Back Home Again in Indiana

Yacht Rock headed to the midwest in the middle of last week for a couple of gigs in Indiana, plus a visit to our (most of us) alma mater, Indiana University.  I hadn't been back in almost twenty years;  much of it looks exactly the same, and brought back some pretty strong feelings about my time there.

Wednesday:  we left town just before noon.  Monkeyboy showed up with some sort of food poisoning or some kind of bug.  We all kind of resigned ourselves to the fact that we'd all have the flu by the end of the week, especially when he got out of the van to barf all over the side of the CVS in the Old Fourth Ward.

(photo cred: Kip Conner)

Our lunch stop (mid afternoon) was in Nashville.

Late in the evening, we finally pulled into Bloomington, Indiana, and checked in at the hotel just off the square, across the street from the infamous Irish Lion.  It still looks the same (though it felt bigger and more crowded in the 90s).

Kip, posing with my half yard of beer.

Mark Bencuya and I, toasting our return.

A quick walk across the square to the Bluebird to check out the room.  It's been enlarged slightly (they acquired the sandwich shop next door), but it still looks basically the same.

Thursday:  my big chance to walk across campus.  My apologies for this portion--mostly just pictures to show my old roommate Mike.  I'll try and give some explanation.

I was feeling pretty fine until I came around the corner and saw the back of the music building, and then things got much more emotional for me.

I only walked through these doors about a million times.

Unremarkably, it was just as I remembered it.  It smelled the same.  The blast from the heat, turned up too high, was the same.  I'm kind of surprised I didn't puke from nervousness right here.

Eugene Rousseau's old office.  I spent lots of time inside, as well as hanging around outside.

Nice to see the Jazz Fables posters for Bears Place are still printed the same way.

Clouse's Lounge.

Recital Hall, where I had my first college course (freshman music theory).

I took flute lessons from a couple of lovely graduate students in this office (Heather the Canadian chick and Kristen Hyde, both of whom I was completely smitten with).

3rd floor lockers.

The entrance to the 3rd floor annex, where I basically lived for my entire college career.

The back of the Musical Arts Center (the MAC).

The front of the school of music.

T.I.S. (to this day, I don't know what the initials stand for), across the street from the school of music.

Back when I had hair, I was given some pretty bad haircuts here.

This shopping center at 3rd and Jordan just to have our Papa John's and a music store (Pro Winds) where I bought my tenor.

The house where we lived my senior year (Atwater and Jordan).

This is the new music building, across the street from what was the new music building in the 90s.

Tom Walsh was a grad student when I started.  Eventually, he was hired on as the associate prof of saxophone.  I studied with him the last semester of my senior year.  He looks exactly the same.  I do not.

The dorm where Mike and I lived for three years (in the same room!).  Read Beck 512.

This used to be the cafeteria.

I had forgotten that you needed a room key to call the elevator.

Our hall.  Read Beck 5.

Another shot of the MAC, where I worked for a few semesters until I got fired.  Ahh, memories...

The lobby of the MAC.  Still exactly the same.

The basement of the MAC.

I tried to walk in the front door of the MAC, but they wouldn't let me.  Fortunately as a former employee, I know just about every way around every locked door in the building!  It didn't take me long to get to the stage, where the crew was setting up scenes for the upcoming opera.

A shot from the stage out into the house.

Another shot of the back of the music annex.

A view from the Sample Gates.

These things are still in every classroom.

That afternoon, we participated in a masterclass of sorts for IU Jumpstart, which gives students some perspective on how graduates who are not Joshua Bell or Chris Botti are surviving.  I think we had three students in attendance (one was also working the event, and one had to leave about halfway through).

We also had solo interviews where four of us talked about gigs and adventures, and I talked about how I was stressed, depressed, and rarely left the practice room for four years.  Oops.

