The Beat Goes On

January 15-22: Marietta, GA. It's show time! I spent this week playing the reed one book for the musical Assassins by Stephen Sondheim. All four reed books (twenty-one instruments between the four of us!) were played by wind players--a rarity for smaller theaters where at least two of these books end up being "faked" by a second keyboardist. It sounded soooo cool! 

The strangest thing in my book was a harmonica part (who plays piccolo, flute, clarinet, soprano sax, and...harmonica?). After a few discussions with the music director, I got the go ahead to play the part on melodica. Yay!

Here are some highlights from the dress rehearsal, beginning with one of my harmonica/melodica solos.

 Here's a nifty thing I did for this show: I made a peg extension for my piccolo to bring its height up even with the other instruments. It makes it much easier to pick up and put down without having to look down in the dark. 

It's just a fifteen inch piece of PVC with some bolts in the caps, spray painted black, but man, it worked like a charm!

Tuesday, January 24: Atlanta, GA. Yacht Rock played a corporate party in town. This one was pretty dull--most everybody stayed at their tables and watched with blank expressions. Those who got up and headed to the bar stations (located outside the ballroom) stood in the doorways and watched. Oh well--sometimes it's just a job.

Friday, January 27: Seattle, WA. We flew out to the Pacific Northwest the night before, so as to be at least slightly acclimated to the time change. However, Mark Bencuya missed the flight, had to wait three and a half hours in Atlanta for the next one, and finally made it to Seattle at 1:30 AM. Ouch!

Good times on this one--I'm a big fan of Seattle, these people, this room, the whole thing--it's fun! Plus, it sold out before we even got the gear in the room, so that was some extra energy. Leisl was there in the front row!

Peter Beckett, Voice of Player, now lives in the Seattle area, so he came and sat in on How Long and Baby Come Back. 

There are lots of YouTube videos from this show by a dedicated fan--here's a sample.

After the show, we caught up with friend of the band Zack Albetta, who is currently playing drums with the national tour of Ain't Too Proud. They are currently working in Seattle, so when he was finished and we were finished, he suggested that we meet up at a bar in between our two theaters to say hey and share a beer. He's doing great!

Saturday, January 28: Portland, OR. We vacated our hotel in the late morning and began the roadtrip to Portland. Today's lunch stop was in some random Oregon town. I don't remember what I ate for lunch, but here's what I had for dessert!

Revolution Hall is a very cool room--the entire venue used to be a school, and the hall is the auditorium in the middle.

A little warming up in the stairwell...

Another big ol' sold out crowd! Good stuff!

After the show in the green room...

And that was it! The next day (Sunday), we flew back to Atlanta.

Monday, January 30: Marietta, GA. Home recording time.

Wednesday, February 1: Manteca, CA. Back on the plane we go, this time to San Francisco. The vans picked us up there, and we continued onward to Manteca to spend the night.

 

crossing the Rockies 

We left the hotel at 11 AM in search of an early lunch before our gig. Our van landed in a shopping area with multiple restaurants, and most of us piled into a booth at the Black Bear Diner. 

In the midst of eating, the waiter came by to say that the restaurant was being evacuated because of a gas leak, and that we must leave immediately. Uhhh, ok! I wrapped my veggie burger in a napkin and made my way out the door.

Our first show of this trip was in Modesto at the Gallo Center for the Arts, a really nice room smack dab in the middle of town.

The crowd was small (less than 300), and it was a nice gig to get some momentum heading into the weekend, but was by no means an epic gig or anything. 

Afterwards, we drove to our hotel in Fresno. 

Friday, February 3: Anaheim, CA. The trip from Fresno to Anaheim was supposed to take five hours, but SoCal Friday traffic got us, and it took almost seven. Ouch!

Tonight's big show was at the Anaheim House of Blues. The last time we were here, the HoB was in a different location, and it was pretty crappy--a dirty old room with a grumpy local crew. This place--way better!

Portrait of the artist as an angry old man...

Saturday, February 4: San Diego, CA. We played The Observatory again. Cool room! 

This one sold out, and we certainly enjoyed the energy of a full room. Great gig. Even the security guards were dancing.

Elliot Lurie came and played with us tonight, sitting in on Dancing in the Moonlight, and of course, Brandy.

More from this weirdo...

Treats for the band! Nackers and I had big forkfuls of several. The chocolate mousse ball in the top corner was the best.

Sunday, February 5: San Diego, CA. We only had our hotel for one night, and we got stuck with having to be out by 11 AM, but the next hotel wouldn't let us in until 4 PM, so the vans dropped us off in the Little Italy section of San Diego for a leisurely brunch.

