How do you tell when it's the last time through the tune?
Some folks'll say "Last time." The Red Hots albums all have someone saying "Wummo" -- "One more." If you're a Klezmer musician, that's "Nokh a mol."
The common signal is to raise a foot the last time through. When the end's ragged, after everyone stops, there will be much murmering of, "I saw a foot." In some jams, you can raise your foot briefly in A1, and everyone will reliably stop at the end of B2, so if you're playing with your legs crossed, don't uncross them until the tune ends or they'll think you're raising a foot.
The cue can also be musical. It's possible to play a last time through that's says, "THE END" so clearly that everyone will hear it and stop. Or almost everybody. I heard a bewildered fiddler say, to an inexperienced guitar player who didn't stop after the fiddler had played a dramatic ending, "You didn't hear that?"
Ellen Rosenberg taught me to how to stop a tune musically as a backup guitar player. Instead of a boom-chuck on the last chord of the second B, play the whole chord emphatically for the boom, stop it sounding with your right hand for the chuck, then strum it again and let it ring for the last beat. That's "Boom-chuck, boom-chuck, WHUMP! (pause) struuummmm!" This sounds great even when someone else has already called the stop, but it's a signal all by itself. Works like a charm.
At dances, callers will often stick up two fingers to say, "two more full times through the tune," or one for "one more," or even pull a finger across the throat for "Stop, now." But callers who're also musicians will sometimes signal the band with a foot.
Vergil Muller recently told me that some jams he's been to let you veto a foot by sticking both feet out, your legs in a big 'V.' I like that.