(photo cred:  IU Jumpstart)

(photo cred:  IU Jumpstart)

Thursday night, we played the Bluebird.  Another weird Bloomington memory, and a place I never thought I'd see again.

Any thoughts that we would return as local music school heroes were quickly dashed.  How many people came through?  Twenty-five?  We were fortunate that Mark Cobb's parents and Nick's parents came to see us--it made the crowd significantly bigger!  Horrible turn out.  Blame it on spring break if you want.

(photo cred:  Kip Conner)

All of my gear, lined up and ready to get the hell out of Bloomington once and for all.

Friday:  Hours after our less than triumphant show, we were on the road again, this time to play on morning TV in Indianapolis.

(photo cred:  Alyssa Moody)

In spite of being tired as hell, this was actually kind of fun, and even though it was a goddamn Fox affiliate, they were pretty cool hosts.

Check it out (a little distorted, but it still sounds pretty good)!



From there, breakfast at Bob Evans and a nap.  In the afternoon, we loaded into The Vogue Theatre in Indianapolis, and then ran to the local NPR station for more promo.

The audio dude couldn't get it together, so we ended up crowding around a single microphone.

Check out our interview and performance.  I didn't mess up the flute solo as much, though my alto pretty bad (sharp) at the beginning, and then I played some wrong notes in the last verse.  Not my best work.



Back to The Vogue for soundcheck.

Redemption!  Awesome crowd at The Vogue.  749 people through the door.  Indy is always very good to us.

(photo cred:  somebody in the audience)

A Quickie in Miami

Last Saturday, Yacht Rock played a wedding for a couple of fans from Baltimore in Miami Beach.  Small wedding (80 people), and pretty tame.  We flew, but our gear drove (Hans and Kip doing the duty).  Love that.

The drive from the airport to the venue included a near accident with two guys in a car who were obviously sooooo high that it didn't faze them one bit.  Minutes later, we noticed them passing somebody in the emergency lane.  Miami has its own special kind of crazy.

We had very good Cuban sandwiches at a nearby restaurant.

After soundcheck, there was a long hang out--the ceremony was on site, so we had to set up and then be quiet (and hide).  I took a nap.

The gig was a success.  I think they liked us, but not in a Park-Tavern-their-heads-are-going-to-explode kind of way.  I'd guess that around two thirds of the guests watched from their seats.  Lots of babes at this event, including the wedding planner.

The specially learned song for this was Lionel Richie's Hello.  Remember the video?  The groom's cake was Lionel's head, made of chocolate.

I've got to admit, I kind of like playing this song.  Lots of things to do.  Bencuya hates it.  Bitterly.

The inspiration:



Load out was...foul smelling!  It really smelled bad.  At one point, Hans had to give up and go back inside because he was almost gagging.

With the PA plus our gear, the trailer was very full.

And then Monkeyboy ran through my picture.

Here was the toughest part...we went to bed at 1:30 AM, which because of daylight savings time was really 2:30 AM, and had to be in the lobby at 7:30 AM to take the shuttle to the airport.  Ouch!

We boarded the plane...no air conditioning.  The crew shut the electricity down and then powered it back up, but that didn't fix it.  I'm kind of surprised that 1.  the "turn it off and turn it back on" solution was attempted;  2.  the pilot announced on the intercom that "turn it off and turn it back on" was the best solution to the problem.  Anyway...after a nap and about a half hour, we were sent back into the airport.  A half hour after that, we reboarded.  I promptly fell back asleep and woke up just as we touched down in Atlanta.  Plenty of time to go home and do some stuff before my goddamned church gig.

Making Records

This is a light week for gigs, but I was fortunately able to fill in with not one but two recording sessions.  Both went well;  I am very happy with the results.

1.  Wednesday night, I recorded woodwinds for Patrick Kelly's upcoming record.  For this one, I played flute, clarinet, and bass clarinet.  Patrick built his songs in Logic Pro 9 and created MIDI woodwind parts--cool because it generates sheet music, but not cool because there's no one to say what's physically possible!  For instance, one song had a flute part that extended into bass clef!  In another instance, the computer wrote that every note in a section was anticipated by a sixteenth note--at the tempo, it was difficult to hear, but on paper, it was definitely not correct!

