Playing Dead

So…some weirdness at the ol' AM church gig.  We did the usual opening of a couple of hymns jammed together.  That left two big songs in the book.  We played through the second, and after hearing the vibe of it, I decided to just play flute (mostly just grabbing the top part of the piano score).  For the first big song, the director brought a flutist from the choir to play…hmm.  My first choice for an instrument would've been flute, so I just kind of hung back and checked out what she was going to play to see if there was room left for me (there actually were some harmony lines to her flute part).  I got my clarinet out to try that at soundcheck.  Clarinet would be a nice blend with the flute.

We went upstairs to set up and soundcheck after rehearsal, and the flutist plopped her music on my stand and literally boxed me out of playing onstage.  Uhhh, now what?  I guess I wasn't meant to play on this one!  Kind of a weird situation--I played saxophone for the opening, walked off, she played flute, then went back to the choir and I played flute.

Anyway, this left me with significant down time during their performance, which I utilized by taking pictures of myself just off the side of the stage.

This happened for two services.  For the second service, I went upstairs and listened to everybody else. It sounds really good--nice work, Matt!  Difficult to stay whether or not my offstage clarinet part would have improved things.  I did get a nice picture of director, flute, and myself together.  I bet if I'd had a blue shirt, they'd have let me play.

After all the fun, I went home and worked on charting out Bill Champlin/Chicago songs for a Yacht Rock rehearsal.  My hatred of Chicago 17 returns twenty-nine years later!

The PM church gig was pretty decent.  I had a nice mix going (and no further complaints from the rhythm section), and my soprano playing was pretty good.  Flute was just OK.  It probably would've been better if I'd played it more in the morning.

After supper, it was back to the Champlin charting.  Up all night!