Food

Dave Mason at Tarrytown Music Hall

Jul 12th, 2009
by hadar.
11 comments

Last night was our eighth concert at Tarrytown Music Hall, and our third Dave Mason show (first one at the Hall). I covered the previous shows extensively here and here.

To summarize the things that were the same: Dave Mason is beyond awesome. His voice is still amazing, and his fingers move across the guitar like butter. The old songs are as magical today as they were then. The news songs (he recently released a new CD called 26 Letters ~ 12 Notes) are wonderful as well, showing that he hasn’t lost a step in all these years.

DaveMason

Dave Mason

The band (each and every member) is fantastic.

That said, there were a number of differences last night, some even notable. :-)

Two band members who toured with Dave last year, and were at both of the shows we attended, have been replaced. I tried (reasonably hard, but hardly exhaustive) and I couldn’t find any articles explaining their departure. The band page has scrubbed their existence.

The links to their bios from my previous posts still work, but they point to the new person playing that instrument. Strange. In fact, now that I looked, one of the links that worked before was to a name of someone that was already gone from the band. In other words, they replace pictures and bios on the site, but keep the old links…

Anthony (Tony) Patler replaced Bill Mason on keyboards and vocals. We both loved Bill Mason’s singing and playing, so I’m sad (for him) to see him gone (unless it was his choice to move on). Tony was incredible last night, both on the keyboards and on vocals, so the band didn’t lose any magic in swapping him in.

Johnne Sambataro and Tony Patler

Johnne Sambataro and Tony Patler

Gerald Johnson replaced Alex Drizos on bass. Alex didn’t sing, but Gerald does, on a few numbers. Gerald used to tour with Dave back in the 70’s, so he’s no stranger to the music. If you read my past posts, you know that I think very highly of Alex on the bass.

Gerald Johnson

Gerald Johnson

Like with Bill Mason above, I can’t find a mention of why Alex is no longer with the band. Like with Tony above, Gerald is absolutely incredible, in fact, better than Alex (in my opinion), so the band lost nothing here either (though fans of Alex certainly have…).

Johnne Sambataro was as incredible as he’s been at the previous shows. He’s a crowd favorite, rightfully so!

Alvino Bennett was again amazing. Last night was a treat for me personally, as in both previous shows, I had very restricted views of Alvino, and I’m a drum nut. Last night, he and Tony were on an elevated platform behind Dave, Johnne and Gerald, so Alvino and his drum set were in full view. The man has guns for biceps!

Alvino Bennett

Alvino Bennett

Last night posed a few challenges for Alvino. He broke three separate drums (I assume the skins) during the performance. Dave kidded that Alvino doesn’t know his own strength!

In one number, I noticed him unscrewing a snare drum and handing it to a stage hand, while the song continued. He never caused a disruption, using his bass foot pedal, and occasionally his right hand to keep the beat, while repairing his drum in real time! Unbelievable!

As with the previous shows, Alvino didn’t take any solos, but was solid as a rock. He’s a master drummer.

The one other major difference last night was the venue. If you read my post yesterday (which I’m not linking to because it’s way off topic for this post), then you’ll find what I’m about to say ironic. ;-)

Tarrytown Music Hall is a wonderful old theater. Even though the seats are ancient, they are extremely comfortable. We were in the seventh row and had a wonderful line of sight to the entire band. The sound system was excellent last night, and all of the instruments and mics were set at the appropriate levels relative to each other.

Given that we were facing the stage (as opposed to BB King, where you generally have to contort a bit because you’re at a dinner table), the entire experience was as excellent as we could have hoped for.

Dave Mason was on stage for 95 minutes, including his signature encore of Feelin’ Allright.

Opening for Dave Mason last night was the TJay Trio. TJay is good guitarist. One thing that he does particularly well is seamlessly switch between lead and rhythm playing. That’s good, because he’s the only one playing each style.

TJay

TJay

His singing is pleasant enough, and he certainly hits every note, but I didn’t find his voice that interesting, and it was nearly impossible to catch any three words in a row (which was not a problem when Dave Mason was at the mic).

Correction: Nick Soto played the bass, filling in for regular TJay Trio bassist Mick Houser. Afterward, Nick sat across the aisle from Lois for the Dave Mason set. He’s extremely good. I thoroughly enjoyed his play throughout their set!

Nick is constantly moving on the stage (he has tons of energy), and Lois was unable to get a single shot of him that was in focus. Sorry Nick, this was the best of a bunch of bad ones…

Nick Soto

Nick Soto

Correction: Bryan Rinaldi played the drums, filling in for normal TJay Trio drummer Rob Gueli. Nothing flashy, but very solid throughout the set.

Bryan Rinaldi

Bryan Rinaldi

They played a nice mix of rock, blues and jazz and received enthusiastic applause from the crowd after each number. They were on stage for 40 minutes, and warmed up the crowd nicely for Dave. They were also well-matched genre-wise to be an opening act for Dave.

One footnote regarding last night in relation to the night before. There is little doubt that the crowd last night was as in love with Dave Mason as the crowd the night before was in love with Yonder Mountain String Band. And yet, nearly everyone sat in their seats all night, until the encore (I’m not counting the standing ovations).

This isn’t a mark of their age, lack of energy, or lack of love of the artist. It’s a mark of their respect for their neighbors, who came to see the same show, with certain expectations. It was a thing of beauty to see the one woman who was dancing at her seat for 1/2 a song, finally realize that no one else stood up to follow her lead, and she quietly sat down with no one having to say anything to her. :-)

In order to avoid the typical parking problems in Tarrytown before a show at the Hall, on both Friday and Saturday nights, we came to town 30 minutes early, parked four or five blocks away, and walked to Main Street Sweets for some Ice Cream.

On Friday, it was our first time ever at Main Street Sweets (I read some excellent reviews online of their home-made Ice Cream). Obviously, it was good enough to schedule our return for the next night. It’s a block and a half down Main Street from Tarrytown Music Hall, so it’s easy to relax eating some Ice Cream, and time it to walk into the Hall whenever you like.

theSet NYC at Le Poisson Rouge

Jul 7th, 2009
by hadar.
2 comments

A month ago, I posted about a wonderful weekend that included catching Altar Boyz at New World Stages. As a result (I assume) I received an email from Pim, a member of the team that founded theSet NYC.

theSet NYC is a great idea. Collect a group of talented performers and promote a show featuring a bunch of them on the same night. The idea is to give these people an alternative to the grind of a pure open mic night. Pim used to do standup comedy (and might again in the future), so he was well aware of the difficulties of getting the appropriate breaks.

For the performers, it typically means a slightly longer set (roughly 15 minutes each) and a (hopefully) friendlier crowd. For the audience, it typically means a (slightly) more vetted group of performers (no one who just mustered up the courage five minutes ago to get up on the stage), and also a friendlier atmosphere (not oriented toward heckling, etc.).

theSet NYC aims to put on a show once a month. They use a number of venues, one of which is the lounge at New World Stages, which is how I guess Pim ended up finding me.

One of Pim’s roles is blogger outreach. Once he connected with me via email, he invited me to attend their next show, which was last night, at Le Poisson Rouge (LPR), in the Gallery Bar (downstairs, they also have a more traditional club upstairs). The show fit with our schedule, so we decided to attend.

Pim

Pim

Most of the shows have been free to date (including last night), though there’s no guarantee of that in the future. We arrived at 7pm (the show started at 8pm) because we intended to eat (and drink) at Gallery Bar first.

You can check out the menu to see the eclectic range of food and drink offered there. Lois had the Edamame. She raved non-stop while she was eating them. I had the Spicy Tuna Roll (absolutely incredible), and the Sloppy Kobe Joes. Folks, I do believe that this is one of the most delicious things I’ve ever eaten. Not quite a hamburger (because it’s not pressed together in a patty, since it’s a sloppy joe), and with a sauce that’s spicy (not hot, flavorful!) and fantastic.

If theSet NYC did nothing else for us, it introduced us to a place that we will return to for the food alone, no doubt! In addition, the lovely bartender made me a perfect Chocolate Martini. Thanks!

Gallery Bar Bartender

Gallery Bar Bartender

On to the show. Lois asked me to cover the performers in the order that we liked them, rather than in the order that they appeared. Seems fair enough to me, so here goes (I think we are in basic agreement on the order, but I’m not double checking with her, so technically, this is my personal order):

Evon Campbell was the most consistently funny of the comedians (which dominated last night’s show). He has a very relaxed style which relaxes the audience. He is then easily able to catch the audience off guard with very clever jokes that aren’t easy to predict (the best kind). Here’s a three minute video of him from a previous theSet NYC show (he didn’t repeat a single line from this clip last night!).

