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All the youth of the land who may avail themselves of radio service will please respond and listen in. In a warmly appreciative sense this must be a gala occasion." "That's all, folks; I'm certain." Bill shouted the school yell and the class year: "Umpah, umpah, ho, ho; it's up to you, Fairview, 1922!" Then: "Bring 'em all back here, Gus." But not one of them needed urging nor reminding.
They have a liaison with the umpah umps the feet. Long ago they danced only to the umpah umps. There were no cadenzas, glissandos, arpeggios then. There was only the thumping of cedar wood on cedar wood, on ebony or taut deerskin. Civilizations have risen, fallen and risen again. Armies, gods, races have been chewed into mist by the years. But the thumping remains.
Thus the thoughts of the dancers dance dead hopes, wearied ambitions, vanishing youth do an inarticulate can-can in the heads of the dancers on the cabaret floor. The cornet wears a wooden gag in its mouth and a battered black derby hangs over its end. Umpah ump from the trombone, the bull fiddle and the bassoon. Tangled lyrics from the clarinet.
A whimsical insanity lurks in the music of the clarinet. It stutters ecstasies. It postures like Tristan and whimpers like a livery-stable nag. It grimaces like Peer Gynt and winks like a lounge lizard, a cake eater. It is not for the feet of the dancers on the crowded cabaret floor. The feet follow the umpah umps. The thoughts of the dancers follow the clarinet.
He umpah umps with the conventional trombone fatalism. Whatever the tune, whatever the harmonies, trombone umpah umps regardless. Umpah ump is the soul of all things. Cadenzas, glissandos, arpeggios, chromatics, syncopations, blue melodies these are the embroidery of sound. From year to year these change, these pass. Only the umpah ump remains.
She is colored like a panther flower and her limbs are heavy with taboo magic. But she is still imperial. In vain the mountebanks and burlesqueries of her court. Her lips place themselves against the hearts of the dancers on the cabaret floor. And she croons her ancient hymns. The hearts of the dancers give themselves to the saxophone. Their feet keep a rendezvous with the umpah umps.
Umpah!" chuckled young Somers, his face distorted with glee. "Some one catch me! I'm choking! Great Scott, what wouldn't I have given to see that? Hal, the quiet, the dignified? Oh, dear! Oh, dear. Hal pounces on the fellow, to arrest him, and Hal is the one who gets pinched Woo-oo!
And tonight the trombone player plays what he will play a thousand nights from tonight umpah ump. The bassoon and the bull fiddle they umpah ump along. Underneath the quaver and whine of the jazz they beat the time, they make the tuneless rhythm. The feet dancing on the crowded cabaret floor listen cautiously for the trombone, the bassoon and the bull fiddle.
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