If you are performing music to an audience, what if some of the performers start laughing and talking?

We had a free "gig" where we played in front of a fairly good sized audience. I looked forward to it a lot because I got to play stuff that I really like and hardly ever get asked to play. The problem is the rest of the band don't share my enthusiasm for the type of music. But they agreed to do the performance, I didn't hold a gun to their heads.

The audience appeared to like what we were playing. Two of the band members started talking and laughing to the point that it was disrupting the performance; I couldn't even concentrate on what I was doing. I was extremely angry with them and tried really hard to keep it together.

Then, to add to the tension, my wife was repeatedly calling me on the cell phone to remind me that I told her I was going to do something with her that the time overlapped with the "gig."

We had only one song left; I was so keyed up I told them I had to leave.

I thought it was generally understood that a musician should not disrupt a performance no matter what as long it the audience still wanted us to play regardless of our own personal taste. I had played music with these ;people on and off for about 30 years and I simply couldn't comprehend how badly they behaved.

What an ordeal--I spoke to the two band members later and said how I felt about it. One guy apologized immediately. The other person, a woman argued with me about for about a year before finally agreeing that it wasn't okay for them to act that way.

Ironically, the forth person in the band declared that I was "unreliable" and hasn't spoken to me since. He didn't participate in the talking and laughing and even shouted at them to "pay attention."

Also ironically, we did the gig again a year later. I just brought the girl percussionist and we had a pretty good performance without any incident. It was snowing really hard and I nearly wrecked my car when I skidded into a divider on the way home.

I don't know how I could be more "reliable" than that; I wasn't even making any money--I just really loved the music and was tickled to death anyone would show up to listen to me play it.

There were many, many, many performances over the years with the same people where I literally hated every song on the list but didn't complain at all. It seem to me that I deserved one time a year where the tables were turned.

Oh, by the way, I have a problem with depression and anxiety; that might explain why I took it so seriously, acted that way and so on. The female percussionist also has a mood disorder and the guy who laughed and talked is married to a woman with bipolar disorder.