Evon Campbell

Evon Campbell

Arthur Carlson had the most professional delivery of the group last night. Here’s a clip of a bit he did last night as well. He was more in control of the audience than the rest, and appeared more comfortable and self-assured on stage than the rest. I’ll have a more general note at the end, in which I’ll have some more to say about Arthur.

Arthur Carlson

Arthur Carlson

Kai Raziq hosted the evening. He didn’t actually do any specific routines, but his style on stage was engaging, and we all chuckled at nearly everything he said, even though he wasn’t telling any jokes per se.

Kai Raziq

Kai Raziq

Alec Sobel held his own reasonably well. He too has a professional quality to his delivery. Here is a link to a five minute video that will give you a good sense of his style and genre. At the bottom of the page is a link to a different video that is a little less adult in nature (not much, but perhaps a little cursing removed).

Alec Sobel

Alec Sobel

Matt Rittberg was close behind Alec in my opinion. While he too has a pretty good command of the stage, he relied a bit too much on sexual jokes, and isn’t quite expert enough to walk that kind of tight rope. Here is a page with a variety of videos of Matt’s routines which includes stuff the seems cleverer than most of the material he did last night.

Matt Rittberg

Matt Rittberg

I’m going to present the next two performers (the only musical ones last night) in the order that Lois preferred them. For my taste, I would swap them, but I’ll predict and respect Lois’ choice.

Adontay sang two songs last night. The first was a cappella and we both enjoyed it more than we thought we would when he first started. Adontay has a very nice voice, and the song was pretty good too. Unfortunately, he didn’t carry that through to the second number. In that one, he had a soundtrack (played off of a laptop). The song wasn’t as good (in our opinion) and was a little too long. When the soundtrack ended, he continued a cappella, and to our ears, rambled off key and out of tune. He has a lot of talent, but he needs significantly more polish and practice.

Adontay

Adontay

Stephanie Carlin sang and played acoustic guitar. I think she has an excellent voice, plays the guitar well enough, and has a reasonable amount of stage presence. Unfortunately, neither of us was drawn to her two original songs. They brought her back on stage at the end because two of the scheduled performers didn’t show up, and we somewhat preferred the two covers she did then (a medley of Hit the Road Jack and Moondance). The raw talent (at least in the voice) is most definitely there, but the performance and musical selection isn’t our personal cup of tea.

Stephanie Carlin

Stephanie Carlin

Ranked last in both of our opinions, but opening the show (which made for a tense few minutes when we thought the rest of the night would be like this) was April Brucker. Her delivery last night was completely flat (close to zero energy). She started with very crude sexual jokes about her roommate, and then brought out the roommate (from a suitcase), a puppet called May.

April Brucker

April Brucker

April describes herself as an Inappropriate Ventriloquist. That’s an incredibly apt description. She’s a reasonably talented ventriloquist, and she’s beyond inappropriate. I’m sure that the college boys laugh like hell at that kind of shock you humor.

I can’t reconcile her lack of energy last night with this video. In the video, she has tremendous energy, but the same crude humor. At the four minute mark, she introduces May, so you can get a sense of that part of the act last night as well.

I have explained in a number of posts how much I love comedy (and laughing) in all forms, even crude ones. Lois isn’t as forgiving of pure crudeness, which she (correctly) equates with comic laziness. In other words, it’s easier to get a laugh by shocking your audience (especially if you’re female) than by actually being clever.

Jerry Seinfeld is one of the most successful comedians of all time, and he never resorts to cursing. He doesn’t resort to much sexual innuendo either, and when he does, it’s high level enough to be acceptable even if kids are in the room.

If I wasn’t sitting with Lois, and analyzing in my head the fact that a crude joke probably just rubbed her the wrong way, I would enjoy the crudeness a bit more myself. Still, fundamentally, I agree with her that it’s a cheap way to get a laugh.

That said, I mentioned above that I would circle back to Arthur Carlson. He had two routines that were 100% sexual in nature. One was actually gross (if you attempted to visualize it). Yet, I laughed like hell at both (even the gross one), and even Lois chuckled at the gross one, and liked the other one a lot.

There were three things that made us/Lois react differently to Arthur’s sexual jokes than to most other such references:

  1. His delivery is so professional that you’re listening to a true joke teller, not someone just trying to deliver a crude one-liner.
  2. Both jokes were very inventive. The punch lines weren’t predictable, so it wasn’t shock value that made you laugh, it was the imagery and the comedic absurdity of what he was saying.
  3. It was a change of pace for him. Since he was able to tell a bunch of clean jokes too, telling a clever sexual joke caught the audience more off guard than when they are coming at you one after another.

While this isn’t really Lois’ idea of a perfect night out, we both had a really good time, and would recommend catching a theSet NYC show to anyone who is interested in seeing fresh talent, in good quantity, in reasonably contained sets (in case any one performer isn’t to your liking), in a very pleasant and supportive atmosphere. If it’s in the Gallery Bar at Le Poisson Rouge, then we can recommend the food and drink very highly as well!

Thanks again to Pim for reaching out, and to Leo (the producer of the show) for making it happen!

Leo

Leo

Girlyman at Highline Ballroom

Jun 5th, 2009
by hadar.
5 comments

For those keeping score, and I know that there are scores of you doing so, ;-) last night was the 11th time we’ve seen Girlyman perform live (the second time at the Highline Ballroom).

In addition to owning their four CDs, we also purchase the recordings of each show we see live (and yes, I listen to them all!). If you don’t know Girlyman, you might think that after all of the listening on my iPod, and seeing them live, that we’re merely groupies (stalkers?), because what could be new and fresh for us in a Girlyman show?

Well, you’d be wrong, but if you’ve ready any of my previous (lengthy) posts about Girlyman, you would have chosen your response more wisely. ;-)

First, there were the usual surprises. By that I mean that Girlyman introduced three new songs last night (at least, perhaps it was four, but I’m pretty sure it was three). One, a new song by Ty, was sung solo by her, with Doris and Nate leaving the stage completely. That’s a first for any of the shows we’ve seen.

Ty

Ty

Most of the shows we’ve seen in the past year have had at least one song we’ve never heard before. That alone makes it worth it for us to show up, and order our live CD, so that we can capture that song before the new CD hits the stands (more on that in a minute). Of course, some of those new songs may not even make the new CD, so we still want the live version.

In addition, Girlyman has a pretty big catalog by now, so each show has some mystery to it in terms of what they’re in the mood to play, or what people will call for in the request section. Lately (as I’ve written from the past few shows), they’ve surprised with some oldies but goodies. Last night they picked another one that we’ve never heard them play live: Even If.

The Highline Ballroom is a gorgeous, large club. It can seat 400. The sound system is excellent, and a majority of the seats (dinner table style seating) have good views of the stage. The shows at Joe’s Pub are more intimate, but the vibe of a larger audience at Highline, coupled with the excellent sound system, makes this a wonderful venue for Girlyman.

Girlyman really had their vocals humming last night. All three were in good voice, and as the songs built momentum (a trademark of many Girlyman numbers), their power really came through, and their voices remained crystal clear even at full volume.

Doris

Doris

Nate

Nate

On stage, they announced that they just finished recording their new CD. They also just finished mixing it. Their relief was palpable. My guess is that we’ll all have our sweaty little hands on the CD in late July, or early August, but what do I know…

In what I ascribe as at least partially caused by that milestone, there were some more muffs last night than usual in a Girlyman show. In what is completely typical of all Girlyman shows, those muffs (e.g., starting a song while a guitar was still out of tune) were handled with humor and class. In all cases, they restarted the song, and (of course) nailed it the second time. That too is one of the joys of live music, being part of the experience.

Newcomers most likely thought they were funny throughout, and they were, but the humor was a little choppier than usual, not as crisp and incisive. Still, I laughed a bunch, and since the music is the top billing, any laughs are a wonderful bonus.

Another result of the exhaling process is that they were willing to entertain more requests than they typically do (though they were very generous at the Barns at Wolf Trap as well). In addition to satisfying many people in the audience, it also caused the show to be a little longer than usual, which was very welcome (yes, I could listen to them all night!). The encore ended up being two more requests, making it something like five songs requested by the audience during this show.

Girlyman

Girlyman

In total, they were on stage for roughly 105 minutes of wonderful music and good (but not their best) banter.

