David Freeman Music

It's been a slow weekend.  I had no gigs at all last week or this weekend except for my Thursday night thing.  Even so, I've been busy with lots of stuff --teaching is coming back since school started, plus I have been cranking out charts trying to get ahead of the next couple of weeks' gigs. Today (Sunday) was my bookend church gigs--one at 9:30 AM and one at 7 PM.  I was a little more awake than last week.  The morning gig went well--it was more of the regular service, so a bit less bombastic than last week's thing.  No choir and almost no pipe organ.  Same stuff for me, though--show and blow.  Afterwards the next service began frantically setting up, and they wheeled out tympani.  The big show must be at the 11 AM! Sunday night's gig was the usual story--not much happening.  I dedicated my performance to adding the interval of a perfect fourth to the lines I was playing.  I fell asleep during the homily.  The hot (female) ush...

I have not been that bored on a Yacht Rock gig in a long time.  I could tell early in the night that we were all pretty flat and there would be nothing that could pull us out of it.  At that point it became a dreadfully long march through almost two full sets of music. Musically speaking, I was able to neither achieve nor maintain...! Increasingly I find it difficult to play with musicians who aren't listening well.  I thought last night I would be able to push past it and focus on the people who were, but I couldn't get away from it.  There were multiple spots where the soloist would wrap up his solo and most of us could hear it, but we would keep playing.  The opposite happened to me, where I was just reaching the top gear on my solo, but the song ended.  Am I misreading the signals?  I don't know.  My feeling was that some of us were just going from point A to point B, and the hell with the in between.   All I know is I can't play wh...

Yesterday (Sunday), I did a couple of church gigs.  The first two were new gigs at a nearby church.  Pretty easy, straightforward stuff--I just showed up and blew over the top of what was going on around me.  For these particular services, around was a choir, four singers, two lead singers, piano, two guitars (acoustic and electric), bass, drums, and three piece horn section.  The only bummer was that I had to be there at 8 AM.  8 AM!  Geez.  I slept during the sermon on the second service.  I also slept at the pool after that. Sunday night was my usual church gig.  Nothing great to report.  My face and hands were really tired.  I was glad to get home, where I immediately crashed on the couch. davidfreemanmusic.net

Saturday night I played a really relaxed wedding gig with Constantly Awesome.  The four guys that comprise that band used to be a terrific original band called Y-O-U.  They are also the principal members of Yacht Rock.  I played melodica (theme to The Office ), flute, alto and tenor saxophone, and keyboard.  It was fun and easy.  Why can't they all be like that? Someone has posted a video from last night's gig.  You can hear me playing the synth and string parts that I worked on Thursday.  Weird...I didn't like the way the synth sound worked with the rest of the music when I was on stage, but now that I hear it on the video, it sounds right.  Maybe I need to live with it for a few gigs. davidfreemanmusic.net  

The Yacht Rock Revue played four sets at whatever they're calling Andrews Upstairs last night.  The first two sets were a private party for Groupon, and then they opened the place up to the public.  The Groupon people were pretty lame--they just sat there like it was a concert!--but we had 500 presales for the public part of the gig, so we nearly had a stampede when the doors opened.  Since there were only about 75-100 tickets left, I'm pretty sure it sold out before we started. Mark Cobb returned to the band for this gig.  It's been a few weeks since we played with him since he no longer plays the 10 High gigs on Thursday nights.  I think we were both excited to play.  He was on fire, especially through the first three sets.  Awesome stuff! Mark Bencuya is still my hero.  Sitting next to him is the best part of playing Andrews--I pick up so much from watching him play.  I feel bad that he has to listen to me! By the time we reached the...