Kip and Zach's lunch spot was through a passageway in an Italian grocery store. Very old school.

After they'd wandered over to meet Peter in a doughnut shop, I left in search of my own meal. I have successfully eaten at Solunto before, so I tried it again. Bread/sauce? Excellent. Salad? Excellent.

I realized too late that I am not a fan of artichoke or squash. My fault. I still ate the whole thing, though. The crust was really good.

None of this did I eat, I promise.

We eventually reunited with Hans and rode in the van to our next hotel, the Coronado Island Marriott. It was much more of a resort looking place. Nice rooms, of course! I slept a lot here.

The TV is a nice place to let a week's worth of running clothes dry.

Monday, February 6: San Diego, CA. We played a private event for a company...their name escapes me. Crest, maybe? Anyway, the show was in The Music Box, a room we last played a few years ago. 

This one was ok. Maybe a little bit of a letdown after triumph of The Observatory gig. Ganesh sang for Nick (who's off in Nashville this week producing a record for somebody), and both Peter Beckett and Elliot Lurie sat in on the usual songs. Not bad for a Monday, and we were finished at 9:30 PM.

Tuesday, February 7. Homeward bound! I slept for about half the flight home. 

December 2022 - January 2023

Here we go!

December 1, 2022: Atlanta, GA. I played a little quartet gig for an awards ceremony for home renovations. It was nuts, because the winners would be "The winner for 2022's best mudroom renovation is So and So Designs, who spent $112,000 on cabinets and a bench and expensive tile floor in this gorgeous Morningside Mansion!" Over and over. Big, insane budgets. $80,000 man cave kind of stuff. A renovation to your three car garage at your cabin at Lake Hartwell. 

Anyway, the gig was pretty cool. I thought it was going to be a jazz standards kind of thing, but it ended up being more eclectic, like instrumental versions of Stevie Wonder songs. I played an hour of solo saxophone for the cocktail hour, and that was my big chance to wear myself out playing over standards.

Friday, December 2, 2022: New York. The next day, it was off to the airport, headed to LaGuardia. 

Night one at The Paramount on Long Island was packed, and as usual, a really good vibe. 

Saturday, December 3, 2022: Long Island, NY. Night two! After a good night's sleep (it's really difficult to wrap up everything and get to bed on time the night before we fly), we did it again! Another good night. I think both of these shows sold out, or came really close. 

Night two had a lady jump up on stage during Baker Street. As I turned to go back to my keyboards for the verse, she went charging by me with Zach hot on her heels. They were gone before I could even process what was happening. Somewhere on the internet, there's a video of him scooping her up and carrying her off.

We played mostly our usual setlist with a few of the holiday songs sprinkled in.

Post show birthday cake for Kourtney!

Sunday, December 4, 2022: Montclair, NJ. 

The Wellmont. Another big crowd in this cavern of a room. Once you get used to the acoustics, it's not bad.

My apologies to New Jersey for not quite nailing the Bruce Springsteen version of Santa Claus is Coming to Town. Two nights in a row where I messed up the sax solo.

Sharing a sandwich at the hotel in Newark. Thumbs up.

Friday, December 9, 2022: Atlanta, GA. I played a pickup jazz quintet gig for some company's holiday party. These are always amusing--there's no leader, and often you barely know the people with whom you're playing, so in this case, the young vocalist was very aggressive about handling the gig, and the two of us who have been around the local scene for a good while were like "have at it." There were also a couple of guys who were so young/green that they were too busy struggling with the music to notice anything else, which was kind of...annoying. I guess all that is fine? It was fine. We got paid, even got a cash tip. So, whatever.

Thursday, December 15, 2022: Atlanta, GA. John Hopkins (of Zac Brown Band fame) has recorded Christmas albums with different Atlanta groups as his backing band, and this year, the Yacht Rock Revue was the chosen one. The album wasn't ready for release this Christmas, but we played a show with Hop anyway.

Lots of gear for this one. There was all the Yacht Rock stuff, plus a small contingent of the Atlanta Pops to flesh out the string and horn parts, and a conductor. I guess we all meshed pretty well, but everything came together at the last minute, so we were all glued pretty hard to our charts.

No Bencuya on this one (his daughter was sick), so we had Hop's regular keyboardist Brian Bisky fill in.

One song that has been released is Snow, featuring the one and only Debbie Boone. Check this out!