Opening for them was Katie Sawicki, accompanied by Adam Sweeney. This was the fourth time that Adam has accompanied Katie, and both Lois and Wes commented to me afterward that Katie should continue touring with him.

Katie Sawicki

Katie Sawicki

Adam Sweeney

Adam Sweeney

For the most part, we’ve been very impressed with the groups that open for Girlyman (that is, when it’s their choice as to who opens). The one serious exception (and it may not have been their choice) was the only other time we’ve been to the Highline Ballroom, when the opening act was too much of a mismatch (style-wise) to Girlyman.

Katie Sawicki was an exceptionally good match to Girlyman. She finger-picks the guitar beautifully, both electric and acoustic. Adam plays banjo, guitar and accordion, and sings harmony very nicely with Katie. She did one song solo.

Katie has a lovely voice, thoughtful lyrics, and a very gentle style on stage. If I had a single complaint, it might be that she could have sung a tad louder, or they could have cranked the sound board just a tad. If she had to err, she erred on the correct side, as too loud would not have been welcome.

The only freaky thing to me was that Katie is the doppelganger of a very good friend of ours (who happens to live in Atlanta, where Girlyman reside) even down to the facial expressions. So, I kept thinking that our very dear friend was on stage singing to us. I got over it, and enjoyed her music, but it still was a very strange sensation.

Katie played for about 45 minutes, and a number of people told me after the show that they were extremely surprised and pleased with how much they enjoyed her performance. I guess most people have very low expectations from an opening act…

There’s always a back story to any of our nights out, and usually a Girlyman back story is longer. Last night was no exception. We’ve seen them in NY a few more times than in VA (seven in NY, four in VA), but we tend to bring a larger crowd with us in VA, partially because of the venues, and partially because scheduling a bunch of NY friends on the same night is often an insurmountable challenge.

If you’ve been reading this space for two years, then you know that ever since I accidentally discovered Girlyman in August 2007, I’ve been on a mission to introduce them to as many people as I can. One of the most effective ways of doing that is by bringing people to see them live. Most enjoy the music and become fans. A few have become fanatics for the band (very gratifying). It’s the rarest person that doesn’t really care for their music after the show, but that’s happened too, and I survived. Whew.

Given that last night was in a large venue with excellent table seating, and that we knew about it well in advance, we decided to try and break the record of the number of people we had brought to a Girlyman show in the past. Our record was 15 people at the Birchmere, this past October.

Two months before the show, I sent out a large blind distribution inviting people to be our guests for the show. Sparing you the many twists and turns along the way, we ended up purchasing 20 tickets, and due to some last-minute personal issues, ended up bringing 19 (including us) to the show. Most of the tables at the Highline Ballroom seat six people, so we took three of them and squeezed a seventh at the head of one of the tables, right up against the stage.

We had lots of food, drink and merriment for the two hours leading up to Katie, and it was a blast catching up with some people that we don’t get to see as often as we’d like. I think I can honestly say that everyone in our party had a delightful evening, in terms of company, food, drink, and of course, the show itself!

We broke our record (and have set a new bar, which we hope to leap over on October 11th, back at the Birchmere again) and created at least a handful of new fans (hopefully more).

A fabulous evening all around. Thanks to everyone who attended, and to Girlyman for putting on such a great show! :-)

I have to conclude with an incredible small world story. One of the couples that attended last night was married last year on 08/08/08 (I blogged about that wedding too). Another couple that attended last night is getting married this year, on 10/10. They had never met before last night.

In introducing themselves, and getting to know each other a bit, they discovered that the pastor that married the 08/08/08 couple will be marrying the 10/10/09 couple as well. That this tidbit is true is strange and cool enough. That they would separately be invited by us, chat to each other, and figure that out so quickly is a little other-worldly to me. :-)

CMA Writers Series at Joe’s Pub

May 22nd, 2009
by hadar.
1 comment

Last night was our ninth CMA Writers Series at Joe’s Pub. Yes, we already have our tickets for the next one, which will be #10. :-)

They started at 6:35pm. This time, there were only four people on the stage, rather than the more typical five. There was a qualitative difference as well. As I’ve pointed out in the past, many of the songwriters are less-than-spectacular performers. On occasion, there’s a real full-time performer (e.g., Craig Morgan), or someone who could be if they wanted to be (e.g., Hillary Lindsey).

Aside from those exceptions (they were just examples, there are other professional performers on occasion), the talent level varies, pretty dramatically.

Last night saw three people, plus the ever-present Bob DiPiero, who were all excellent performers in their own right. In addition, they were every bit as interesting and entertaining in their story-telling as the more typical songwriters who are the backbone of this series.

From left-to-right on the stage:

Jimmy Wayne played the guitar and sang. He’s a singer-songwriter, meaning, he performs his own work, and cuts his own CDs, and tours. He’s opening for Brad Paisley this summer! He plays a superb finger-picking style on the guitar, and doesn’t need any further accompaniment to create an excellent sound to complement his singing.

Jimmy Wayne

Jimmy Wayne

Jimmy had a very rough childhood, and overcame more than most of us have to experience (thankfully so, on both fronts!). I thought he looked 25, but he’s 37. Because of his difficult upbringing, many of his songs are filled with those stories, including all of the anguish, but with hopeful or uplifting endings. In other words, he sings from the heart!

We enjoyed every one of Jimmy’s numbers, and his stories were touching and much appreciated as well. He has a winning smile. For the first time in our nine appearances at this series, we experienced women screaming to Jimmy about him, rather than just about the songs. If he wanted to go home with someone, he could have had his pick. ;-)

Bob DiPiero played the guitar and sang. Bob did his usual giant hits, and also introduced a brand new one that was just cut by Brooks and Dunn. Nice to know that when you hit the CMA Writers Hall of Fame, you don’t stop writing new ones. ;-)

Bob DiPiero

Bob DiPiero

Scotty Emerick played the guitar and sang. Scotty is a master guitarist (again, an anomaly for this kind of show, but not unheard of). Jimmy Wayne is excellent, but Scotty is better, exhibiting more styles. Scotty often writes with/for Toby Keith, which meant we got to hear a couple of our favorite Country songs, Beer for My Horses and I Love this Bar (both huge Toby Keith hits!).

Scotty Emerick

Scotty Emerick

Scotty has a gorgeous voice (click from the above site to his MySpace page to hear four of his songs). Couple that with his guitar playing, and he could be a full-time performer. Unlike Jimmy, he concentrates more on song-writing. That said, he does have a CD out, and Lois bought it last night (signed, of course).

Aside from getting to hear the Toby Keith songs, Scotty also played some hysterical songs, including the first cut from his CD (also available for you to listen to on MySpace) called Love Me Like My Dog! I laughed out loud at each and every line in the song. Aside from being funny, it’s also a good song musically. He’s a real talent!

He sang another song that broke up the crowd on every verse as well, I’ll Never Smoke Weed with Willie Again. If you want to see Scotty sing and play the guitar for yourself, then enjoy this YouTube version yourself:

Dean Dillon played guitar and sang. Dean was a professional performer for many years, so it was no surprise that he was excellent last night as well. However, he concentrates more nowadays on his writing, and it has more than paid off for him. George Strait has cut more than 30 of Dean’s songs!

Dean Dillon

Dean Dillon

I am sure that Dean and Scotty are good friends, and I think I heard them say that they have written together as well. That came across last night when they each sang harmony on the other’s songs. For example, in the video above, Scotty and Toby Keith sing harmony, and Dean played the Toby part last night (just for the harmony, as Scotty sang each of the verses).

In addition, Scotty played lead guitar on many of Dean’s numbers, enriching Dean’s performance very nicely. Well done by both of them.

As much as the crowd always goes nuts for anything/everything that Bob DiPiero sings or says, surrounding himself with three people who can all sing and play so much better than him is a testament to his committment to bring extrmeley talented people for us New Yorker’s to enjoy! Bravo Bob!

That’s it for the show. We had a little adventure that worked out in the end…

We walked to Joe’s Pub last night, something we haven’t done before. We got there in plenty of time, and were probably 20th on line. When we finally got in, for the first time ever, our name was not in the computer for a dinner reservation. Aside from being hungry, you need a dinner reservation if you want to sit. No reservation? You might end up standing, especially if the show sells out (which the CMA does nearly every time).

