Nine Fingers by Thom August Page B

Paul. He tends to program the sets chronologically, from old to new. It’s not in exact order that way, but it
     has that feel. The first set is almost all Dixieland, traditional stuff, a nod to the old days when that’s all we could manage.
     I look up, and he’s got the trumpet upside down, dripping oil into the three valves, two drops each, and pumping the valves
     with the fingers of his other hand, getting things loosened up, as if it needed it. If I know him, and I probably know him
     better than just about anybody, he’s already spent half an hour cleaning and oiling the horn this afternoon. I’ll tell you:
     If it weren’t for the valve oil, you could drink champagne out of Paul’s trumpet and it’d be so clean you could tell the vineyard
     and the vintage.
    By the time I come out of this reverie, he’s finished reoiling the valves, and he runs them, checking, and tightens number
     two, just a hair. He turns toward the felt backdrop, slides in his quietest mute, an old aluminum Harmon, and starts to warm
     up, long tones, in an ascending scale, then runs, arpeggios, then trills and tonguing drills, classical shit right out of
     the Arbans book, no melody, no tempo. He’s not warming up his head, just his embouchure and his fingers. He knows enough not
     to tune up until he’s warmed up, because until he is, the sound is a little pinched, and maybe a quarter-tone sharp. When
     he’s ready he turns around, his head only, and looks at me. “Hey, Vinnie. What have you got?” This is a little of our code,
     my signal to play a B-flat. I strike one, he plays his C. I keep tapping it, slowly, and he adjusts the tuning slide out a
     hair, plays another C, moves it back in half a hair. I give him some octaves, he runs up and down the scale, looks at the
     tuning slide but doesn’t touch it.
    “Nice,” he says. “I perceive that you’ve been working.”
    He knows. Ninety-nine percent of the crowd will have no fucking idea, but he knows.
    Sidney wanders in, always looking as if he sees where we are at the last minute, carrying that big string bass as if it were
     a football, cradled under one arm, and his huge tuba under the other. He has his dazed smile on, which means he’s a little
     nervous, which is good. When he’s frowning or just staring steadily, it means he’s somewhere else, engaged in some philosophical
     problem, some mental experiment, miles away. Not tonight.
    Akiko had gotten there at 8:30, and had set up and tested the skins, tightening and tuning the heads. Then she disappeared
     somewhere until just before nine.
    At about a minute before we’re supposed to start, Jeff practically runs into the room, holding his sax case like a weapon,
     clearing the way before him. His eyes are wild, he’s checking his watch. The guy is always late. He climbs up on the stand,
     no eye contact, but nods at Paul like he’s ready. But he still has his coat on, still has his sax in its case. Paul looks
     him over, and then Jeff looks himself over, says “Shit,” strips the coat off, flings it over by the wall, drops to one knee,
     takes out the sax, slides on the mouthpiece, clips on the neck strap, ducks his head into it. He looks back at Paul, like
     he’s ready.
    Paul hates this. Here’s Jeff, late again, he hasn’t tuned up, he hasn’t warmed up, his breathing is still ragged from running
     in from the cold. He always tunes up on the fly, halfway into the first song, and Paul knows this is just wrong, it’s an affront
     to us, to whoever’s listening, to the music itself. Jeff hasn’t even looked at the set list. That’s wrong, too.
    Paul is being cool with it tonight. He’s standing with his horn held down around his belt, running the valves, and he gives
     a look at Jeff’s set list. Jeff gives him a stare, like “Just start, man,” but Paul stares straight ahead, waiting for him.
     Jeff finally picks up the card, looks it over, says “Hey, we got some old-timey shit here tonight,”