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BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes
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BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes |
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Subject: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Fortunato Date: 08 Jan 02 - 04:07 PM Click for the 'PermaThread™: List of all joke threads'I was sharing this story with JohnDLoudermilk, when I decided it might make an interesting thread:
Back in the late 60's country singer and songwriter Don Gibson was pals with John D. Loudermilk, Nashville songwriter. Gibson was a large man, maybe 6'3", 250 lbs. He had these incredibly piercing, vividly blue eyes. Well, when Halloween rolled round Don rented himself a Dracula costume, got a set of plastic fangs and set off to play a little prank on ol' John D. He slipped into his buddy's house, crept into his bedroom in his best "Bela Lugosi" accent and woke up John D at 2:00am, declaring his intention to 'bite JohnD's neck'. As you can imagine Loudermilk came right out of his skin, damn near scared to death.
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Rick Fielding Date: 08 Jan 02 - 05:06 PM Hey Chance, my LIFE'S been a practical joke! I may be the only human being, who during his wedding, had the best man declare to room full of dour Scots, "Well I'm glad to see that Rick has finally taken SOMETHING seriously"! I'm sure that filled Heather's relatives with confidence in her choice of husband material. One of my favourite stories concerns my friend Luthier/picker/singer Grit Laskin and his Volvo. This happened many years ago. Grit was apparently very proud of his car and kept telling his friends how economical it was, gas-mileage wise. Ace practical joker and top notch Glasgow singer Tam Kearney decided to help the economical part along. Apparently every night for many weeks, he'd sneak a pint or so of gas into the Volvo's tank....resulting in a car that NEVER ran out of petrol! Don't know how long it took for Grit to figure it out...but apparently he was pretty confused (albeit pleased) for many days. Rick |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Clinton Hammond Date: 08 Jan 02 - 05:13 PM I think it weas Stephen Fearing told the tale about a certain guitar player who was reknown for hard playing and LOOOOOOOONG breaks... While he was on break, one of his side men filed down his strings right at the bridge, so when he picked up the guitar, and strummed his first chord back from break, ALL the strings blew! 20 minutes more break! LOL!!!! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Deckman Date: 08 Jan 02 - 05:34 PM Rick ... I can match your car story. One hundred years ago, when I worked at a previous job, we had a boss who spent weeks researching a possible car purchase, based on the best possible mileage. This was during the NIXON gas wars. He got his new car and started parking it in the employee parking lot. We all started adding a little gas, now and then. But we all did it individually, we didn't know that anyone was doing it except ourselves. "Gerry" started getting gas mileage readings like 20, 30, 40, 50 ,56 miles to the gallon!. When we realized that we ALL were doing the same thing, we all stopped at the same time. His mileage plunged back into the teens. Jerry hollered on the dealer and took the car back. We all had to share the burden of driving "Jerry" to work and back to home. One of things I've always appreciated about "Jerry", he was a very good man, was that after the story came out, he bought us all a beer. True story. CHEERS, Bob |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Rick Fielding Date: 08 Jan 02 - 05:58 PM Well, I'm not sure if Chance wanted X-rated stories, but here's a true one from about twenty years ago. The names of the participants will definitely NOT be mentioned! I had a five piece Country/Bluegrass band and we were working a three week gig at a posh hotel out of town. Being a chatty soul I got to know one of the call girls who frequented the lounge every night. She loved the music, and was becoming somewhat of a friend. During our last week, I asked her if she'd participate in a practical joke on our banjo player. Myself and the other three guys chipped in 25 bucks each ('cause like us..she WAS a professional) and after the last set of the evening she sidled over to the (quite shy, young and single) victim. She allowed as how she was SO attracted to him that she HAD to spend some time with him in his Hotel room, before he left town for good. The rest of us eavesdropped as best we could, while packing up, and she was really laying it on thick! From a distance, he gave us a bit of a shy wink, and disappeared into the lobby with her. The next morning, we all bombarded him with questions about his passionate encounter. He seemed flustered but eventually told us: That was SOOO weird guys. We got to my room, she got undressed...and she was SOOOO beautiful, and all of a sudden she says to me "I Love your guitar playing". I reminded her that I was the BANJO player....and all of a sudden she gets dressed, and says "I've NEVER slept with a banjo player and I never WILL! I've still got some pride left!" Then she just stomped out. We all looked quizzical, and commiserated with him, but we NEVER told him he'd been set up. Ever. Rick |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Jeri Date: 08 Jan 02 - 06:05 PM Wonder what would have happened if he'd just said "Gosh, thanks." |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Deckman Date: 08 Jan 02 - 06:10 PM Rick ... AGAIN I can match your story. (You don't suppose that we're really brothers under the skin?) Way back in High School, and we really did have them back then, a bunch of us guys set up our mutual friend "George" with a very populiar girl. That particuliar evening made legends! Many years later, after "George" had married and divorced several times, he and I reconnected. Bride Judy and I went to a private dinner with he and his new wife. As we started telling tales, the story of that high school "set-up" came out! I was completly floored when Don's new wife casually asked, "You know, I've heard about her ... what can you tell me? about her?" SSSHHHHEEEUUUHHH! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Rick Fielding Date: 08 Jan 02 - 06:55 PM Nah Bob...It's just our AGE! Here's one that I've heard so many times from reliable sources I KNOW it must be true. The late Ed McCurdy, while doing a weekly show for CBC (Canadian Broadcasting Corporation) in the fifties, would get annoyed when the cafeteria was jammed and he was trying to get lunch. Apparently he'd break into the bawdiest song he knew (at top volume) and the women (and probably the men too, 'cause it WAS the fifties) would grab their trays and beat a hasty retreat out of the cafeteria, into another room. Rick |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: catspaw49 Date: 08 Jan 02 - 07:01 PM I was working as a rep out of our Knoxville branch in 1981 and the Regional Manager was a young and ambitious sort who had been "aided" by the Divisional Director in his climb. Both were pretty straight and serious types which was a bit unusual for the company. A lot of the management of which I was later a part as well as the reps were pretty off the wall.....I fit right in. A group of us always stopped at a table dancing joint after monthly sales meetings and we had a few of the girls who knew us pretty well. When the Christmas Party came up, the Regional manager was anxious to impress his "mentor" and invited him to this big bash he had planned.for the region. After the November meeting we were at the"Mouse's Ear" and one of the guys suggested we hire one of the girls, but I suggested the joke would be better if I took her as my date. One of the girls thought it was a funny idea and for a few $$$ she went along as my date. Friends, it was a great night. After a fine meal and various presentations the DJ that had been hired started his set and B*** went into her act, stripped nude, on the tables and all. The wives who were there were in on it and the other guys had elected not to bring theirs! I tried to play it straight, but it wasn't happening and everyone except the manager and his mentor were literally on the floor. I damn near choked to death laughing. The looks on their faces was priceless. Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: GUEST Date: 08 Jan 02 - 09:56 PM I always liked the story that one year for a rehearsal of the National Youth Orchestra some unknown placed a playboy pinup in the music for first violins at a passage where they had to turn the page fast and keep on playing. Apparently they stumbled in that section. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Steve Latimer Date: 08 Jan 02 - 10:16 PM Rick, When's the book coming out? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: English Jon Date: 09 Jan 02 - 11:38 AM Most of the vln1s in NYO are girls actually. EJ |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Hrothgar Date: 10 Jan 02 - 05:59 AM I remember the singer/guitarist at a local pub who sang a wide range of stuff (it was a pub gig, after all). One night he started reciting "The Shooting of Dan McGrew." He went on, with very few people paying any attention, until he got to the bit about the derro coming in out of the night and sitting down at the piano ".. my God! how that man could play." The he went straight into "The Piano Man" - and guess how many people noticed? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: GUEST Date: 10 Jan 02 - 06:58 PM Back before the days of Politically Correct, military instructors had lots of gimmicks for keeping the class awake and on task. Since I taught electronics and usually had a schematic projected on the wall or chalkboard to trace signal flow, things could get really dull if you weren't the one doing the tracing. Additonally our classrooms usually were ovedrheated ans stuffy. I discovered that you could take pictures from magazines printed on glossy stock, like Playboy, stick the face to clear gummed plastic, like laminating plastic, and wash everything but the ink, and of course, the picture, off the plastic, leaving you a very eye catching slide for an overhead projector. This in the days waaaaay before color copying. I used to have one or two of these pix in my box of overhead slides, and when things got a bit sleepy, I'd slap one on the overhead, wait for the inevitable gasp, and replace it with an authorized slide. Those sleeping would be awakened by the gasp, and wondering what they'd missed, stay awake for the rest of the period. I have also been known to drop metal trash cans beside the desk of a habitual sleeper. The most efffective trick was to get the whole class to get up as quietly as possible, and go for a break at the snack bar, leaving the sleeper in peace. Dave |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Peter Kasin Date: 11 Jan 02 - 01:02 AM This one occured at a Scottish music concert in California. Harper and piper Chris Caswell told a drawn-out joke to Donnie MacDonald, of Men Of Worth, at a Scottish music camp where he was teaching gaelic songs. The joke involved a bear and a hunter, where this hunter tries to shoot a bear numerous times, and is sexually molested by the bear each time. The punchline is when the hunter backs into the bear, and the bear says "you don't come here for the hunting, do you." (just the joke's synopsis, not a proper telling). Anyway, several months later, Chris is playing on stage, and who walks onto the stage from the wings behind him while Chris is playing harp, but Donnie MacDonald in a full bear suit, and taps Chris on the shoulder! Chris turns around, and immediately goes into a stomach-holding fit of laughter. The audience had know idea what it was all about. -chanteyranger |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Gary T Date: 11 Jan 02 - 01:26 AM Dave's story reminds me of a biology professor saying "If you fall asleep in my class, don't do it with your mouth open, because I like to see if I can toss a piece of chalk in there." Which he proceeded to do. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Bonnie Shaljean Date: 11 Jan 02 - 11:47 AM One of my favourites is about a snotty opera diva whose high-handed manner made enemies of all the stage hands; and after one too many displays of prima-donna temperament they got their revenge. At the very end of the opera, her character commits dramatic suicide by jumping off a high castle wall, after which the curtain falls. But unfortunately for her, it didn't fall quite soon enough. In backstage reality there was a built-up platform with a soft mattress on it, which was meant to catch her as she landed, having just disappeared forever from sight. But on this particular night the crew removed both platform and mattress, and at ground-level they substituted a trampoline – you can guess the rest. She bounced back into the audience's view so many times that they caught the spirit of the whole caper and started shouting Encore Encore each time she re-appeared. She's meant to have sued the opera company for loss of earnings because after that she could never sing Tosca or any other tragic role again: the minute people thought of her they just started laughing. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: GUEST,DaveC Date: 11 Jan 02 - 01:07 PM Mt favorite is one I heard of when I worked in ad agencies in the late sixties. It concerned a guy in a New York ad agnecy twenty years earlier than THAT, which was before JFK put an end to men in suits wearing hats. The man was a self-important type, and one day he came back to teh office with a custom-made hat which he bragged about. Several employees chipped in, went to the hatmaker and bought two more hats exactly like it, only one was a couple sizes smaller, the other just as much too large. All three hats had identical labels on the inside, which had even had the guy's name on it. Obviously, the joke was to substitute one of the non-fitting hats for the right one and keep switching them around -- mixing the original in, too. It's not hard to imagine what it looked like or, for that matter, what must have gone through the guy's mind. I am not sure how it came out. I do not know if this story is true or not, but I diod hear it in the late sixties from a co-worker who would go into my boss' office every day when the boss wasn't there and give the height-adjustment knob on his chair a quarter-turn. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Fortunato Date: 11 Jan 02 - 01:38 PM The story about the opera singer gives new meaning to the old saw "Always look before you leap". (Wait, don't throw that, I couldn't help myself) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: alanabit Date: 11 Jan 02 - 06:58 PM Back in the early eighties, busking with my mate Pete Oswald, a big guy with the sort of voice your mum likes from Texas, we would constantly wind each other up. Because we were playing in Cologne, very few people used to catch the lyrics of the songs, which we subjected to horrible abuse. For instance, when Pete was trying to look straight-faced as we warbled the two part harmony of the Everyls' "Dream", I would come out with something like, "When I turn blue in the night"... I would never have to wait long for his revenge. He always corpsed me with something similar at the next opportunity. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: GUEST,Ian Darby Date: 11 Jan 02 - 09:21 PM We got to the gig, set up, tuned up, did the soundcheck and wandered off for a drink. Just as we were walking on stage our roadie tapped me on the shoulder and said that the tuning pegs on my Strat were untidy and he'd 'lined them up all nice for me.' And he had.
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: Nerd Date: 12 Jan 02 - 03:31 AM John Martyn and Danny Thompson used to tour together years ago, and John has told many stories of practical jokes. One involved flying to Australia or some other far-off (from England) place for a tour. When they got there, they'd be totally jet lagged. One time, John let Danny fall asleep, then set the hotel room clock eight hours ahead. He went down to the lobby of the hotel and called Danny on the phone, waking him up after only about twenty minutes of sleep. "Man, where the hell are you?" he asked. "We've got to leave in ten minutes, get your arse to the lobby!" Danny looked at the clock and panicked. John hid himself in some corner while Danny, bleary-eyed and staggering with exhaustion, emerged from the elevator and wandered around the lobby with his double bass, looking like he'd burst into tears any moment. Cruel, yes, but funny... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: RoyH (Burl) Date: 12 Jan 02 - 07:54 AM When I was 14 I made some notices reading 'Please Use Other Door'. Then, under cover of darkness, I went around sticking them in phone boxes, the old fashioned red ones, with only one door. It was great fun to watch people trying to find the 'other' door. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: marty D Date: 12 Jan 02 - 11:32 AM This may not be up to 'pro' practical joke standards but it sure had me buffaloed for quite a while. For many years myself and some friends would play music on weekends at each others houses. There was always enough non-players to make up an appreciative audience. I had SO much trouble staying in tune a lot of the time, that it almost drove me crazy, and when my buddy suggested better tuning pegs, an electronic tuner and even a new guitar, I'd listen. One night I found out WHY I couldn't seem to stay in tune. Every time I'd turn my head around my buddy would reach over and loosen one of my tuning pegs! He must have gotten really good at it because no one in our little audience ever noticed. (I think) They WOULD have told me what he was doing, wouldn't they? marty |
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Subject: RE: BS: Great Performer Pranks, practical jokes From: harpgirl Date: 12 Jan 02 - 11:44 AM When I was a disc jockey on "KUAF 89 FM in Fayetteville Arkansas", the station manager, whose name was Rick, was a big practical joker. I was reading a PSA about the local carnival and he sidled up to the glass on the other side of the booth and took off his right shoe and pantomimed that it was a roller coaster ride going down the last hill and with his left hand he hoisted a glass of water and threw it in his own face! Of course I had to turn off the mics while I howled... |