We’re super-regulars at Joe’s and were treated extremely curteously by the staff, who never accused us of lying about not having a dinner reservation, etc. They put us in a roped-off VIP area (communal seating) while they sorted it out. As they started putting other people in there with us, we heard the same story over and over, that these people also had reservations which were lost.

This was a first, and we’ve been to Joe’s so many times, so we’ll definitely forgive them.

10 minutes into the show (so two songs were played already), they came and got us and gave us a table. Well, not just a table, but rather our table, meaning, the exact table that we request in advance every time we call for a reservation. So, no harm no foul.

I got to eat my Tuna Steak, which was cooked to perfection! I also had a perfect Chocolate Martini (they make them so well there, it’s a crime not to order one!). ;-)

Next CMA show is July 30th. See you there! :-)

Make the Time

Apr 22nd, 2009
by hadar.
No comments yet

Lois and I have been, and continue to be blessed, in many ways. At or near the top of that list is the amazing group of friends that we have. Individually and collectively, they bring us immeasurable joy, and expand our horizons with each interaction.

I know that many people lead busy, complicated lives. We do too. Ours are a tad more complicated than most, because of our hectic travel schedule. Even that is subject to last-minute changes. That makes pinning social dates down somewhat tricky. When you factor in the jam-packed schedules of most of our friends, finding dates we can all agree to, and then sticking to them, is often a major hassle.

There’s one couple in particular where the scheduling conflict rears its ugly head more often than not.  Because of that, we don’t end up even trying as freqently as we should, so we end up seeing them every 18 months or so on average. That’s a major shame, as we always have a fantastic time, whenever we pull off a drive-by get-together.

Last night was one of those lucky evenings. As busy as they are (and folks, they qualify on a number of levels for leading pretty hectic, but productive lives), more often than not, they do the classy thing and come to our side of the river (to the apartment or the house), which we appreciate to no end (though we promised last night that next time, we’ll come to their house!).

They also came early (6pm), which us old folk appreciate beyond measure as well. It permits a long and relaxed evening, without having to be falling asleep at the height of the festivities. We had a simply amazing sushi meal.

Among the many topics we discussed all night was blogging, and Twitter. Both of them (claim they) are too busy to blog (though both have been encouraged to, for a numer of reasons), and neither sees the point of Twitter (something you hear a lot from non-Twitterers nowadays). I doubt I made a dent in either direction, but we’ll see.

One of the things we had some fun with was coming up with blog titles that were provocative (often already iconic cultural phrases) that might stand alone (content would be interesting, but unnecessary). ;-) In fact, I explained that this could be one reason to be Tweeting instead of blogging!

There were some obvious ones:

  • Not that there’s anything wrong with that…
  • Do the Right Thing
  • I’m Not Judging, but…
  • To Get Through Work, Only Two Decisions are Required: What to Wear and What to Eat
  • If I’m the Typical User, then it Should Be Designed for Me!

There were many more. Some were inspired by specific stories that had long philosophical discussions. For example, “Do the Right Thing” was about a situation where an older male colleague, fumbled over whether and how to handle the situation of walking a younger female colleague back to her hotel after a business function. There are lots of nuances in that situation, and in our opinion, our friend ended up on the wrong end of an overthought dilemma.

That spurred me to title this post in a similar vein, though it didn’t come up in our long list last night: Make the Time.

Every time that we make the time to get together with this particular couple, but in general with any of our friends, we feel enriched by the experience. So, we (and they) need to continue to pursue each other, even when scheduling appears to be impossible, and just Do the Right Thing. ;-)

I’m including a photo of our friends without naming them. As you can plainly see, I don’t dress up for company. ;-) Also, as you might be able to tell by my glassy eyes, we enjoyed some nice wine as well.

Friends

Friends

I met the husband when I hired him in 1986 (give or take a year). I knew in the interview that he was a very special person. I was wrong, he was and is an exceptionally special person. He was as good an employee as I could have hoped for, and went on to a very long and successful Wall Street career in a number of top firms.

A number of years ago he started his own software company, and has made a wonderful success of that as well, and will continue to, I’m sure.

His wife is equally extraordinary in too many ways to list in this small space. To call either of them smart would be to insult them. They are also interesting, conversational, good listeners, etc. In other words, everything you could hope for in a friend.

Here’s to not letting as much time go by before the next visit (which will be at their place!). :-)

Girlyman at Barns at Wolf Trap

Apr 5th, 2009
by hadar.
5 comments

Another night, another fabulous Girlyman concert. Same old, same old, blah blah blah. Right? Wrong! :-)

So, I just covered their April Fool’s NYC show at Joe’s Pub extensively in this post the other day. I’ll try not to be too repetitious, but I will highlight some of the similarities.

I mentioned in that post that Girlyman mixes it up, even on the same tour (in this case, in the same week). That was the case last night too. For the past year, Joyful Sign has been featured in every show, either as an opening number (at Joe’s) or a closing number (at Gravity Lounge, Birchmere, etc.). They didn’t play it last night. Not complaining, just reporting. :-)

They opened the show with my favorite song, Hold It All At Bay. Since I closed my last post about them mentioning that, I’ll fantasize for a second and say that they did that to specifically make me happy. ;-)

Girlyman

Girlyman

Next they played one of our favorites (a very silly thing to say, because 95% of their songs are amongst our favorites), On The Air, which they hadn’t played at Joe’s, but opened most of their 2008 shows with. During the set they also played their new cover of Mary by Patty Griffin, and their new song Wherever You Keep, both of which are so wonderful that it was great to hear them again and start to cement them in our minds.

They did not play Doris’ new song, Nothing Called Home, so we’ll have to wait for our CD of the live recording at Joe’s to hear it again.

So, why did I say that this night was not the same old, same old? (Aside from the obvious fact that all of their shows have a freshness to them!) Last year, at the Barns, they played their cover of Rock Me Amadeus (the previous link is not their version) by Falco. I have been dying to hear it again ever since. I’ve called it out a couple of times during the request section of their shows, to no avail.

Last night, they did the same bit that they did at the Barns last year (which was the only time I’ve seen them do it before). They had the audience vote on which of three whimsical songs they should do, based just on keywords. Of course, their fans know which songs are associated with which keyword, but any newbies wouldn’t know

The keywords were:

  • Backwards
  • German
  • Moose

They voted on them in the order: Backwards, Moose, German. Lois clapped her little heart out for Backwards. It moved the needle, but it was clear that the majority of the audience was holding their vote for one of the next two.

Next up was Moose, which got a ton of applause (Nate also noted some serious whistles as well). I was sure it was going to end up being Moose. Then we voted on German, which is what I wanted, badly. Thankfully, enough other fans wanted it too, as it ended up surpassing Moose. Whew!

Why was it so important to me to hear them do it again? Aside from the instantaneous enjoyment of the song (which they delivered on), I knew that I’d be buying a CD of the performance, so I would finally have a copy I could listen to forever, whenever I am in the mood. Sweet!

Of course, the audience sang the chorus out loud with them, so I’ll be able to enjoy remembering singing my little heart out as well. :-)

They played a number of songs from Little Star (five in total!) only two of which they played at Joe’s on Wednesday night. They also played Good Enough, something I haven’t heard them play often live, so that was a real treat too.

For the request, so many titles were yelled out it was overwhelming. Nate joked that people had just yelled out their entire repertoire (which wasn’t so far from the truth!). Of course, with 400 people in the audience, even though all of them were Girlyfans, clearly, there would be a wide range of favorites.

After much discussion between the three of them on stage, they settled on Maori. I mentioned in the last post that Maori is stunning, and difficult to nail live. They clearly didn’t intend to do it at the Barns, but with enough people yelling for it (perhaps because they all read my last post!) ;-) they decided to do it again. Gorgeous!

They closed the show with This Is Me (one of the five Little Star songs). They returned to the stage quickly to a standing ovation. They played two more songs. In total, they were on the stage for 100 minutes. Let me correct myself, 100 blissful minutes!

After the show, we ordered our live CD (as we always do). Then we waited patiently to say our hellos, goodbyes and see you next times.

That’s it for the concert, but (unfortunately for those of you who can’t look away from an accident) nowhere near the end of the post itself. ;-)

We bought tickets for last night’s show the minute we became aware of it, last October. We saw them at the same venue, the Barns at Wolf Trap last year, and loved the place (there should be no doubt about our loving Girlyman, right?). Even though the show was seven months away, in purchasing six tickets (at the time) together, the best we could do was the fourth row. Later on, we bought three more tickets, and those were relegated back in the 13th row…

Every seat at the Barns gets great sound, but aside from Lois’ poor vision, even well-sighted people lose a lot of the feel of a live performance when they sit further back, given that the faces of the performers are just a blur. As I mentioned in yesterday’s post about Colin Hay, when the performers are funny (in addition to their obvious musical talent), you miss out on some of the raised eyebrows, smirks (at exactly the right second), etc.

