Yacht Rock played a private party at the Ritz at Lake Oconee last night. It was a pretty easy gig, and they got us rooms there for the night. How sweet is that?!
When we turned up at the rehearsal space to load gear into the van, Sugarland was there conducting tour rehearsals. No doubt tweaking Jennifer Nettles' fake twang.
We stopped for gas somewhere. Bencuya didn't want to.
Soundcheck looked like this:
The Ritz is really nice. The weather was fairly uncooperative--we set up with no cover, and then a cloud sprinkled on us, so we moved inside. After that, it never rained again.
My highlight of the night occurred on Peg. I got kind of funky (for me, anyway), on my clav part. I'm a long way from Stevie Wonder, but at least I'm not playing chord, chord, chord.
We're back in town for the day to do a couple of gigs, and then out again tomorrow! Stay tuned for more.
I always thought Charles River was a river; turns out it's a drug company. I think these people might have been on some Charles River medications.
We did a House Live gig for them last night at the Omni.
Wayne.
Jeremy.
They were an annoying, drunk bunch. We endured lots of people trying to talk to us while we were playing. Multiple people walked up on stage to talk to Jeremy (the DJ). By the end of the night, there were more than ten people sitting on the front of the stage at my feet, and occasionally the fat girl would fall over backwards and almost the microphone stand or my instruments. We had requests (we're not even playing songs!) for Dave Brubeck and salsa.
Here's my personal highlight of the night: we're playing, right? We're background music--we're setting the vibe of the party. Keep in mind that It sounds something like this, and I'm just improvising over it. As I'm switching from flute to saxophone, a girl starts yelling to me, so (for some dumb reason) I lean down to hear what she wants.
She: "Do you know what the next song is?"
Me: "No."
She: "Can you ask the DJ to play something more upbeat?"
Yacht Rock played at Turner Field last night for the playoff game between the Braves and the Giants. We also sang the National Anthem on the field.
We set up in the plaza directly behind the center field jumbotron. I think we played about an hour, maybe slightly more. It was pretty easy--no new tunes or anything. The way we were set up was pretty difficult to hear the vocals because the monitors for the front line were pretty far away from me.
Other than that, it was business as usual. I had to deal with the usual potato chip reed issue--I'm thinking about using plasticover reeds or something like that for outdoor events so I don't have to constantly try and wet and flatten those suckers. It's particularly noticeable because I don't play much saxophone on this gig (relative to the other things I'm doing). It's probably once every six songs, and by then they've totally dried out on me.
As we were starting one tune, I noticed the light flashing on the EWI indicating that the batteries were pretty much gone. Yikes! There was no time to change them out, so I turned it off and on throughout the tune to conserve energy. When that song ended, I had time to get out fresh batteries. Woo! Dodged a bullet.
We went down in the tunnel to head to the holding room next to the Braves dugout immediately before the game. Along the way we passed some old guy and a trophy-wife looking blonde, and a couple of other guys. It turned out it was Ted Turner (as in Turner Field Ted Turner, as in "I created CNN" Ted Turner!). Here's a casual shot over my shoulder. You're going to have to believe me.
We went into the room to wait the last few minutes, and in walks Ted Turner! He went to the bathroom, and then he stood in the middle of us and conducted while we practiced the Star Spangled Banner. Weird, weird, weird. I mean, it's Ted Turner.
We walked out and sang. No big deal. I'm not sure why I can't get nervous about stuff like that. I guess it was just us and some microphones.
Mark Bencuya!
From there, we went up and watched the game. Great seats! Here's the view.
Mark Cobb!
Mark Dannells and myself.
We left after eight innings to get back to the plaza. If the Braves won, we would play. If they lost, we would pack up. They lost.
Saturday was THE DAY! The big keyboard crunch...could I handle Bencuya's keyboard parts? Could I hang with Eric Frampton? Would I be bloodied by my own shame?
The answer? I DID IT! A few minor flubs here and there, but I had a fantastic time (I texted Bencuya: "Being you is AWESOME!") and played really well. Frampton was impressed; the band was impressed. Everything worked. How about that!
My stuff.
Eric Frampton wants a cupcake THIS big.
The only disaster was that I volunteered to sing Lowdown, and I bombed miserably. I was Linda McCartney-esque pitchy. Yuck. I was laughing; the band laughed at me. I was terrible. First attempt singing a solo in public: no good! I (of course) have a million excuses/hypotheses, but it came down to missing the first note, and then I panicked and couldn't hear the melody, and the lyrics just flew by. Oops. It didn't go like that in my preparation!
