Nice Compliments that you have had

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: trevek
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 03:18 PM

A respected musician (then) living in Galway asked me to learn a song her father always sang, because she liked my singing.

Shane MacGowan gave me a quid when I was busking (and he was sober-ish)and more Pogues followed with contributions.

An old Uillean (sp?) piper heard me busking with my bodhran and (I am told) commented, "well at least he has the damn thing in tune".

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Dan Schatz
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 02:59 PM

Late one night at a gathering I stayed up and wrote a new song - "Bring the Morning Home." When I played it the next morning, Kendall Morse asked where the song came from. "Oh, I actually made that up last night," I said. He looked at me hard. "You just wrote that song last night?" he asked. "Yes." He stared at me again, a look of pure disgust on his face, and said, "I hate you."

I was walking on air for a week.

Dan

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: banjoman
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 11:08 AM

I once gat a school report that stated "Musically speaking this pupil is dead from the neck up" which I always regarded as a back handed sort of compliment as it made me determined to "become" a musician which some would say I never did as I concentrated on playing the banjo and more recently in making them.

Puts me in mind of one of my all time favourite songs "Compliments returned"

pete

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 02:41 AM

I often get called the best mandolin player in our band, number one in a field of one.

eric

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: GUEST,Jeff
Date: 08 Jun 08 - 12:16 AM

In the mid 70s I had the great fortune to open for Martin, Bogen and the Armstrongs at The Earl Of Old Town in Chicago. Upon my arrival in the back room Carl Martin and Ted Bogen were jamming on 'Sweet Georgia Brown'. As I stood there listening Carl said, "Boy, don't just stand there, break out that GIT-tar...we need some he'p!" I obliged and we jammed on SGB for about 20 minutes...swapping licks. I didn't take a lead break until Carl, sort of gestured to me that it was my turn. Very nervous to say the least I took a turn...then another...then another as Carl kept nodding towards me when I was about to go back on rhythm. Finally, Ted took a turn and let me off the hook. Then we swapped around for another 10 minutes or so. After we ended the song Carl looked over at Ted and said, "This boy's been doin' his homework." Ted said, "Sho'nuff, Carl." Then he kicked off 'Ain't Misbehavin' and we jammed on THAT for 15-20 mins. I'm not the best guitarist in the world by quite a margin, but I would've wept had I not been so busy trying to justify Carl's esteem. In many ways I still am...what a gracious gesture from one of the greats to a scared, young man.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: jacqui.c
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 09:42 PM

I'm writing this because my better half has threatened to do it if I don't. I find anything like this difficult to do as I was always taught to keep the 'light under a bushel' as a child.

Kendall and I took part in a Utah Phillips benefit a few weeks back. also on the bill were Michael Cooney, Jay Peterson, Scott Alaric, Gordon Bok and a few other professionals.

We did our bit just before the interval, after Michael and Jay and I was really concerned that, after two such good performers, our two numbers were going to be a bit of an anti-climax. During the interval a number of people came up and told us how much they enjoyed the two numbers we did. Mary was dealing with CD sales and had one lady come up and ask if Jacqui Morse was on the Kendall Morse CD that we had for sale!

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Don Firth
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 05:06 PM

One evening in the early 60s I was singing at one of Seattle's nicer coffeehouses. It was late, approaching the 1:00 a.m. closing time, and I was doing my last set. There were about a dozen people still there, mostly couples. In keeping with the general atmosphere, I was singing some of the quieter songs, and I decided to end the set with a classic guitar solo. I played Romance de Amor, the Vincente Gomez arrangement that he had played in a couple of movies, notably "Blood and Sand," a 1941 bullfight movie starring Tyrone Power, Linda Darnell, Rita Hayworth, and Anthony Quinn.

When I finished, there was no applause. There was long pause, then they all got up and began to file out. As they did so, several of them came up to me and thanked me for the music.

Sometimes no applause is better.

Don Firth

P. S. That's not me in the video. But he does a pretty fair job of it.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Joe Offer
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 04:46 PM

When I was in fifth grade, I had a crush on our choir director, Sister John Bosco. She said that Ronny Benedict and I, the choir's two altos, were "really sharp." I thought that was such a nice compliment - until I reached about the age of 40 and found out what she had meant.