Nate was so on last night (is he ever not?), that it was particularly cool to be close enough to him to catch every nuance of his between-song antics.

The fourth row was just fine for that, but our friends who ended up in the 13th row really loved the show, but admitted to seeing more of a blur on the stage than what we saw. Oh well, Girlyman fills the Barns (400 seats!), so you have to pounce early to get seats up front. I ended up in the middle seat in our row, dead center stage, which was perfect!

If you read the last post, then you know that Elizabeth left me a comment that she’d be at the show too. She’s a major Girlyfan as well. She ended up sitting right behind us, and was finally able to bring her daughter to a show (she was too young to attend the last two times, when Elizabeth brought her son). Both her kids are big-time Girlyfans.

Elizabeth also stepped up her support for the band by volunteering at the Merch table. Kudos Elizabeth! We all need to find ways to help and support the people we love and who give us so much joy. Writing these blog posts about Girlyman is one of the ways we try to help, as is introducing them to as many people as we can convince to join us at their shows!

I know that Elizabeth reads my missives about Girlyman and pays attention. At least I know it now, after last night. I usually mention that we really do everything we can (including leaping onto the stage after the show) to snag a set list, whenever we can. That didn’t happen last night, because we were four rows back, and had a lot of people with us.

After we said our goodbyes to Girlyman, Lois told me that she had something in the car that she really wanted me to give to Girlyman. It was a one sheet printout of the last few paragraphs of my last blog about them, including the photo of the youngest Girlyfan. I went to the car and came back in to hand it to them and got back on line. Elizabeth spotted me with a piece of paper, waiting on line (looking like I wanted it signed by the band), and she said to me “Is that tonight’s Set List?”

Unfortunately, it wasn’t, but I applaud Elizabeth’s fortitude in making it through all my wordiness. ;-)

On to what we did before the show. Nine of us had dinner at Hunan Lion. We accidentally discovered this wonderful restaurant last year, when we dined there before the Girlyman show. We were seated at a round table, so we were all able to enjoy each other’s company thoroughly. The food was great, again.

Here is a shot of our seven guests with Lois. Ironically, I am not the one taking the picture, as I was off getting the car. A patron who was about to enter the restaurant saw Lois snapping photos of our guests, and offered to take one with her in it. Thanks! :-)

Guests at Hunan Lion

Guests at Hunan Lion

Recall that we purchased the tickets seven months ago. We didn’t look at them carefully, and we made a pretty big mistake. We were caught in bad traffic on I95 on our way to the restaurant, and we got there later than we had planned. Still, we thought we had plenty of time, because we thought the opening act came on the stage at 8pm.

After dinner, we headed over to the Barns (first incorrectly going to the main Wolf Trap, about 1/3 of a mile down the road). We walked in at 7:58pm, which was cutting it too close, but since we had assigned seats, we thought we were fine.

Unfortunately, the show started at 7:30pm, and the opening act, Adrianne, was about to start her last number. I felt badly that I messed up the schedule, but was grateful that we didn’t miss any Girlyman! Thankfully, they pumped Adrianne’s number in the cafe where we waited, and the sound system was excellent, so we got a taste of what a talent she is. A very beautiful voice!

Lois took a shot of our guests, with me in it this time, waiting in the cafe while Adrianne sang her last song:

Guests at Barns

Guests at Barns

A few minutes later, her set was over, and there was a 20 minute intermission, so we were able to get to our seats and settle in. You already know about the show, so I’ll leave you with one more baby Girlyfan story.

One of our guests was 6.5 months pregnant. After the opening number, Hold It All At Bay, she turned to us and said that the baby was kicking beyond belief. Before you freak out, that’s typically a very good thing, and the mother definitely took it that way! Amazingly, it was the same song that calmed down the 5-week-old that I reported about in the last post. Of course, I have similar tastes to newborns (or even nearly borns!). ;-)

After the show, the mom-to-be reported that the baby continued to happily kick along throughout the show. She was very pleased.

If you made it all the way to this point, there just might be a pleasant surprise reward for you (depending on who you are). ;-)

The next time we’ll be seeing Girlyman live (at least the next time we’re sure about) will be June 4th, 2009, at the Highline Ballroom in NYC. Since that is a much larger venue than Joe’s Pub, we’ve decided to invite a lot more people than we usually do.

On Friday, I sent a large blind distribution out to a bunch of our Tri-State area friends, inviting them to be our guests at the show. If you are a friend, and didn’t get an invitation from me (then apologies for accidentally leaving your name off the list!), and would like to attend, please let me know.

If you don’t live in the area, then you didn’t get an invitation, but if you will be around on June 4th, or are willing to commit to making the trip, then also let me know.

Hope to see everyone at the Highline Ballroom on June 4th. Let’s sell the place out! :-)

Colin Hay at Birchmere

Apr 4th, 2009
by hadar.
3 comments

Last night we saw Colin Hay for the first time at Birchmere. I’ve known a lot of his famous songs for nearly 30 years, but I never knew his name, nor even knew that he was the leader of Men At Work.

In fact, more often than not, when I mention to someone nowadays that we love Colin Hay, they say “Who?”. When I say that he was the leader of Men At Work, they say “Wow, I loved them!”.

He became a little more of a household name when Scrubs had him do a number of cameos, including playing a number of his songs. That’s where we discovered him. He joked last night that he had a best kept secret career for 30 years, before Zach Braff selected his song I Just Don’t Think I’ll Ever Get Over You for his movie Garden State. Zach Braff is the star of Scrubs, so after the success with Colin’s music in the movie, he introduced him to the show, very successfully as well.

Colin can do both solo shows (wonderfully) as well as full band shows. The show last night was a solo effort. It’s likely that this entire tour is a solo tour, but don’t take my word for it.

He came on stage at 8:30pm (I’ll cover the opening act later on). There were already three acoustic guitars sitting on the stage, but he had a fourth one already strapped on when he walked out to greet the crowd. I am using the word crowd literally. The show was sold out, and Birchmere can seat 650 people, so this is no small accomplishment, especially in these times, for a solo artist.

Colin Hay

Colin Hay

Interestingly, and more predictable, he mentioned up front that this was the sixth date on the current tour, and the first one that sold out. Of course, he complimented the audience on being so smart. ;-)

We have been listening to a lot of Colin Hay recently, so we had no doubt we’d like the show. Even though we were 45th on line to get in, we ended up with nearly the best seats in the house. Right near the stage, all the tables seat 12 people each. So, even though there were 45 parties of people who were seated before us, there were still five empty seats at the table immediately in front of the microphone at center stage. Lois sat in the second seat in (giving the person to her left the best seat in the house, and Lois the third best seat) and I was to Lois’ right.

It’s important to us to sit up close, because Lois is effectively legally blind, and if we’re even mid-pack, everything on stage is basically a blur to her. But, it turned out to be a blessing from another perspective. Colin Hay is simply hysterical. He told very long stories in between most songs (and told one even before he started the show). It was pretty close to a full-blow standup comedy act (which is one of my favorite things in the world), but most of the stories actually related to the song he was about to sing, making them all-the-more special (but no less funny!).

By sitting up so close, we could fully appreciate every nuance in his facial expressions while he was telling the stories/jokes. He’s truly a master story teller / comedian (I’m convinced he could make a living as a standup comic), and that includes his ability to use body language, facial expressions, little noises, etc., to complement his schtick.

So, enough with the comedy, how about the music? Awesome. His guitar playing is excellent, and very consistent. While he picks beautifully on a few numbers, he’s mostly a fancy rhythm guitarist (by fancy, I mean that he throws in picks here and there, a few small leads, and mostly change-of-pace strumming to complement the beat of the song).

What stands out though is his voice, and the lyrics. He’s a great songwriter, both lyrics and melodies, but his voice is really exceptional. It’s very strong, yet very clear as well. Even when he hits very high notes (surprisingly), his voice remains steady and clear.

The sound system (and sound engineers) at Birchmere is one of the most consistently good ones of all the venues we frequent. Last night was no exception. That enhanced his skills, since there was no distraction due to distortion, feedback, incorrect leveling, etc.

