Tag: YouTube

Went to NY with Ali this weekend to see some friends, sights, etc. I enjoyed the city a lot more than I did on previous visits, and I’m pretty sure its because we did the city at night. Daytime in NY gives me a headache, and on top of that I don’t like the rush. Nighttime is different. We did a lot, and I could tell a lot of different stories, but I’ll just tell the one anecdote that stands out from this weekend.

At some point on Saturday, someone commented on/started singing/started humming Mahna Mahna. Slowly, it crept into everyone’s mind, and refused to be stopped. Later into the night, we started bursting into song, because we just couldn’t keep it inside. While hanging around the Bamn! Automat (which I very much enjoyed, even if I didn’t eat there) Max decided to try and get people on the street to join in with us in song. He went up to the corner, and started singing/humming, and one by one we joined him, as if we were just passersby, caught up in the magic of the song. We got a couple other folks to join in with us, but for the most part people just walked past us, bemused.

This wasn’t nearly satisfying, so we started to look for another target. Across the street were two musicians, playing trombone and accordian, playing traditional klezmer songs. We walked up to them, and waited for them to finish the song they had been playing before tossing the Mahna Mahna ball into their court. Quickly, they picked up on what we were doing and started to jam along, creating an entirely new beast of a song. Max was clever enough to think of recording it, and hopefully I’ll be able to get a copy. Once that was finished, they started back up with their own repertoire, with us clapping and dancing along. Soon, a crowd had gathered to hear these guys play. Some in the crowd were musicians with instruments in hand, and before long they had joined in as well. Now we had a five piece band consisting of a soprano saxophone, fiddle, guitar, trombone and accordian, with a mass dancing and clapping people around it all. On a street corner in New York City. At 4 in the morning.