The keyboard stuff went well enough that the singing didn't bother me much. I was disappointed that I didn't sing as well as I did when I worked on it, but oh well.
Saxophone-wise, I am in one of those zones where every idea that I'm playing sounds great. We stretched some tunes out Saturday night so I could rip on them a little more, and I never ran out of gas. Same thing happened at my church gigs Sunday. I wonder why the creativity comes and goes? It's not like I discovered a new way of thinking about any of this stuff--it's the same musical vocabulary I have been using. The ideas have meaning right now. I don't know...maybe it always sounds the same on the other side of the horn, but I believe myself more.
Thursday: I left home at 8:45 AM for a rehearsal for my Saturday Schooner gig. There was lots of traffic!
I was set up shortly after 10 AM. Unfortunately, most of the rest of the band rolled in between 10:30 and 11 AM. Boo. This was mostly a vocal rehearsal because the usual front man (Ganesh) is out of town for the weekend. Vanessa is filling in for him on my gig (Greg Lee is subbing for him on Sunday). They spent most of the time ironing out harmonies and making sure Vanessa knew the songs she was supposed to have learned.
As far as my parts went, Eric Frampton (the opposing keyboardist) was impessed, and that was good enough for me.
From there, I moved a few blocks over and loaded into the 10 High for the Yacht Rock gig that night. I got everything set up and ate lunch, and then drove to Buckhead for a jazz duo gig.
Tyrone Jackson and I played an open house for a law firm at their new offices. Nice place! They ended up jamming us in a corner, and people were pressed up against us, drinking and showing off their wives. Loud, they were, so much so that I didn't bother recording most of the gig. Here's what I did take:
Lots of bluriness in the tune memory department!
Here's some pics from the law offices:
Cake!
From there I moved back to the 10 High where we celebrated the Great Mark Bencuya's birthday by playing our usual gig...not much of a party! It was fun. The first set was really good. Then we went on break and drank...I think Jen (our bartender) is trying to kill us with huge shots. Somewhere in the middle of the second set, we were all completely obliterated, and the gig became a silly mess. When it (mercifully) ended I was fairly sober, but then I was totally exhausted. I managed to get everything back in the truck and get home. Sleep! I got home around 2 AM.
Here are some pics. Let the Mark Dannells Love Fest begin!
Friday: Friday started with me learning a tune for that night--Heart Hotels by Dan Fogelberg. The studio recording has piano, rhodes, strings, and a lyricon solo played by Tom Scott. I accidentally discovered a live version that had the one and only Michael Brecker playing the string part and the solo on tenor. Sweet! I was totally into that.
I worked on that for a little bit, gathered my clothes, and headed to the Park Tavern for our last Summer Series gig (Yacht Rock)--Mustache Rock! After setting up, we did a photo shoot for some new promotional stuff. Here's a cool sampling from our Beatles suits, courtesy of Mark Cobb's iPhone.
I'm wondering why Bencuya and I are standing behind the tall guys.
We soundchecked Heart Hotels. It went pretty well. I'm trying to record myself more these days because I tend to tense up when I know it might be analyzed. Here's a couple of short videos of the first and second solos:
Stop looking at Renee's ass. You're supposed to focus on the saxophone.
Bencuya asked me to pick up the piano part to help fill it out, and I learned it at the gig--a major accomplishment! Going into it, I was pumped about being Michael Brecker, but after that, I was more into trying to nail down the piano part for Bencuya. I think I did! Hopefully he heard it.
A video of the surroundings!
How about some pics:
The Main Street Exiles opened for Yacht Rock--for me, a set of mostly tambourine, plus the solo on Miss You and the sax part on Honky Tonk Women...pretty easy stuff.
The Yacht Rock set was pretty good. The crowd was significantly smaller than the past few--I don't think it sold out. I played pretty well. The only brain fart I was in not being able to remember the horn part to I Want a New Drug. It comes around three times, though, so the first time was not so good, second time was ok, and the third time I got it. I played the whole gig thinking about how I was doing on the recording--Bencuya always records the Park Tavern shows--only to hear afterwards that it was not recorded! Good and bad. Take my word for it--I played pretty well.
So that was that. Today's the big keyboard day with the Schooner. I'll be glad when it's over. My head is swimming with questions like "Is it F/Bb, or Bb/F?", and my fingertips hurt just thinking about it.
Oh well--it's happening...let's see what I can do!