He played a bunch of fan favorites (I could hear a number of people behind me singing along to most of the songs). He has a new CD coming out in August, and he played at least one new number that will be on that CD (at least that’s the only one that I recall him explicitly mentioning was from the new CD).

After he said goodnight, he never left the stage (thankfully), and played one more song as an encore. He encouraged the audience to sing the entire song along with him, and many did. He tested them a few times, stopping to sing, to see if people were singing, and more importantly, singing the correct words. It turned out to be pretty funny.

While I’ve seen many solo acts in the past 37 years, many of whom were brilliant, he has to rank near the top in overall showmanship due to his ability to mesmerize with words, as well as with song. He had the crowd eating out of his hands from the minute he stepped on the stage, until the minute he left, which was a total of 100 minutes.

Colin Hay Goodnight

Colin Hay Goodnight

If I had to guess, I’d say he sang for 60 minutes, and spoke/joked for 40. A very good blend. Lois commented to me that given his energy level when he sings, if he didn’t take a break to tell stories, he might not have been able to make it through a 90 minute set!

One of his songs that we love is called What Would Bob Do?, and he didn’t sing it last night (unfortunately). It has a very special meaning to us now, because we just recently wrote a custom version of that song (using only his chorus), and turned it into a birthday tribute song to our wonderful friend Bob! The we in that sentence was his family and friends (there were seven separate writers, all of whom wrote at least two verses each!).

Here’s a link to a YouTube video of Colin Hay doing What Would Bob Do?

Here’s a link to our YouTube video tribute to our friend Bob! (it’s 10 minutes long, just warning you in advance!) ;-)

Anyway, to repeat, he was awesome. We bought two of his CDs after the show, but we didn’t hang around to get them signed because the line was long, he wasn’t out yet, and we had a long drive back to Fredericksburg. Next time!

Colin had an opening act, Janet Robin, a solo act as well. She’s been opening for him a number of times on this tour (but not all). Rather than spend too much time on Janet, my summary is that she’s talented in ways that aren’t really suited to a solo act, in particular to an acoustic solo act.

Janet Robin

Janet Robin

She’s a considered a top guitarist by many. There’s little doubt that she has a lot of talent on the guitar, but it struck me that she’d have been more comfortable with an electric guitar than an acoustic one. Again, I could probably elaborate, but we were really there to see Colin, not Robin.

Her voice isn’t that great (at least not last night, but produced, her voice sounds better on her MySpace page, which I’m listening to now, as I type this). We weren’t that impressed with her songwriting either, so that was really three strikes out of three possibilities (though her guitar playing was still reasonably impressive!).

That said, I liked her (not the performance of the songs). Much like Colin Hay, she spent nearly as much time telling stories between songs as she did singing. She’s very funny (in a self-effacing way). In fact, I would have preferred that she played less, and talked more. In addition to enjoying her stories, it made her personally more likeable to me, and I was therefore more tolerant of her performance.

This was in stark contrast to when Chelsea Lee opened for Girlyman at Birchmere. That night, Chelsea’s voice was extraordinary, but her personality was non-existent to negative, making all of us anxiously await her departure from the stage.

Anyway, to be fair, there are definitely many Janet Robin loving fans, including some at the show (that likely came more for her than for Colin). One sat two seats away from us. So, as in all music, it’s a matter of personal taste. If yours are like ours, you won’t be seeking out a Janet Robin solo effort…

Not much back-story to tell here, so I’ll just say that my typical pulled pork sandwich was excellent, as it always is! :-)

Girlyman at Joe’s Pub

Apr 2nd, 2009
by hadar.
4 comments

I know I’m boring my regular readers by repeating that Girlyman is my favorite group. At least you now that this continues to be the case. ;-)

Last night was the ninth time that we’ve seen them perform live, and the fourth time we’ve seen them at Joe’s Pub, our favorite club. We love their music and on stage antics enough to want to see them over and over (in addition to listening to their CDs a ton as well). But, while there are repeats (mostly crowd favorites) among the shows, they always manage to keep thing fresh, even within a given tour.

Last night had some serious surprises, even for those that have seen them as often (or even more) than we have. They played three songs that we’ve never heard before.

The first was Mary, a cover of a Patty Griffin song. Absolutely gorgeous. They also told a funny side-story about it, and Patty, who was also on their recent Folk Cruise, Cayamo.

Next was a new song of theirs called Wherever You Keep. As much as I love all three of them as musicians, the magic of Girlyman is their harmony and lyrics. In this new song, Nate plays a beautiful finger-picked acoustic guitar, while Ty and Doris just sing, no instruments in hand. (Saying that Ty and Doris just sing is like saying that Lance Armstrong just rides a bike!) ;-)

The fact that there’s only a quiet (but gorgeous!) guitar for the background, makes their voices so front-and-center, that you get the chills seconds into the song. I can’t begin to tell you how much I love this new song, even though I’ve only heard it once! I’m praying that it will be on the new studio CD coming out later this year (they’re hard at work on it now!).

Either way, I will have a copy in a month or so. Girlyman records all of their live concerts, and you can order a CD for $20, right after the show, and have it mailed to you after the tour is over, and they have a chance to mix it. We have CDs of the last four shows we’ve seen (ever since they started offering this service), and we love them all. The CDs include the on stage banter as well.

The last of the new songs is by Doris, called Nothing Called Home. They joked that it hasn’t been arranged yet, and that each time they do it on stage it comes out differently. Doris apologized in advance that she even occasionally forgets some of the words. Last night, they nailed it, Doris didn’t miss a beat, and the random arrangement of the night (Nate joked that it was #57) sounded great to me!

For the past year, they’ve been closing the shows with Joyful Sign (the first song I ever heard of theirs, and one of my favorites). Last night they opened the show with it, setting a different tone than in most of the other shows. Like I said above, they keep it fresh.

They always have a request section, and they did two last night, Young James Dean and Speechless. Wonderful!

They did an absolutely incredible rendition of Maori. Lois and I love this song and listen to it in the car all the time. Neither of us can remember whether we’ve ever heard them do it live though. It’s possible, but given how many times we listen to it on the CD, it’s hard to be sure and separate our memory from reality.

I linked the lyrics above, because the song starts with a startling line:

When I first met you, I said
“My God, get away.
You smell like fish heads.”

Obviously, we know this by heart (and I even joked about it in a Facebook comment recently). Last night, Nate told the story behind the song, and it turns out that the above line is actually true! Anyway, the song is so rich, and their harmonies intricate, that it has to be a very difficult song to nail live (perhaps that’s one of the reasons they don’t do it often), but last night was perfect.

They played a bunch of other favorites, that I could list out (because I snagged the set list, like we always try to), but I’ll let the above stand as the differences, rather than repeat things I’ve said before. As for all four times that we’ve seen them at Joe’s, we were right up against the stage, smack in front of Nate.

Nate Borofsky

Nate Borofsky

Ty Greenstein

Ty Greenstein

Doris Muramatsu

Doris Muramatsu

They came out for an encore and played two songs, also done to perfection. After the show, we stood on line with the rest of their adoring fans and ordered our live CD from the show we just saw. We said our hellos and goodbyes to all three and headed back to the apartment, still aglow.

After we said goodnight to our two guests, we turned to each other and simultaneously said that we each thought that this was likely the best Girlyman show we’d been to. Of course, we both laughed that they’re all great, so it’s a little like splitting hairs, but still, that was our initial instinct, and it hasn’t faded, nearly 24 hours later.

If you tuned in only to hear about the show, go away now. For the hardy among you, here are the background details of how we came to see the show, and the day that led up to it.

Last October, we bought tickets to see Girlyman this coming Saturday (4/4/09) at the Barns at Wolftrap. In keeping with that, we expected to be in Virginia for the week before that show so we purchased tickets to see Cherish The Ladies at the Barns for last night (4/1/09). We also bought tickets to see Colin Hay at the Birchmere tomorrow night (4/3/09).

I’ve written about Cherish The Ladies before. They are fantastic and I was really looking forward to seeing them again, especially on a bigger stage (more on that in a moment). We’ve never seen Colin Hay before, but he’s very quickly become a new favorite of ours, and we are excited to see him tomorrow night (yes, we’re down in Virginia now, so we’ll be able to make that show!).

A month ago, we found out that Girlyman was going to be at Joe’s Pub on 4/1. While I felt badly that we would miss them in our favorite venue, I told Lois that my vote would be to keep our original schedule, see Cherish The Ladies, and then see Girlyman a few days later, both at the Barns. She was torn and wanted to think about it.