-Joe, heartbroken-

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: CupOfTea
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 04:39 PM

In my early days singing I attended Irish week at Augusta and took a ballad singing class with Frank Harte. There were some heavy hitters in that group- voices that could fill a concert hall and repertoires that could fill a library. I had neither, and could barely sing in public. I was so nervous.

After one go round, I was rather dismissively asked to not waste our time by singing again. I was moderately mortified, but I'd rather have listened to anyone else sing, any rate, as I'd come to learn.

Fast forward a decade, it's Irish week at Augusta again. This time I'm there as a crafts teacher. At an informal singing session on the patio outside the dorm, I screwed up my courage and sang "Thousands or More." Frank Harte was among those who sang along. After, he made some comment to the effect that had been lovely, hadn't heard that song in quite awhile. Now, while it wasn't what anyone there would have seen as a huge compliment, merely knowing that I could hold my own in that company was heady stuff & made my week.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: frogprince
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 04:28 PM

As to musically related: Ive had a few people ask my wife where she got "that great song" when they didn't know I'd written it. (I'm a non-performer). A respected Canadian singer-songwriter looked over my website a couple of years ago, and commented "You don't just write songs that rhymne; you write songs that reach out and grab people by the heart". But the one that brought tears to my eyes was when one of our Mud-ladies told me that, as soon as her little niece woke up from her nap, she was going to start teaching her one of my songs.
Non-musically-related: I saw a former fellow student, and within a few minutes he said, "I really like your poem about the waitress in the all-night cafe"; he would have heard it once, about three years before that.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: lefthanded guitar
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 04:21 PM

I was at a big song circle on Long Island, and there were some very VEry accomplished local 'pros' singing. I never considered myself in their league,mostly I just sing and play for the fun of it . And I don't have a smooth, professional type voice or style, but I do sing from the heart. So it took some nerve for me just to sing with the highly talented people in attendance. (I may not show it, but I have a shy streak)

As he was leaving, Oscar Brand came over to me and said in my ear,
"You are the best singer here."

Kinda made my day. If not my year.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: meself
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 04:07 PM

"Why dost thou waste thy sweet gift on these mortal men? Wilt thou never return to the Olympian home of the undying gods?"

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Don Firth
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 04:00 PM

Walt Robertson attended Haverford College in the late 1940s, and just down the road apiece was Swartmore College, where some monumental folk festivals were held. Walt mentioned hearing such performers as Lead Belly, Richard Dyer-Bennet, John Jacob Niles, Pete Seeger, and other legendary figures—well before the big folk revival burst on the scene in the late 1950s. This may very well have been where Walt's interest in folk music was born.

He told me that he knew a fellow there named Cletus Otis Oakes (Oakes usually signed his name "CO2"). When Oakes got married, Walt was at the wedding. So were several major folk music figures, including John Lomax (Walt wasn't specific as to whether this was John Lomax Senior or Junior, but I got the impression that it was Senior, which would have made in about 80 and very close to the end of his life). Lomax had known both the bride and the groom for a long time.

In the reception line, Lomax shook hands with the groom and kissed the bride, then stood there, looking them up and down appraisingly. He then said, "Well . . . ya both coulda done better!"

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Betsy
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 03:51 PM

To Phil Edwards ... although the thread relates to " nice "...just to extend on what you said,I think the biggest compliment is when you hear someone perform (who took the time and effort to learn your words and music) performing something that you wrote. Now THAT is a buzz!!!!

