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Hey Gang, here's your second song-of-the-month from our May 24 recording session featuring an eight-piece from the normally enormous Panorama Brass Band. This one also includes Mark Rubin on banjo. So you could call it the “Panorama Brass 8+1.”
One of our first gigs as we began emerging from the COVID lockdown was for an online series produced by local real estate agency, Latter and Blum, called "At Home" in August, 2020. Remember, this was way before the vaccine when infection rates and mortality rates were still sky-high. You didn't leave your house without a mask and nobody was thinking about trying to hang out in public.
Anyway, remember our song-of-the-month from way back in September 2016, Enjoy Yourself? We recorded that one with my brother-in-law, Davis Rogan, sitting in on piano and singing. Plus he and I both wrote new verses and Davis offered a soliloquy concerning the "joie de vivre" of all the New Orleanians in diaspora after Katrina.
In fact, Enjoy Yourself is a song that lends itself to extemporaneous rhyming couplets, so I decided to see if I could come up with some new COVID-themed verses for that web-party I mentioned. Day of the gig I sat down with an ink-pen and a blank piece of paper and my first thought was, "this is too hard, I'm no good at writing lyrics." Then I proceeded to actually bang out some rather amusing rhymes!
I've been singing them since we started getting work again and I'd been wanting to record the new verses. This brass band session seemed like the perfect opportunity and, well, here you go. Give it a listen and let me know how it feels.
Thanks for all your support, tell two friends about "Good Music For You" and let's make a party, y'all!
lyrics
Enjoy Yourself (COVID Edition)
“Hey everybody, this is Ben Schenck from the Panorama BRASS Band here in New Orleans, Louisiana. These are weird and scary times but, you know what? You still gotta enjoy yourself.”
You can’t go out, you stuck at home
Just playin’ solitaire
Cuz all your work, and all your gigs
Just vanished in thin air
You check your feed, you find a link
To join some friends on Zoom
Then someone puts on Spotify and you dance
Around the room.
Everybody…
(Chorus)
Enjoy yourself, it’s later than you think
Enjoy yourself, while you’re still in the pink
The years go by as quickly as a wink
Enjoy yourself, enjoy yourself, it’s later than you think
Aurora! Enjoy yourself!
(Jack: Hey Ben, hey Ben
Ben: wha? Huh?
Jack: Can I smoke on this take?
Ben: Oh yeah, go ‘head Jack. Enjoy yourself)
You work from home and watch the kids
And pull out all your hair
But when it comes to your wardrobe
You’re pretty laissez-faire
Your deadline looms, the pressure mounts
You haven’t got a prayer
At least you get to do it all
In just your underwear
(Oh, look at y’all, so cute, struttin’ around in your little skimpies)
(Oh yeah Mark, go ‘head. Enjoy yourself.)
You’re doing great, you’re making bank
You’re raking in the cash
Cuz right before the virus hit
You bought up all the masks
You’d like to use your newfound wealth
To lend a helping hand
Might I suggest a couple of ways
To support your favorite band, yeah!
(Chorus)
"Yaaaaaaaay! Everybody! Enjoy yourself!
Don’t worry y’all, we’ll get through this. Maybe even sooner than you think."
credits
from Song-of-the-Month Club: Good Music For You,
track released July 1, 2022
Panorama BRASS Band:
Ben Schenck - Clarinet
Aurora Nealand - Alto Saxophone
Jack Pritchett - Trumpet
Nathan Wolman - Trumpet
Colin Myers - Trombone
Mark Rubin - Tenor Banjo
Jimmy Williams - Sousaphone
Boyanna Trayanova - Snare Drum
Chris Davis - Bass Drum
Music by Carl Sigman, with new lyrics by Ben Schenck
Arranged by Ben Schenck (Snack Daddy Music/ASCAP)
Publisher - Snack Daddy Music
Recorded by Mack Major on May 24, 2022 at Marigny Studios, New Orleans, LA, and edited on June 8 at Mack's home studio.
Lead vocal recorded, track mixed and mastered by Lu Rojas
Photo by Ben Schenck
Graphic design by Ben Schenck
Panorama Jazz Band / Panorama Brass Band - New OrleansNew Orleans, Louisiana
"New Orleans' genre fluid jazz band"
The Panorama Jazz Band and the Panorama Brass Band have
been working steadily in New Orleans and beyond since 1995. Many hundreds of nightclub gigs, festivals, weddings, crawfish boils and Mardi Gras parades have added to this community of musicians' collective experience, all of which they bring to each of their recordings....more
supported by 18 fans who also own “Enjoy Yourself (COVID Edition)”
I am very disappointed by the sound of this recording, it is cavernous and confused. I prefer by far the sound of their excellent studio albums. jpmorel
supported by 16 fans who also own “Enjoy Yourself (COVID Edition)”
Listen to this album and you will swear that you're hearing something recorded decades ago and it's not just because it was recorded straight to 78 rpm acetate. This French Caribbean meets New Orleans jazz album conjures the magic of a faraway time with it's authentic sounds and romantic, nostalgic and dreamy vibe. This is absolutely brilliant musicianship and artistry and one of my favorite albums. Jeudi
Originally sung by Holocaust survivors in Yiddish, Polish and French, this moving album is now available in a gorgeous LP package. Bandcamp New & Notable Apr 11, 2022
Raw black metal that brooks no compromises, this has all the ferocious guitars, lo-fi aesthetics and infernal howling you crave. Bandcamp New & Notable Jan 30, 2023