Thursday night, I played a trio gig in Buckhead--strictly background music for some kind of corporate mixer. Maybe 200 people in the room, and several of them seemed to be going out of their way to stand as close to band as possible while holding conversations, all the while seemingly oblivious to us. Later in the evening, a man, armed with a small PA and a wireless microphone, shouted over us (and the indifferent crowd) instead of asking us to stop for his announcements. Very strange. Sometimes it feels like people don't know what live music looks like up close, so they treat us like furniture, or catering.
Anyway, enough about that. The gig was with Nick Rosen (keyboard) and Robby Handley (bass), and once again it's been way too long since I've done a jazz trio gig (maybe a year at this point), and I was anxious about whether or not I could remember any tunes and/or play over changes. Much to my surprise, things went very well, and I was actually really happy with what was coming out of my horn. It definitely helped to have such musically eloquent friends with me--Nick and Robby were great. Pretty easy gig, and the check was in my mailbox when I returned home. Boom!
Friday night, Yacht Rock played the Buckhead Theatre, just down the street from my Thursday gig. The ownership has done a lot to improve the sound of this room, but it's still not quite there--things are very boomy and noisy on stage. I heard that it was good out front, though, so that's good, though I think that's mostly because our front of house guy, Kip, is extremely good at his job.
We had a pretty good crowd--around a thousand people, I think--and they were pretty into what we were doing, but maybe not? It was tough to get a read on these people. We would get a pretty big reaction for a song, but it would completely die away before we could start the next, so...I don't know what that means. They were weird. It's Buckhead.
The setlist was a mix of regular songs, some Thriller album cuts, some that we brought back (Frankenstein, Tiny Dancer, and Sister Christian), and a new one (More Than a Feeling, featuring a killer vocal by Nick). Greg really nailed the vocals on Sister Christian. For me, it was a pretty even show, playing-wise.
Saturday afternoon, we all drove up to the mountains to play a wedding reception at a winery. The weather was really beautiful in the afternoon.
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| super cool VW bus/photo booth |
Unfortunately, once the sun went down, the winds started whipping through the tent (at one point, it nearly carried away the catering tent just outside of the reception). The first set got colder and colder, and by halfway through, most of my fingers were numb, which made playing saxophone and EWI interesting, to say the least. On the break, my hands thawed out and the catering people shut one of the tent flaps, and we survived a second set that ended just before midnight. Immediately following was one of our fastest load outs, and the seven of us raced back down 400 with the heat on.
Sunday afternoon, I was back in Buckhead, this time a little south of the Theatre to play my church gig. Mostly flute, but I gave 'em some piccolo for the last song. Cold again, though my fingers didn't go numb this time.
Church musicians are a different breed altogether, with their own humor and eccentricities--it's like playing in the pit for a religious theatre show...I'll just leave it at that.
