small town of 100,000 you could pack a house for the World Saxophone Quartet?