David Freeman Music

Yacht Rock played a run of the mill corporate event at Buckhead Theatre yesterday afternoon.  A couple of nice things about this one: 1.  Kip and Zach ran sound 2.  Another chance to rehearse some of the songs for this weekend's big Revival 3.  This was a two hour gig that ended at 6:30 The crowd was ambivalent (to say the least).  Someone came forward as we were beginning the second set and suggested that we were boring and that if we wanted to liven up the gig we should have a contest and the winner could come on stage and play tambourine with us.  Mark Dannells did not take kindly to that. That said, they were very enthusiastic about having their pictures taken with us afterwards.

Yacht Rock was on local TV Tuesday morning, doing some press for the big Revival this weekend in Piedmont Park.  With us was Robbie Dupree, and we sang one of his songs titled All Night Long , a doo-wop memory of his Brooklyn youth. CBS46 News After that, it was off to rehearsal.  We're in pretty good shape. I don't have a lot to do on some of these. See you Saturday!

Ahh...a moment for which I'd been waiting quite some time--an opportunity to sub with Bumpin' the Mango, a horn band based in Atlanta.  Their covers of Tower of Power, in particular, sound so good that when I was asked to come play bari sax with them Monday night, it was easy to say yes. There's more to it than Tower of Power, but that's kind of what I fixated on.  I saw ToP in the early 90s (my sax teacher took me) and then I saw them at the start of this year at The Canyon Club in California.  Both times--totally awesome.  The sound of those horns is in my DNA.  I think I did a good job of approximating Doc Kupka on this evening (except for the hat)! This gig had many subs--more than regular band members!--but everybody came prepared.  Subbing along with me were Dan Baraszu (guitar), Jason Chapman (bass), Justin Powell (trumpet), Travis Cottle (trombone), and Umcolisi Terrell (tenor sax). I shouldn't have been surprised at how well Dan played,...

Please Pleaserock Me (the Yacht Rock guys playing the Beatles) did a two night stand at Smith's Olde Bar this past Friday and Saturday, mowing down four sets of music for two very good crowds. Smith's got a new menu and better food--yay!  On the flip side, the bathroom upstairs is still disgusting.  No soap at the sink either night, and no towels in the towel dispenser Saturday night.  How do all the employees wash their hands before returning to work? Friday:   A very easy night for me.  My only disaster of the evening was the little two measure sax solo at the end of Jet .  I couldn't see what I'd written on my chart.  Well, maybe that and Hide Your Love Away .  When the set list was emailed out, I misread it thinking that we'd played that song before, and since I didn't have a chart for it, I didn't even bother listening to it.  Turns out it WAS a new tune with a flute part at the end.  Oops.  Bencuya played the flute ...

The David Freeman Organ Trio (David Ellington, Henry Conerway III, and me) played Churchill Grounds last night.  Great playing all around--adding Henry to our duo gigs radically changed the way Dave and I play these tunes (in a good way), and pushed us to some really cool places that we wouldn't have gotten to on our own.

one of the best gig posters we've ever had Yacht Rock played a show in Austin, TX for the Fourth of July.  The gig was supposed to be an outdoors event in conjunction with a massive fireworks display, but the fireworks were cancelled and the event fell apart, so our party was moved to a club. We flew out in the morning from Atlanta.  As I was getting off the park and ride bus at the airport, I realized that I didn't have my driver's license with me--I'd left it at home.  There was nothing to do but drive home and get it, meaning I would certainly miss my flight. At the airport for the second time, I found out that there were no seats available on any flight for the rest of the day in my seat class (or something like that--I took it to mean that there were none left in the same price range that my original flight had been booked).  Great...I had to get to Austin, so I bought a plane ticket on my phone (with my hands shaking so badly that I could barely input ...

Yacht Rock played a 3rd of July show last night in Sugar Hill, GA (right near Duluth).  There's no good way for me to get to that part of town--for this one I had to make my way over to GA400, get on at Holcomb Bridge Road, head north for seven exits, and then continue east.  For no apparent reason there was an obscene amount of traffic, and coupled with a GPS failure (insisting on taking me to Creek Road instead of Level Creek Road), a trip that should have taken one hour took two.  I was completely incensed by the time I finally made it. The guys coming up from Atlanta had similar problems, though, and we all arrived right around the same time. Load in and set up were uneventful.  We drove across the field and up to the stage.  Kip mixed us, which once again saved us hours of frustration. This was a fun gig.  I was dreading the heat, but temperatures were pretty pleasant, and a good breeze kept us pretty cool.  The crowd got better as we wen...