We played a terrific gig Thursday night at the 10 High.  Everybody was in a good mood and everybody played well (with a few rough moments).  It was as much fun as I've had at the 10 High in weeks! 1.   Lonely Boy:   I nailed it.  The first song of the night rocked. 2.   What a Fool Believes:   All day I practiced the synth and string parts.  In particular, the second verse is difficult for me to coordinate.  I think I did pretty well on that.  There might have been a stray note in there, but one the whole I'd say my work paid off. In addition to this, tonight was the first night that I used Mainstage (part of Logic Pro) with the EWI.  It was awesome!  The sounds were good and the program worked without any hiccups.  It makes me wish I'd changed my stuff over a couple of months ago. A great gig! davidfreemanmusic.net  

I had a House Live gig at Ventana's last night.  The people who hired us wouldn't pay for staff from the sound company;  wouldn't pay for a stage;  wouldn't pay for food.  We soon found out is because they'd spent all their money on HELICOPTER TOURS OF THE CITY!!!  For three hours we played and watched the helicopter come and go.  Wayne and I got close--we were in the line at the top of the stairs, ready to get on the next helicopter, but then some other people showed up and we thought we should let them go (and Wayne got a lil chicken--I think the danger that we would get busted, not the helicopter part).  Anyway, we did NOT get in the helicopter (though I added lyrics to lots of our improvisations that dealt with our misfortune).  Next time? The actual helicopter in which we did not ride: I've spent all day trying to get my hands to play both the synth part and the string part of What a Fool Believes.   I don't think I'm ready, b...

I played a lot of bullshit tonight, but I looked damn good. Tonight was a weird trio gig at the Marriott Marquis downtown.  It was supposed to be 6 to 9, but at some point I was informed it would begin at 6:30.  No big deal;  we hung out. When we finally got started playing, I don't know if it was because Kevin was exhausted from a long weekend or we were in a dead spot in the room or what, but it felt like we were playing into deep space.  I mean, the room just ate our sound and took all the energy with it.  There seemed to be nothing I could do to kick us into gear.  Thus, I played a bunch of crap, trying to force some excitement.  Maybe when I go back and listen to it tomorrow, I'll think differently, but it felt like I wasn't making any sense.  My reeds felt stuffy and my hands wouldn't work. My contract said dinner/awards, so we played about an hour and twenty minutes waiting for the awards ceremony that never came.  When people s...

Last night I began the Yacht Rock festivities by ordering a Newcastle and declaring the possibility that I might get rip-roarin' drunk (to which Nick replied, "Like last night?")  I'm really not that bad.  I in fact did not get drunk, but I was buzzed for the entire night.  It was that kind of night--I hate to say it, but I didn't care. The crowd was good (and good lookin'--wow!), and pretty appreciative of what we were giving them.  I was surprised at the end of the night that the final count was so high--in front of me there were times when it was thin.  The room must have turned over more than usual. I was on a pair of great reeds last night and I could hear my monitor really well, so I just went for it.  Things like Baker Street got a little extra sauce;  maybe it was the beer?  I just had to do it.  Kind of givin' it all the finger. On the other hand, my laptop (the old one) gave me the finger a couple of times!  Something ha...

Last night was Please Pleaserock Me at Smith's Olde Bar. It was a low energy kind of night.  We've got to figure out a way to get more people to come through the door, I guess.  The crowd last night was ok, but they didn't give us much--it was almost like they were stunned by what they were seeing.   At no point did it feel like they were all the way with us.  I wish there had been a little more unabashed enthusiasm. The first set I was not busy, so I spent most of my time focused on the awesomeness of Mark Cobb (who is awesome).  He was killin' it.  I haven't seen much of him because he's been out of town and Yacht Rock has been kind of slow at the moment, but he really kicked ass.   Paul Poovey played trumpet with us last night (Jason Pellett is on vacation).  Paul was outstanding!  He walked in and played the gig with no rehearsals or anything.   Greg Lee played alto last night, and I think it made the tunes we did last night soun...

I played a really easy solo sax/quartet gig in Chattanooga last night--a private party for a couple of hundred lawyers at the Hunter Museum. The gig included Trey Wright (guitar), Louis Heriveaux (piano), and Kevin Smith (bass).   Dan Baraszu was originally on the gig, but he ended up playing with Will Scruggs for a CC Booker III gig (cool organ/sax stuff with David Ellington and Marlon Patton). So the gig...I played solo saxophone for an hour in one part of the museum and the trio played in another.  After a break, we played the remainder of the time as a quartet. These people were LOUD.  While the four of us were eating, the question was posed--why hire us?  I mean, these people didn't need background music.  They couldn't have cared less!  All we did was contribute to the volume.  I don't get it.  Anyway, we had fun in spite of them.  At the end of the night, one of the bartenders came up to sing "If I Ain't Got You" by Alicia ...