Comment: Philly Joe

The Voice of America’s John Birchard writes:

Your Philly Joe material reminded me of an evening back in the early
60s, a Monday Night at Birdland.

Joe had brought a quintet into the club. Following the obligatory
oratory by PeeWee Marquette, Jones—very clean in a hip three-piece Ivy
League suit—slid behind the drums and counted off the first tune, one
of those up-tempo bop jobs that discouraged amateurs from even thinking
of sitting in.

There’s Philly Joe, with one stick tucked under his arm, adjusting the
angle of the cymbals and tightening the head of the snare with his free
hand while never missing an accent on the complex chart with his other
extremities—and smiling a satisfied smile that said, (to me, at least)
“I got this thing covered, baby, stand back!” And, at the exact moment
the band reached the end of the head and arrived at bar one of the first
solo, Philly Joe finished his fine-tuning, put the second stick in hand
and gave his sideman a thunderous press roll as a launch pad. I couldn’t
help but laugh out loud at a terrific piece of show biz.