Clifton, Stefan and I arrived right about the same time and immediately knew that all the furniture on the stage was gonna have to stay. A tiny desk with a cute little lamp. Let’s roll the piano out here and open it up. A table with an upside down stool and a big lamp shade to top it off. Check out that whiskey carafe and those high ball glasses! We are definitely using that American flag. We didn’t use everything. Stefan wanted, somehow to use the 30 bright blue tiny plastic chairs but he let it go! When all was said and done, the stage looked like the set of a high school play, maybe “Our Town” or something by Agatha Christie or Noel Coward. During the show, every time I would turn to my left and Stefan sitting behind his “desk” I would crack up. He’d be sitting cross-legged with his kooky glasses on with his Clarinet matching his frames. I just would loose it. The whole setting was perfect and perfectly atrocious.
Our impresario and hostess tried to manage our expectations telling us that weather was likely to keep people away and that things were looking pretty slow over at the Senior Center. If we didn’t get a full house, we shouldn’t take it personally. Indeed. Turns out we had nearly 90 people in the audience which was far more that she expected. One of the better turnouts even!
When you are in a band playing 1920’s and 1930’s music and the average age in the room is around 70, you have to think that at leas some of the audience certainly knows the music from first hand experience. Clifton said he was sure that several if not many had actually danced to “Sister Kate” in high school. All our recent talks about selecting relevant material that our peers and those younger than us would recognize were made marvelously mute by our audience.
The acoustics were marvelous. We didn’t need any microphones not even for the singing. The room was just great! The first tune was “Millenburg Joys” by Jelly Roll Morten. When the crowd applauded after I sang the first verse, Clifton gave me a look as if to say, “Ok, that was easy.” This was our first experience at playing in a room with rows of chairs with a seated audience who were there to focus all their attention on us and be entertained. It felt very easy, fun and natural. We managed to keep the room fully engaged for the full hour we were on stage. The sensitivity of the acoustics aloud us to really work with the softer, more gentle side of the music so we could contrast it with the brash, knocking stuff.
I am so happy that we are so well oiled as a band. Everything flowed together very smoothly. Of course, when appropriate, as the front man it is my role to address the crowd directly and I did my best. I could use more and more experience doing this. I did get a laugh out of the crowd when it was time to introduce “When I Get Low I Get High.” My mind was blank and Clifton was tuning his guitar so I had to come with something to say. I fell back on the Billy Nemec standard: “This next one is gonna be great. You’re gonna love it.” And then I smile to myself and left a little beat, “… it’s about medication.” Over all, I could have erred on totally hamming it up because we really did have complete command of the crowd. I feel, if anything, I erred on the side of discretion and reserve. Nonetheless, at least two people asked us after the show, “Aren’t you wiped out or tired after a performance like that?” “You kidding, that was a snap.” Try doing three hours in the subway station where you have to pull pull pull just to get someone to listen. This was a dream.
All of us would agree – we’ll take shows like this one over and over again. It was easy, fun, warm, entertaining, and for a quality audience!
Oh, the piano… at the end of our last tune, “Bill Baily” in the key of F, Clifton played a definitive closing, single-note, staccato F. You can’t have a piano on a stage like that and not play at least one note!