Cheers Betsy

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: The Sandman
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 03:48 PM

message: Hello Dick, I have been listening to your CD "Around the Harbour Town" for weeks now as I have been dashing around Vancouver BC getting our 58' gaff-rigged wooden schooner ready for an extensive off-shore cruise. You might be interested to know that the CD has helped me through many long days of traffic jams. I love the music, the arrangements, the choice of songs. Thank you. Someday perhaps we will meet. We do maritime Music and other stuff too. My grandfather was from Yorkshire (Ripon). I am a Morris Dancer and I love the traditional Brit. stuff. I am particularly delighting in the sheep-shearing song. Did you write Jack the Lad? Wow! That is a great song. Gotta dash right now. We are leaving Vancouver tomorrow and there's a lot of stowing to be done. (to California, Mexico, Marquesas, Australia) We are letting lots of folks know about your music. So you might get some e-mails from points south in the future. All the best.
   I received this e mail on 30 may,and was really cheered up particularly that someone liked one of my own songs.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Don Firth
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 03:31 PM

Back in the early 1970s, my mother wanted to visit an old friend she hadn't seen for years, a woman she went to nursing school with in the "way-back-when." The woman lived in Portland, and I had a couple of free days, so I drove Mom down to Portland. She suggested that I bring my guitar along, so I did.

Lillian, Mom's friend, was married to a fellow named Jim Bell. Very Scottish.

I was prevailed upon one evening to drag the guitar out and sing a bit, so I did. Jim asked me if I knew any Scottish songs. I said I knew a few—folk songs, ballads, that sort of thing—and then I went through my Scottish repertoire, including "Bonnie Dundee," "MacPherson's Lament," and a few others.

Afterwards, when Jim was out of the room for a few minutes, Lillian said to me, "You've made Jim very happy. Thank you. But I'm afraid you've also made him very homesick for Scotland. He's been asking me to go to Scotland with him for a trip, so I guess I'll just have to go with him. I think I'd like that. I know he would."

And Mom told me afterwards that while I was singing "Bonnie Dundee," Jim's eyes got a bit moist and he surreptitiously brushed away a tear.

The consensus of the ladies was that the songs had really touched Jim. I hope that was it. I'd hate to think that I was so gawdawful that I'd made him cry!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Ythanside
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 02:44 PM

An old guy stopped me to say that my rendition of the song I'd just performed had been his grandfather's favourite party piece, and that he'd not heard it sung so well for almost fifty years. I enjoyed the buzz so much that I couldn't bring myself to spoil it by telling him that I'd written the melody and lyrics a mere few months earlier.

The nicest back-handed compliment I've had was from a group of WWII veterans who loved an army song I'd published, but insisted that I couldn't possibly have written it as I had never been in any branch of the military.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: bankley
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 02:30 PM

once after jamming all night with Stephen Stills... he said, "Ya wannna do another line?"

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: kendall
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 02:02 PM

All I did was repeat what I was told. Ego had nothing to do with it.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: fat B****rd
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 01:45 PM

I got some new glasses this week. My 3 year old grandaughter said Iwas now 'beautiful granddad' and her 4 year old sister said I was now a 'cool dude'

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Dave Roberts
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 01:44 PM

1: When Bob Webb, a performer I had admired for years, asked me to join with him to create firstly Roberts and Webb and now (with Ian Murfitt) 'Lost In The Mist'.

2: When Les Barker told me how much he liked 'All This Was Fields' (a rough equivalent, for all you musos, would be Bob Dylan telling you he liked one of your songs).

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Alice
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 01:42 PM

My nicest musical compliment came from Jean Ritchie.
"It is always good to hear the old songs sung again; it is
even better to hear them sung without artifice and
modern-day trappings; it is almost unbelievable, in this day
and age, to hear them sung as Alice Flynn sings them - a
simple telling of the story in a fine clear voice, conveying
respect for the music and at the same time superbly
entertaining her listeners." ~Jean Ritchie
THANK YOU, JEAN!

Alice

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Phil Edwards
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 01:32 PM

A couple of people have told me they really like that song I did the other time they saw me - unfortunately they weren't able to remember which one...

As a songwriter, there's one phrase that always hits the spot (and I have had it said to me a few times):

"Did you write that?"

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: bankley
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 12:53 PM

I was once told that I smell like an old man.... (of no particular colour)

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Frank_Finn
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 12:35 PM

March 2006 Sunday 2:00pm in a bar in Clonmany , Co. Donegal during the Inishowen Singing Weekend. Slightly hungover and drinking just water I sang "Carndaisy". After I finished Mick Quinn from Mullaghban shook my hand and said "A good song , well sung"
That was enough for me.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: dwditty
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 12:32 PM

I have been told that I sound like an old black guy.

dw

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Ebbie
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 12:27 PM

I was told once: You sure know a lot of interesting people.

