It's been the slowest, weirdest December in my lifetime. Oddly enough, though, I did get several calls for gigs, but almost all of them sounded like bad ideas--a jazz duo (yes!), but in somebody's living room with twenty-five people in attendance (hell no!). Who's taking a gig like that right now, but also, who's putting together parties like that right now? I declined all of those, reminding myself that it would not be worth it to possibly infect anyone in my family for $200.
Last Sunday afternoon, I did take an outdoor jazz gig in College Park that was a lot of fun. Louis Heriveaux, Tommy Sauter, and Ben Johnson joined me for a neighborhood Christmas party in somebody's yard. Great fun with a few old friends! Louis wanted to know if I still hated Christmas tunes--it made me think about it, and I guess my problem is that on these gigs, people want you to politely play everything on Charlie Brown Christmas. I, on the other hand, am usually so excited to be playing a jazz gig that I want to play every tune like it's Coltrane's Live at the Village Vanguard!
Anyway, 54 degrees was a little chilly, but I am still happy to play some tunes with my friends.
In other news, the Ladies of Soul (Keisha and Kourtney Jackson) put out a livestream concert on Christmas Eve. The backing band was Mark Bencuya, Mark Dannells, Greg Lee, and Zack Albetta, and I wrote and recorded horn arrangements for everything. Big fun for me, and our audio/video ninja Zach Wetzel was able to blend everything together perfectly. Check it out here.
Leading up to the broadcast, I also made some short videos to highlight my parts. Check these out!
One more good thing: I got a call from Steve Augeri (formerly of Journey!) to play on his quarantine project. This song, called If You Want, needed one of those heroic 80s tenor sax solos in the vein of Tim Cappello or Clarence Clemons. Steve sent me the song, I recorded a couple of passes at home, we talked on the phone, I recorded a couple more, and it was done! Recording from home rocks.