Anyway, once we'd sorted all that stuff out, it was pretty easy, and Patrick (and Bruce, the producer/engineer) were cool and open to suggestions.  I was relieved and excited that all three instruments were relatively in tune (always a big fear of mine in recording!).   I wish there were more opportunities like this.

2.  Thursday morning, I met up with Greg Lee to add saxophones to Glen Pridgen's newest project.  Glen's stuff was more straight ahead rock, and both songs had existing horn parts, so it was clear what was to be played.  Both songs were two tenors and bari--love that sound!   

One of Glen's songs had a solo, and I was really pleased with myself for playing something beyond a safe, pentatonic scale.  Kudos to Greg Lee for leaving a little jazz in a rock song!

Trio

The David Freeman Trio came out of mothballs to play a gig last night--the usual corporate awards dinner kind of thing.  This one was a bit unusual because it began with two hours(!) of solo saxophone, then a bit of "play them into the room," an hour or so of dinner, and a last song to play them out.  David Ellington played keyboard and Kevin Smith played bass.  I guess I should have brought my hat.

Right off the bat, a curveball.  Even though it was confirmed the previous week that we would be sax, keyboard, and bass (and therefore needing a microphone and 2 DIs to get our sound to the house), our famous local sound/production company set up five lines with DIs.  When I said, "No, I'll need a microphone," they claimed not to have a single one on site.  Really.  "But we can run the keyboard in stereo!" the guy said.  Ha ha ha ha!  Like I give a shit!  Out to my truck to grab the microphone stand and crappy microphone that I keep behind the seat for just such an emergency.  

The two hours of solo saxophone actually wasn't too bad.  For whatever reason I was able to get into a groove;  my hands felt quick and light, and my horn felt good, so it was pretty easy.  Thank god, too, because I've had some solo gigs where ten minutes felt like too long.

The trio part of the the gig was painless, except for a request that led to several more requests, the last by a drunk old lady who almost fell down on her way to ask us to play At Last.  "If you play it, I'll dance!"  Uhh, no thanks.

I was kind of fried by the time we got into this, but in listening to it now, I don't sound as uncoordinated as I felt at the time.

The final portion of the evening was spent raising money--a male and female tag team with microphones, walking around the room cajoling people into dropping $1,000.  It was like Regis and Kathy Lee took over a non denominational church.  When a guy offered his tux jacket up for auction (and people actually bid on it), I got worried that my horn would be next.

We played them out of the room and the evening ended.  Never a dull moment, I guess.  Here are mp3s from the trio portion of the gig.

U2 in the Park

Yacht Rock's first Park Tavern show last night was a huge success!  In spite of the weather, we had a large, enthusiastic crowd and the band played well.  What more could you ask for?

The stage for this one was rotated ninety degrees, with the most of the crowd out in front and a smaller contingent behind.  Kip said that the crowd was so thick that he couldn't get to the front of house position;  he ended up mixing from behind the stage.

Our first set was all U2.  We hadn't played this set in a couple of years.  We rehearsed a few weeks ago (with the anticipation of playing on the Train cruise, but it didn't happen).  Surprisingly, there wasn't too much rust!  My worst moment was right at the beginning--I started the first song of the gig on the wrong sound (and wrong transposition).  Not my best playing.  Once we got into it, I was fine, though.

The Yacht Rock set was good;  we had a fun night.  At one point, I took a high five solo across the front of the stage.  Playing-wise, things were solid.

At the end of the night, a friend of mine remarked, "You guys are rock stars!"  Forty-five minutes later (as I was dragging my gear up the stairs), some guy asked me if we were the Schooner.  Fame is fleeting.