I'll take that.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Murray MacLeod
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 12:21 PM

I still remember the first open mike I played in the States, somewhere in Massachusetts, must have been 1997-98, and the MC came up to me afterwards and said, "Hey, that was awesome".

I was totally blown away by this, it was only later during my sojourn in the US that I realised that "awesome", far from being the huge compliment that I had imagined, was simply US-speak for "reasonably good".

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: meself
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 11:57 AM

"My girlfriend really likes your hat. She wants to know where you got it."

(From the male half of a Japanese couple who had been paying very close attention to me while I was busking ... )

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: GUEST
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 09:10 AM

I was told that I was gorgeous.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 09:06 AM

My wife divorced her first husband because his playing drove her nuts. She's been married to me for twenty years now.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: john f weldon
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 08:38 AM

For balance I must add this comment on one of my films on youTube:

"u aggot! u anker! eat it and die, u ballz is no more good facker!!!!!"

I'm not sure what it means either.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: john f weldon
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 08:28 AM

Boy, you've opened the door to a lot of egos. Well here's one of my favourites, cut and pasted from an e-mail. It's author, a philosophy prof who shows my film "To Be" to his students.

"I unashamedly tell them that I think it is absolute genius, and that its creator is a god."

Hoo boy, was I hard to live with after that. Just call me Thor.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: GUEST,Suffolk Miracle
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 08:24 AM

I once sang a song to Ken Loveless and he didn't criticise it. How many can say the same?

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Piers Plowman
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 07:55 AM

I don't like to boast, but I've been told that I have a great face for radio!

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: melodeonboy
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 07:53 AM

A few weeks ago, after my folk band, Ruff 'n' Reddy, had just finished playing at the Tudor Barn Folk Club in Eltham, a bloke came up to me and described us as "very unpo-faced". Now that's a compliment!

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: Leadfingers
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 07:52 AM

The best compliment I have had is to be asked to do paid gigs with people I respect as musicians !

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: treewind
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 07:40 AM

One of the most memorable I've had, from a very good musician that I'd worked with, was that I had 'big ears'. He was a beautiful example of that himself, acutely aware that, for the practitioner, music is more about listening than playing. Playing with people like that is absolutely magical: it's as you were communicating by telepathy and what you are playing together becomes greater than the sum of the parts.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: greg stephens
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 07:37 AM

Capn Birdseye: you did well with the fiver off Ronnie Drew. I only got 50p off Sharon Shannon when busking in Edinburgh.

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: kendall
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 07:32 AM

Eric Bogle told me that I sang his song, "The Band played waltzing Matilda" the way he wanted it sung.

Utah Phillips said he would never sing "Phoebe Snow" again after hearing me sing it. That's why he chose my version on his new 4 CD collection he calls his song book.

I sang Lorena for Pete Seeger and his comment was, "I never realized how lovely that song was, thanks for giving it back".

My Brother, my most vocal critic, said recently, while looking at a tape of Beginner's Luck, "That is one hell of a good recording."

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: The Sandman
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 06:55 AM

I was complimented on my playing of an air by a very famous Irish, Anglo player.
one of the best compliments was from Ronnie Drew[I was busking at the time]a fiver[not a bunch of fives].

Subject: RE: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: manitas_at_work
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 06:40 AM

I was once told I play the melodeon like a musical instrument.

Subject: Nice Compliments that you have had
From: GUEST,Shy_but_proud
Date: 07 Jun 08 - 06:37 AM

I don't often post as a guest but am on this.

I've had two compliments recently that I have really appreciated from people

The first was to be referred to by a person whose music and playing I respect a lot as "a musician". We were speaking about people we mutually know and he said "but you are a musician and however much they practice they never will be"

The second was somebody I hardly know (and who very rarely even speaks to anyone) who turned to me recently when I sang a song and said "I've never heard you sing a song that isn't interesting"

Both made my week

What compliments have you had that really meant a lot to you?