David Freeman Music

Wayne Viar and I performed last night at a corporate awards ceremony last night.  Easy stuff--the guy had charts for the dozen songs we did;  I think the most challenging thing was keeping everybody straight on the form of Pick Up the Pieces (the corporation's business involved data recovery--a clever musical choice!), though this dotted eighth/triplet rhythm was pretty much unfathomable: Mostly it was a fun hang with Wayne, whom I don't see as much these days. There was food (inhaled on the break) and free parking.  Not bad for a Tuesday night!

Yacht Rock played the Eats and Beats benefit at Buckhead Theatre last night.  It's a children's charity event which features a multitude of local restaurants, bands of chefs, and us.  Sort of a hipster Taste of Dunwoody, with (by my picky eater standards) some rather exotic food. The stage is a good size at the Theatre, the green room is nice, and the load in is pretty easy.  It doesn't have any vibe, unfortunately, and I don't have any feeling for what it sounds like out front.  The crew is also pretty dysfunctional.  We made the best of it. The chef bands were decent/fun.  We sang Fat Bottom Girls with them (uhhh...I don't know that song) and Bencuya, Nick, and I blew through a wildy chaotic version of Let's Go Crazy .  Ford Fry plays really loud guitar.  Don't go near it. Our part of the show was one ninety minute set.  The crowd was with us right from the beginning.  Fun gig. Monkey ran the Kemper through Ford's...

Just to round out the weekend...I played my PM church gig last night.  Things went pretty well except for a bad mic cable that I had to switch out on the fly. I bought a box of clarinet reeds this week, and swapping them out for my old reeds made a big difference in sound (and thus performance).  Funny how that works.  One thing that didn't work so well was my upper lip for flute playing--what was up with that?  My flute sounded fine, but my upper lip felt weird--like I couldn't grip the air.  I felt like I had Mr. Bill's mouth. Big week of gigs ahead, so stay tuned.

Friday:  Yacht Rock played Purple Rain in Piedmont Park up by the Legacy Fountain.  I'd bet that most people have no idea where that is, but if you know where the parking deck is, it's right near that, up in the northeast corner of the park (closest to Piedmont and Monroe). This is our third or fourth year playing Purple Rain .  Across the band, I think we're all pretty comfortable with it and know our parts;  like Dark Side of the Moon , it now only takes us a rehearsal or two to bring it back.  It sounded good (we listened to the board tape last night on the way home).  I had a few random mistakes, but overall, I was satisfied with my performance. The second set was a regular yacht rock set.  Interestingly, whatever was making my hands not work Thursday went away, and I felt much better about my sax playing on this night.  I wonder if this had been a jazz gig if I'd still be saying that. Something I don't rememb...

David Ellington and I played a sax/organ duo gig last night.  It's always fun doing a hit with Dave, and we've got a fun batch of tunes going.  The gig is easy, the pay is good, the hang is terrific, and the food is great!  What more could you want? That said, I am playing like SHIT these days.  My hands don't work anymore...maybe it's the connection between my head and my hands, but I'm forcing every note that comes out of my horn right now.  There's no flow at all--I feel really stiff, and my musical phrasing feels tongue-tied. The stuff I played tonight sounded ok, but I was working way too hard at it. Anyway, here's what we did.  My hamburger was delicious.  Fries were ok.  Sometimes I think about ordering something different, but...that's not me.

Tyrone Jackson, Kevin Smith, and I played a pretty nice trio gig at, of all places, Stats in downtown Atlanta.  We were playing a small private party in a room there.  It was a hip looking space, though unfortunately for any music fans, it got pretty loud over the course of the night, between the conversations, the activity at the bar, and the occasional slamming door. Maybe predictably, the three of us were more interested in playing than at our previous gig at the mall.  Kevin, in particular, had a great night, I thought.  Check it out!

Jacksonville is far, far away.  It doesn't seem like it should take hours and hours of monotonous driving to reach it, but Yacht Rock drove down there for a gig on Saturday.  Seven hours, I think.  Even more when you miss the turn for I-10.  Oops. One gas stop had a beer cave. One stop had Mexican food. Several stops required gas. We were playing a charity event tied to The Players Championship PGA tournament.  Nothing too stressful--a couple of sets in a big tent, with an air conditioned RV for a green room and BBQ for dinner.  Things could be worse!  We had Matt Lipkins from The Shadowboxers subbing for Nick.  He did an outstanding job. Soundcheck was long and tedious--nearly as difficult as the one we did a couple of weeks ago, except instead of a sound guy who wanted to get it right, we had the most apathetic monitor guy possible and a jackass of a FOH guy (who would ask "Is that how h...