After thinking about it for a few hours, she firmly decided that she’d prefer to see Girlyman. We gave our tickets to Cherish The Ladies away to a friend (and colleague at Zope). He went last night with his wife, and reported today that the show was great. In particular, he really liked the step dancers.

I mentioned above that I was interested in seeing them on a bigger stage (which is unusual for me, since I love tiny clubs!). That was precisely because I’ve seen YouTube videos of them playing venues that could support the step dancing, and I loved it, and really wanted to see it live. We saw them at an awesome venue, but a tiny one, where no dancers could fit.

So, even though I missed out, both of us were thrilled that the tickets went to good use. Of course, we were doubly glad that Girlyman created an even more magical night for us than we expected (and you all know, we have high expectations for them to begin with!).

We love to introduce as many people to the wonder and joys of Girlyman, so we never buy just two tickets to see them. Since this show was scheduled to begin at 9:30pm on a Wednesday, we only bought four tickets, because we knew it could be difficult to find people who would want to stay out that late on a school night.

We have been trying to get together for a while with a good friend of ours, and his new girlfriend (new to us, I don’t know how long they’ve been together). When I offered him to be our guests, he wrote back saying that she was a big Girlyman fan, and that they would be happy to join us. Obviously, we liked her instantly, even though we haven’t met her yet. ;-)

Unfortunately, Tuesday morning, the day before the show, he let me know that both of them had horrible colds, and would be unable to attend. Uh oh, we realized that it might be tricky to find people at this late date. We were correct. A number of couples turned us down, one after another.

Finally, one friend told me that he would love to come, but his wife was in Japan with their baby. He said he’d understand if we passed and went for another couple. We liked the idea of filling one seat guaranteed, and being able to broaden our search to single people as well.

But, before we broadened our search, I called one of our favorite couples, and invited the husband only (and I made that invitation through the wife, so there was nothing nefarious involved), ;-) knowing that the wife wouldn’t want to be out that late under any circumstances. Thankfully, he accepted, and we were set. Whew.

The next day (yesterday, the day of the show), we had two friends over for lunch. We had the most amazing Sushi meal from our favorite sushi place (conveniently located exactly across the street from our apartment), Hane Sushi. In addition to many of my favorites, I tried the Spicy Lobster Tartar. It’s cooked, so I don’t know why they call it Tartar. That said, it’s one of the more exceptional dishes I’ve eaten lately. Yummy.

Neither of our guest husbands (not the same people that were over for lunch) had seen or heard Girlyman before. Both thoroughly enjoyed the show, and one of them became an instant fan, purchasing one of their CD’s (download) from Amazon minutes after he got home. :-)

Update: after reading this post, their new fan wrote to me to say that he purchased three of their albums from Amazon downloads! Now he has something to do on the airplane on his upcoming trip. :-)

The Boys

The Boys

One final Girlyman anecdote that happened today.

At Zope, our VP of Finance and Administration is a big Girlyfan. So is her 5-year-old daughter. Both have seen them live (with us) twice. The mom just had another child less than a month ago. Today, via IM, she was telling Lois that he was particularly cranky, and she was having trouble settling him down.

Lois instantly suggested that she play one of Joyful Sign, Through To Sunrise or Kittery Tide (all three being very up-beat Girlyman songs). A few minutes later, the mom replied that the song that did the trick was Hold It All At Bay. She said “You should have seen the look on his face the minute that song started playing!”

For the few of you that made it this far (congratulations on being masochists), and somehow don’t know this yet, that’s my favorite Girlyman song. So, he’s a kindred spirit of mine, and Girlyman has just increased their lifelong fan club by one very young fan. :-)

Update: with permission from the mom, here’s a photo of the confirmed youngest Girlyfan, as of 4/2/2009!

Youngest Girlyfan

Youngest Girlyfan

Weekend Birthday Bash

Mar 23rd, 2009
by hadar.
5 comments

Our friends from Richmond came up to spend a very special birthday weekend with us in NYC. They were supposed arrive at our apartment by 10am on Friday. That didn’t happen. There were significant snow flurries in NYC (nothing stuck), and the navigation system on the airplane was unable to make an instrument landing at LaGuardia, so while they were descending in NY, they we rerouted to Philadelphia.

I was tracking the flight in real-time and saw that it landed safely. I just didn’t realize it wasn’t anywhere near us… They ended up catching a 12:05pm flight from Philadelphia to LaGuardia, which got in at around 1pm, but that was enough for us to have rejigger Friday’s plans.

We had a blowout lunch scheduled for Rock-N-Sake. I have only eaten there once before, and loved it. I was really looking forward to introducing them to it. We ended up having to cancel that reservation (because they close at 2:30pm and reopen at 5:30pm). Instead, we went up to see Laura at her office and grabbed a light (and very fresh) lunch at Chop’t (a place I was interested in trying after hearing Laura speak highly of it).

(It’s been a long while since I’ve mentioned that clicking on any photo in any of my posts will display a larger image in a separate window/tab, so I’ll mention it again, now.) :-)

Chop't

Chop't

We walked back to the apartment after lunch and relaxed for a bit. Not too long thereafter, we headed up toward Lincoln Center for dinner. We had tickets to South Pacific at the Vivian Beaumont Theater for an 8pm show and we wanted to eat in the neighborhood. I searched the web and read a ton of reviews, and settled on an Indian restaurant called Sapphire.

We met Laura there. Unfortunately, Chris got hung up at work, and ended up joining us just as we ordered dessert. The food at Sapphire was simply extraordinary. The four of us who ate the Tandoori lamb all claimed that it was the best lamb we ever had. All of the other dishes were superb as well. As much as we were all looking forward to Rock-N-Sake for lunch, if we had eaten there, we would have opted for a very light dinner, and would not have discovered this jewel!

Saffron Shrimp

Saffron Shrimp

Sapphire Indian Cuisine

Sapphire Indian Cuisine

From there we walked over to see South Pacific. Laura thought of this as a special birthday gift for her dad, given his love for this show. She made a perfect choice, because love it he did! The two leads are exceptional. Interestingly, neither of the leads that we saw are the Tony winning actors. Kelli O’Hara left the show on March 7th and Paulo Szot took two month-long leaves, the second of which occurred during our show. Laura Osnes played Nellie Forbush, and David Pittsinger played Emile de Becque.

South Pacific

South Pacific

I suspect that Bob loved this show more than Wicked. As much as I enjoyed South Pacific, for me personally, there’s little comparison to Wicked. Since this was Bob’s birthday bash and not mine, South Pacific was the perfect choice! :-)

When we got back, Lois and I conked out while the rest of them stayed up way too late watching the NCAA tournament.

Saturday morning we had breakfast outside on our deck. It was chilly, but the sun helped make it not-too-unpleasant. This was our first meal outside in 2009, so it was very special in that respect as well. As much as I love restaurant dining, there are few more special places to have a meal than our deck at the apartment, so I’m glad that the season is finally underway. ;-)

Deck Breakfast

Deck Breakfast

After letting the food settle, Sally, Bob, Chris and I went for a long walk. Lois took care of things around the apartment, and Laura baked her magical Apple Pie for a birthday dessert. After walking roughly 2.5 miles, the three of them broke off and headed back to the apartment, making for a five mile walk in total. I continued on my normal walk, roughly 8.25 miles in total.

Mid-afternoon, we decided to foist our presents on Bob. He opened a bunch, one-by-one, but he had no idea what was in store for him as his special gift. After he thought it was all over, we broke out a package of gifts, specially created by his family and friends. In fact, it’s so cool that I will be devoting an entire post to it later on (could be as much as a week from now), but I’ll describe it briefly here as well.

We took a song by Colin Hay called What Would Bob Do, and seven of us wrote our own verses about our Bob. We then had it recorded by Jack Kapanka over a simple background acoustic guitar. We sent 100′s of photos to Jack, who put together a wonderful video synchronized to the words and music. He then produced a DVD of the movie/music. The song is 10 minutes long (we wrote lots of verses), and the result was phenomenal.

The six of us watched the DVD at least five times between Saturday and Sunday, and got a huge kick of out of it each and every time. In addition to the video, Lois created a book with the lyrics and photos, and some song-sheets with the lyrics as well. The full package was a wonderfully creative custom gift for a very special person, celebrating his life (to date) and his amazing accomplishments.

Watching the DVD

Watching the DVD

Like I said, more on this specific topic in about a week. :-)

Right after viewing the DVD a number of times, we walked up to our favorite restaurant, the Peking Duck House. We had a fabulous meal (as always), and waddled back to the apartment.

