Saturday, July 1, 2023: Isle of Palms, SC. Night one at The Windjammer...it's a dive bar on the beach, the green room is dirty, the food is all fried, the gear gets covered in a sand and salt...
...but they have dogs!
Both of these gigs sold out, and both were solid performances with no hiccups. Even the weather was really comfortable by the time we took the stage.
We opted to take all of our gear with us (instead of leaving it warped on stage, hoping for the best), so unfortunately it took some time for the stagehands to drag it all out to the street. The salty air and sand are not good for any of our stuff, though.
Sunday, July 2, 2023: Isle of Palms, SC. Night two--more of the same. After spending all day hiding at the hotel, we came back, set it all up, and did it again.
Thursday, July 6, 2023: Boston, MA. The Leader Bank Pavilion is impressive in its size, and the way the local crew handles things. I have no complaints.
Catering was excellent, and they always have a vegetarian/vegan offering.
This was probably not vegan, certainly was not healthy, but I ate it anyway.
A visitor...
Solid gig! Not sold out, but it was plenty full--probably eighty percent? Seventy-five? It looked full. It seems like everybody had an off night except me. I think we debuted
Do It Again by Steely Dan on this night (I have the organ solo). Seems like it went pretty well.
After we'd gotten all packed up and back in the vans, we drove about an hour to get a jump on the next day's travel to NYC.
Friday, July 7, 2023: New York, NY. I don't think I've ever had a particularly successful NYC gig, and this one was pretty damn big--PBS was here filming our performance. Greeeeeeeeaaaaat. Extra pressure.
I will go ahead and let the secret out--I sucked real bad. I mean, maybe not, but it felt like it, in a "death by a thousand paper cuts" sort of way.
Before that, though, a side story. I ordered a new flute to replace the flute that I had before it was stolen (now presumably living a life of ease somewhere in Mexico), and I ordered it from the Flute Center of New York. Earlier this week, it arrived, so en lieu of shipping, I asked if the person I was dealing with wanted to bring the flute to Pier 17, and I would put her and a friend on the guest list to stay for the show.
She was not interested.
Is there anybody in the Flute Center of New York who would like to bring this flute to me, and then stay and enjoy our big show that PBS wanted to record?
No takers.
So...I hired a bike messenger (now that's New York!) to pick the flute up and bring it to Pier 17. He did not stay for the show, but I got the flute.
Quick sightseeing (also, I was out for a run). My hero, Michael Brecker, lived here at 247 Grand Street on the second floor in the 70s and 80s (incidentally, after the great Don Grolnick moved out). Lots of notes were played right here! Also, quite a bit of heroin...but come on! There it is! History!!! Hot damn! Michael Brecker forever!
Anyway, back to the gig...it's sold out!
This damn gig. Even though we could overdub any problems after the fact, I was uptight, and I started making small, blippy mistakes pretty early on--I bumped a piano key, I played a dumb solo, whatever--but the voice in my head started making a list of things that I would have to fix (rerecord), and as the list got longer with "oops--I'll have to do that over," the voice got louder until it was shouting in my head--THREE MORE SONGS UNTIL YOU MESS UP THE
AFRICA SOLO, so of course I folded on the
Africa solo, I don't even remember playing it. And there were other things...I played a wrong note in the solo to
Smooth Operator, and that went pretty off the rails in the span of three beats. My head was full of bad thoughts. It was not fun.
These are sugar cookies. I had one. It did not ease my sorrow.
I didn't take any pictures, but here's one from social media. I am holding on for dear life.
Also worth noting: I chose this outfit (we had to submit wardrobe choices to PBS a few weeks prior), and I failed to take into account that it would be pretty warm in New York in July. I got hot pretty early into the gig, but I thought I had to keep the jacket on for continuity. Something else I messed up!
Saturday, July 8, 2023: Asbury Park, NJ. After the NYC gig, we spent the night in Staten Island, and then headed over to New Jersey around lunchtime. Since it wasn't a long trip, we had lunch close the gig, so we once again hit this insane New York deli near Edison, NJ.
They have a pickle bar, which is great...(in case you've never come across this sort of thing, it's like a salad bar--tongs, plexiglass shields--but it's all different varieties of pickles).
But their main claim to fame is giant portions of meat. Every sandwich is bigger than you can imagine. As a non meat eater, it's pretty gross, but whatever.
Kip's sandwich was in there somewhere...
I had a veggie burger and fries. It was ok.
On to the gig...we got to The Stone Pony and started setting up, and Bencuya's Fantom wouldn't turn on (the silver keyboard on top). We're guessing that maybe the thumb drive where he saves stuff got pulled out at the wrong moment or something? Who knows. After several desperate minutes of it freezing, it finally booted up properly. We were back in business, but this keyboard's days are numbered.
Another big, sold out show, and as you might guess, I had a good time and played great and no long list of mistakes. Damnit. The Game of Gig, as we say.
Wednesday, July 12, 2023: Hyannis, MA. Back at The Melody Tent for two nights, and this year, my microphone works!
Last year, the antenna for the wireless microphones would wipe out my sax mic's signal when I would spin past it. Now that I'm on the same system, there are no more problems.
Another fun gig. The revolving stage doesn't bother me at all--you might think that we get motion sickness or something--but it's slow enough that I almost don't notice it.
We left a lot of stuff set up on stage overnight--the keyboards, guitars, and saxophones were put away, and it's a good thing, because everything that was left out was covered with a layer of dust. Maybe it was from the parking lot, or maybe just from the cape being so sandy, or Canadian wildfires?
Thursday, July 13, 2023: Hyannis, MA. Night two. Slept late, went for a run, ate lunch, and here we go again.
Another good gig. The line "in the dunes on the cape" from
The Pina Colada Song caused quite an uproar both nights.
Friday, July 14, 2023: Boston, MA. Back to the Leader Bank Pavilion! In case you're wondering, this one was on the calendar first, and they added the other date as this one got closer to selling out (and it did!).
My fan club has new shirts for this year. Dig it.
Tuesday, July 25, 2023: Atlanta, GA. No gigs, but I made $75 from trying to sing three Charlie Parker songs from inside an MRI at Georgia Tech.
Ornithology, Anthropology, and
Confirmation have never sounded worse!
To make matters worse, we had to scat sing a solo, but on
Confirmation, I sang Michael Brecker's solo from the album
Three Quartets instead of something of my own. That probably messed everything up. It was worth it, though. Michael Brecker forever!
