Please Pleaserock Me

Last night was Please Pleaserock Me at Smith's Olde Bar.  It went very well.  Most of my charts are almost right.
Back to Yacht Rock for the rest of the weekend, and then Easter church gigs.  Stay tuned!
www.davidfreemanmusic.net

Baritone Saxophone

Here's a computer video of me screwing around with my bari sax.  I was demonstrating for a friend that I'd fixed a leak with made the low end unplayable.  Nothing great, musically speaking.  That's the beauty of the baritone saxophone!

You might want to turn down your speakers before the video starts.

www.davidfreemanmusic.net

new Cobb!

Mark and Katy Cobb had a baby boy this morning!  Gadson Cobb is alive and well!  Congratulations!

Sunday in the Rain

Sunday night was a strange one.

I went to Buckhead and played my usual church gig.  No problems there, though a big pine tree had blocked one of the streets so I had to navigate around it.

The second gig was a Yacht Rock gig at Park Tavern for the Pamoja Penda Music and Art Festival.  Due to some crappy weather that blew threw Atlanta a few hours before (probably knocked down the pine tree), the crowd had dwindled from a few thousand to fewer than one hundred by the time we had arrived. A bummer, no doubt, but it did make the load in easier!

All of my equipment worked for a change.  I was sort of anticipating some sort of disaster (because that's the norm these days), but everything was fine.  The only thing I can think of is that I had to change batteries on a wireless pack in between songs.

This week should be pretty good.  We have another Beatles tribute gig at Smith's Olde Bar on Wednesday night, Yacht Rock Thursday and Friday, and the Yacht Rock Schooner (where I will attempt to not go flat) on Saturday.  It's manageable.

www.davidfreemanmusic.net

Schooner Saturday

Tonight was a super easy gig with the Yacht Rock Schooner at the Wild Wing Cafe in Alpharetta.  No keyboards, no EWI...just saxes and flute.  All my stuff was in the first set, too, so I was home before they finished the gig (and I texted them to let them know).

I felt pretty good, playing-wise.  I recorded most of the first set (I missed the first couple of songs because I forgot to turn the thing on), and I'm kind of flat (speaking in terms of pitch), but the effort is good.  I didn't get much in the monitor because we (Mark Bencuya and Kevin Spencer) were sharing the wedge, and that's usually when I start to overblow and go flat.

You'd think with no keyboards and no EWI I'd be safe from technology's evil plans (or my stupidity), but I did have one small problem.  I left the transmitter on my tenor on while I was playing alto on I Can't Go for That, and a couple of times the tenor cancelled out the signal and I got no sound in the microphone (you can hear it in the solo--when there's no chorus effect it's because you're hearing acoustic sound only).  Way to go, Freeman!

Ganesh Giri Jaya played drums tonight.  I think it's the best set I've ever heard him play.  He nailed everything.
Bencuya played some awesome organ stuff on Biggest Part of Me.  He did this perfect palm slide that made my knees buckle.

Check out the HORRIBLE wrong note I sat on at the end of the bridge/beginning of the last verse of Summer Breeze!  More evidence that I could not hear what I was playing.  Ouch.


www.davidfreemanmusic.net

Double Thursday

Yesterday was another double gig Thursday for me.  House Live did another gig at Ventanas downtown.  As you can see, it was another cool looking gig, and we had a good time.  My new shirt performed well.

When that gig ended, I drove like a wild man to the 10 High for the Yacht Rock gig.  I'm beginning to think that the crowd will never catch on to the fact that we start at 9:30--everybody turns up in the middle of the first set (10 PM!).  

This installment of Yacht Rock was invaded by the Schooner!  We had Ganesh Giri Jaya on drums, Kevin Spencer on vocals and Vanessa Olivarez on vocals.  We played lots of tunes we haven't touched in a while, which was cool, and then kind of frightening!  Lots of "I wish I'd played through that this afternoon" moments.  Overall, I think things went pretty well.  The second set kind of steamrolled me, though--a few too many in a row where I didn't get a chance to think them through before we got on stage.  The giant Newcastle on the break was also involved.

The Great Mark Cobb came through around 10:30 and stayed and played in the second set.  He even sang Brandy, which hasn't happened in quite some time.  

Now...the equipment problem of the night!  This gig's weirdness occurred either in my little mixer or my DI to the house.  Hans (sound guy) says that my levels would be either really hot or barely there at all.  Things were fine on stage, so I'm thinking that the aux send on my mixer is messed up.  I would rather it was the DI, but I doubt it.  A few months back Hans mentioned that my level was much lower than the previous week (even though I hadn't adjusted anything on my board).  I suppose it could be his line, too.  I guess we'll troubleshoot over the next month and see where the problem is.  The fun never ends!

www.davidfreemanmusic.net

Tuesday at Opera

We did a House Live gig at Opera in midtown last night.  It was an "industry event", so it was a mixer for a bunch of event planners.  Steven Walker (drums/percussion), Jeff Burnisky (DJ), and myself were set up in a tent outside.  When we began, the thing was like a greenhouse.  It was probably 10 degrees hotter in the tent than outside.  Once the sun went down, it was chilly everywhere.  Playing in the cold weather makes my hands feel terrible.

Not much to report...I messed around with my effects pedal a good bit--a dialed in a nice slapback delay, a la Sanborn's effect on Young American!  I still haven't quite let my obsession with that go.

 I also made some HORRIBLE sounds!  You can set the effect up for a parallel interval, and I tried the following (just to bother Steven):  half step (painful!), whole step (very comfortable!), fourth above (weird), and an octave plus a half step (back to painful!).  You can investigate these intervals on a gig like this.  A fourth and a fifth below actually sound cool.  A third below if weird, but in a good way.

We were hoping to get some food out of it, but all they had were homemade pop tarts and some really funky (as in really gross) Chinese food.  Those parallel fourths were for you.

There were lots of strange fashion choices by our audience.  The boots/skirts thing is either sublime or hideous.  Here in Atlanta, it's been cowboy boots and mini skirts (of which I am generally not a fan), but there were also mini skirts and UGGs (of which I am definitely not a fan).  Not to be outdone, there was some weird MC guy (in the final two pictures!) wearing a pinstriped fedora, "Oakley/blades" type sunglasses, an Ed Hardy style shirt, and furry black and white (rabbit skin?) boots.

Here are some great moments:

1.  Girl asks if she can play my flute.  "No."  She says she plays flute.  "Bring your own."  "We could duet."  I decline.  Girl says, "I think I still have my flute."  End of story.

2.  Good looking woman who could be Robin Roberts' stunt double asks me if I "go out in the audience."  Like work the crowd?  Yes, she says.  I'm playing into a microphone on a stand, so no.  Do I do it at other events?  It costs extra, I say.  Antoine (or whatever her favorite sax player's name is), does this, and people go crazy.  My reply:  I'm not saying it's not effective, I'm saying it's really cheesy.   She should probably hire Sergio for that.

3.  The soap in the restroom smelled like Raid, and my hands thus smelled like Raid until I could get home and wash them.

Once I got home, I got back to work finishing out the new charts for the next Please Pleaserock Me gig (March 31, Smith's Olde Bar).  I'm down to the final chart.  It should put Greg Lee's mind at ease;  he's getting uptight about preparing his bari sax parts.
www.davidfreemanmusic.net