Friday, December 16, 2022: Columbia, SC. Back to our regular programming! This was a regular Yacht Rock show at The Senate in Columbia, though it's kind of a fundraiser, so...I don't know. Anyway, this place is a pretty good spot to play, and after Hop's gig, it was nice to get our feet back under ourselves. The mayor was in attendance, and declared December 16 to be Yacht Rock Revue Day, so there's that. The guy making my sandwich at the Subway was impressed. 

Yeah, good gig! Ian Klin subbed for Bencuya tonight (and tomorrow night at The Roxy) and did a fantastic job. He's super badass, and we were lucky that he was able to make it.

Saturday, December 17, 2022: Atlanta, GA. Our annual Christmas show at The Roxy was really fun, and it sold out, and I finally got the Springsteen Santa Claus is Coming to Town solo right.

Post run/pre gig backstage noodling:

Afterwards, we opened an expensive bottle of bourbon.

I had too much. It made packing up my gear very difficult.

Sunday, December 18, 2022: Atlanta, GA. I played a little jazz trio gig with Billy Thornton (bass) and Louis Heriveaux (piano). Good stuff! This was the cocktail hour before a big private party in the ballroom at the Hotel Intercontinental. 

Two things I remember about this one: 1. We played a tune called Vilia off one of the newest Coltrane albums--kind of cool to play a "new" Trane tune on a gig. 2. Billy stopped in the middle of his solo on Valse Hot, ending the tune. "Sorry. I was hating that one."

Friday, December 23, 2022: Buford, GA. I played the Bumpin' the Mango gig, just as I had predicted I would a month prior.

The train got me! This freight train was stopped right outside the venue, and I had to go about a mile down the road to get around the end of it so I could circle back to the gig.

Pretty decent gig (my buddy Umcolisi Terrell on tenor was killing it all night), with much more of a crowd than I thought there'd be. There's nothing booked in January, so it doesn't look like I'll be back here any time soon.

Holy cow it was cold on the way home. 

Saturday, December 24, 2022: Atlanta, GA. My church gig was looking pretty spectacular. Because of a quick changeover between masses, nobody discovered that we were missing the keyboard's power supply until about twenty minutes before the start time. We managed to find a power supply (to a lamp!) that had enough juice to get us through the night. That was kind of nuts. Who steals a wall wart?

I didn't get much time to spend on these little social media projects this year, but I did finish this one before Christmas.

Saturday, December 31, 2022: Indianapolis, IN. Last show of the year.

Indy looked dreary this morning.

We've played in the Egyptian Ballroom at the Old National Centre before, but this was our first time in the Murat Theatre, the bigger of the two rooms. Very impressive looking.

What a weird gig! The on stage sound felt really wonky (the balance of everything in my ears felt way off), and it seemed like we were just going through the motions from 10 til midnight, like nothing was connected.

At midnight, all hell broke loose, and we were all running around in circles on stage, and there were balloons and chaos and then it was over. I had two glasses of champagne. Hopefully I put away my gear safely. Drinking after gigs is tough, but I'm two for two.

Tuesday, January 3, 2023: Marietta, GA. I laid down my parts for the next Yacht Rock Revue album. The vibes are definitely better than on the previous album. I think I played on five songs on this day. I think the final product is going to be cool.

Monday, January 9, 2023: Atlanta, GA. We had a few days of rehearsal to bring back our Talking Heads Stop Making Sense show. My involvement was pretty minimal/repetitive, as there are not quite two keyboard players worth of parts. The Great Bencuya had more stuff happening--it felt like I spent most of my time watching him play cool stuff. I am very much just along for the ride on this show.

At the end of Wednesday's rehearsal, we did a photo shoot with local legend Emily Butler for some new band promo. Here's one--dig it!

Tuesday, January 10, 2023: Atlanta, GA. I played a nice little trio gig with Andrew Eulau (bass) and Micah Caldwell (guitar). One cocktail hour for a bunch of wedding planners. Easy stuff. Very good people.

Friday, January 13, 2023: Atlanta, GA. Our first show at The Eastern. Cool room! 

I had it in my head that there were only going to be a few hundred people there--maybe somebody had said that ticket sales were light--but it was pretty full, and we were all really excited to do this show for a big hometown crowd. I think it went well!

Saturday, January 14, 2023: Athens, GA. I got screwed by Atlanta traffic/construction, missed the van meetup, and had to drive myself to Athens. Not the best start to my day.

No big deal. I got there just around the same time as the van, so I didn't miss anything. 

This one was good, too! I think that the rehearsals really paid off in that we could be more consistent from night to night, instead of hoping that the excitement of performing would spark some magic.

And there's a video! Check this out...