May and June's Triumph and Tragedy

It's time for another "way-too-late" blog update! Only two weeks behind schedule! World class procrastination!

May began with night two of our shows at The Fred Amphitheater in Peachtree City, GA. Maybe not as electric as the evening before, but still a very solid show. Sort of business-as-usual with a lazy soundcheck, a livestream performance of With a Little Help from My Friends for the 500 Songs for Kids Beatles show, chips and salsa, some sort of vegan concoction of rice, beans, and veggies that I brought from home, and solid playing on stage.

The following weekend, I played in a concert production (no acting, just the singing) of Nine at the Cobb County Theatre. The orchestra was stretched all the way across the back of the stage, with the conductor on  one end and me on the other. Luckily, we were all on headphones and the conductor wore a microphone that she used to count in tempo changes. Sill, check out this picture. The conductor is the last head at the end of the line of people on stools. 

I did thoroughly enjoy playing all my instruments, though! Shows are such a terrific challenge! I wish I could squeeze more of these into my calendar.

One more shot, this time with the stools empty, so you can see physically how far I was away from the baton! 

On to the next weekend! Yacht Rock was back at it, this time in Charleston for an outdoor show.

This one was ok. There wasn't much of a connection to the audience, so I couldn't get very excited about it. Let's just say that this was a good warm up for better gigs later in the year.

nice pic of me by Kip, soaking up all that audience vibe from fifty feet away

The following night, we played "The Amp," a really great amphitheater in St. Augustine, FL. This was a GREAT gig, like this was the honeymoon for starting up the Yacht Rock gigging again. Oh yeah. Awesome.

They even had these cool concert posters that we signed for fans. Dig it.

Yeah...we want more of these.

On the next Wednesday, I played a lifestream jazz gig from Venkman's comprised almost entirely of my originals. Holy hell, who would ever willingly book that! It was fun, but maaaaaan, it was tough. My embouchure was not ready for two hours straight, and my brain was not ready for the stress of doing a show, talking to a camera, and then concentrating on my music. And thus, by the time I sat in on Bencuya's show (which followed mine), I was either an idiot, or really wildly entertaining for a half hour.

Joining me in the jazz were Louis Heriveaux (piano), and Tommy Sauter (bass). How cool was that, though, to play my own tunes! And people were digging it!  Very cool. I'd love more chances to do something like this once Venkman's opens back up.

The next Yacht Rock gig was on a former tennis court in Lake Charles, Louisiana. 

Can I bitch about it? The airport was 90 minutes away; the stage was small; it was hot; the people were all Duck Dynasty; we were ignored for the entire time (except that they demanded an encore--really?). As you can see in the picture, we were never threatened with a chaotic mosh pit of smooth music lovers.

On the other hand, we got paid, I squeezed in a good run, and the chef made us all really great food (including the vegan spaghetti and meatballs). Also, Scott Sheriff subbed for Mark Bencuya on this one and played everything perfectly. It's a draw, I guess, and after fifteen months of not playing gigs, nobody's allowed to gripe about it. Definitely a clunker, though.

June was abysmal, so I'm just going to include the one gig I had, and then I'll be ahead in the blogosphere because June isn't even over.

Yacht Rock played a gig in Greenville, SC at the airport--another portable stage and a hot parking lot. This one was awful. We set up and sound checked and everything was good, but on the gig, my sax microphone would not work--the frequency that I was on had a massive dead spot basically all over the stage. I tried about fifty times to rescan and find a different frequency (while I'm also trying to play the gig, mind you!), and the receiver would only suggest one frequency (the one with the giant dead spot). On the fifty-first scan, it suggested a different frequency--yes!--but when I changed my microphones to that one, there was nothing but deafening static. Sooooo, rescan, rescan, rescan, still trying to play the gig, rescan, aaaaaand fuck it. I ended up back on frequency option one and hoped that I could find a spot on stage that worked, but no, so I played into Nick and Monkeyboy's vocal mics. It sucked. I was miserable. I hope that whoever else was on my frequency (a plane on the runway behind us, perhaps) got an earful of obnoxious saxophone.

In other news...here's my social media stuff that I put up in May and June.

First up, a little blowing over the Charlie Parker tune Blues for Alice, with the aim of getting used to a different mouthpiece, and just getting comfortable with the alto in my hands.

Earache My Eye was a special recording for Mark Bencuya's Dr. Demento livestream show. This is from a Cheech and Chong album. 

I also guested on Mark Bencuya's livestream show when he played more of his regular stuff, and we took on New York State of Mind.

My friend Rob Opitz is doing a recording project, and he invited me to play on one of his arrangements. 

I've been working through Bach flute sonatas to help with my playing endurance, and the Siciliano seemed like a good one to capture.