Duck House

Duck House

We all gathered in Laura and Chris’ apartment to watch the Duke game, and couldn’t wait for half time to dig in to the Apple Pie. Again, Lois and I called it an early night, and the rest of them continued on with more NCAA action.

Apple Pie

Apple Pie

On Sunday morning, the four of them had breakfast out, and then walked up to attend church services. We then all met up outside of Joe’s Pub at 12:45pm. We had tickets for a 2pm show for Eden Espinosa. This was her solo debut in NYC. Of the many Elphaba’s we’ve seen in Wicked, Eden was by far our favorite, so we were really looking forward to see her at our favorite club.

We had a nice lunch before the show, and she came on, with a five-piece band at about 2:05pm. She has a fantastic voice, with a surprising range (she hits incredibly high notes, with amazing power, and sustains them, even though you think, or at least I think, she’ll miss them). It was a real treat to see her, though I have some small nits to pick with the show.

Eden Espinosa

Eden Espinosa

The volume on the band was too high. They are superb musicians, and there was no distortion, but the place is too small to play that many pieces at that volume. While you could make out Eden’s voice even at the maximum volume of the group, that’s sheerly a testimony to how hard she was belting it out (and sweating as a result, even though it was on the cool side in the club).

Thankfully, she also did quite a number of songs with only the electric piano or acoustic guitar for accompaniment, so it wasn’t all top-of-the-lungs all the time. That brings me to my second nit. Song selection. While she’s great at the full range of songs she sang, I so much more enjoyed the ones with solo accompaniment (not just because of the volume). I don’t think she needs to prove her rock capabilities, at least not in a place as small as Joe’s.

She had a surprise guest, Katie Thompson. She came out and did a solo number, accompanying herself on the electric piano, called What Turns You On (available on the MySpace page linked above). She has one of the better voices we’ve heard, and she plays the piano marvelously as well. It was a real treat. After that, she played another of her songs, and Eden sang along with her, a bit of harmony (beautiful), but mostly alternating verses.

Katie Thompson

Katie Thompson

They played a third song together (with the rest of the band accompanying them as well), and then Katie left the stage.

Eden closed the show with an encore, singing Defying Gravity. We would have been disappointed to miss this one, so we were grateful that she came back out and gave us a taste of Wicked. :-)

Even with the nits, I was very glad to see her (and discover Katie), and I suspect that I was more critical of the show than the rest of our guests, which is also a good thing!

Lois Eden Laura

Lois Eden Laura

Bob Eden Espinosa

Bob Eden Espinosa

Katie Bob Hadar Lois

Katie Bob Hadar Lois

Laura Bob Sally Chris Hadar

Laura Bob Sally Chris Hadar

Three of us headed back to the apartment to relax, and three more headed to B&H for some browsing (in anticipation of future camera shopping). We all met up at the apartment for a little more snacking on Apple Pie and Cupcakes (and two people even had some shrimp), watched the DVD again, and then we headed out.

We dropped Bob and Sally back at LaGuardia, then headed up to the house. Other than being colder than predicted, and the nuisance of being routed to Philadelphia at the beginning of the trip, it was a picture-perfect weekend, and we hope Bob enjoyed his birthday blowout a fraction as much as we did!

Happy Birthday Bob!

Jerry Jeff Walker at BB King

Mar 15th, 2009
by hadar.
4 comments

A year ago we took seven people (plus the two of us) to see Jerry Jeff Walker at BB King’s in NYC. I wrote about that wonderful evening in this post. The stars aligned for us again this year, as we had company staying with us for the weekend, they love live music, and Jerry Jeff was back in town (celebrating his birthday with the rest of us).

This year there were six of us in total. The show started at 8:03pm.

Last year, Jerry Jeff had three exceptional musicians playing with him, Tommy Nash on the guitar, Brad Fordham on the bass, and Steve Samuel on the drums. Steve Samuel was back again, and I am reasonably sure that so was Brad Fordham (I am embarrassed that I can’t say definitively).

Unfortunately, Tommy Nash wasn’t there last night. He’s a fantastic guitarist, and I was really looking forward to hearing him again. Jerry Jeff introduced his son as the guitarist, saying that he was pressed into action, but he didn’t mention if Tommy was supposed to be there, and what happened to the regular guitarist either way.

Three of us heard Jerry Jeff introduce his son as Daniel (I would swear to that!). But, all web searches show his name to be Django Walker. I’ll come back to him in a minute, and do my normal left-to-right rundown of the musicians.

Apologies in advance for the very poor quality of the photos of the band members. The lighting plus some errors in the settings on our camera conspired against us last night…

Brad Forham played a smoking bass all night, and was the primary harmonizer with Jerry Jeff. He was excellent all night, and had great energy.

Brad Fordham

Brad Fordham

Jerry Jeff was center stage, and for a 67-year-old, has it going in every way (except for maybe hair). ;-) His guitar playing (mostly rhythm) is good, his voice is very strong (and deep), he has more energy than many teenagers, has an infectious personality, is beloved by his audience, and still puts on a great show. Basically, you want to be in whatever room Jerry Jeff is in. :-)

Jerry Jeff Walker

Jerry Jeff Walker

Behind Jerry Jeff was Steve Samuel, the drummer (I couldn’t find a good link last year, and couldn’t find one again this year, sorry!). Steve plays the drums really well, and given the up-tempo of most of Jerry Jeff’s songs, he keeps everyone in the crowd cooking to the right beat.

Steve Samuel

Steve Samuel

Django Walker played lead guitar and sang. His guitar playing is decent, but not on par with the numerous brilliant guitarists we’ve been hearing for the past few years. That still makes him 14,237 times better than me (meaning, he’s not bad), but it also makes Tommy Nash 972 times better than Django (though Django has many years to improve before reaching Tommy’s age).

Django Walker

Django Walker

Django sang a bit of harmony (well), but he solo’ed on a verse of The Cape (a song we really love), and he was fantastic. Later, he played (and sang lead) a song of his own, Texas On My Mind. He’s really a superb singer, with great stage presence as well. If he played just rhythm guitar (like his dad), or keeps getting better at lead guitar, he will be a force in music for years to come!

They played a bunch of favorites, including one that I covered last year (Up Against the Wall Redneck Mother). This year, I was part of the crowd that yelled out So Well, So Well, So Well during each chorus as well. What a blast.

They played for 77 minutes, then left the stage. A minute later, they were back out for a 2-song encore (like last year). Unlike last year, the first song in the encore was Mr. Bojangles (one of my favorite songs). When all was said and done, they were on the stage for just about 90 minutes, so the show was a little shorter than last year, but still wonderful.

Musically, last year’s performance was better, solely due to Tommy Nash’s amazing guitar playing. But, while this crowd was just as enthusiastic, and just as big fans, they were much more respectful of everyone around them, even when they were partying hearty, and dancing in the aisles. This allowed people like us (less rowdy) to actually enjoy their sideshow, be swept up in it, but still enjoy everything that was going on on the stage as well!

I’m sure we’ll try to be there to wish Jerry Jeff a Happy Birthday next year as well! :-)

Now for our usual background leading up to the show.

Late morning, we did something we’ve never done before. We crammed six people into our Ford Explorer (all adults). That meant that there were four very uncomfortable people in the back seat, and the two of us in the front had our seats moved way up. We headed up to the house because our guests wanted to see it, and Laura and Chris wanted to see some grass, for at least a few minutes.

We ate lunch at the local diner near the house, and then headed over. Lois and I relaxed in the house, but the four youngsters actually stayed out in the backyard for at least an hour, soaking the chilly, but gorgeous views of the Hudson River.

Youngsters Standing

Youngsters Standing

Youngsters Sitting

Youngsters Sitting

When they came inside, they all conked out for a nap (they stay up later than us old folk each night, so it’s understandable).

Youngsters Sleeping

Youngsters Sleeping

When they woke up, we headed back to the city, and then over to BB King. We had a very nice table for six about 20 feet from the stage, and had a wonderful meal. Lois and I have watched people order the giant Meat Lovers Nachos (supposedly an appetizer) every time we’ve been there, and always thought it looked great, but was too big. Last night, we decided to make it a meal for the two of us. We were not disappointed. It’s really good (Pulled Pork, Chicken, Steak, etc.).

Meat Lovers Nachos

Meat Lovers Nachos

Chris ordered the Mac ‘n Cheese. Rich is an understatement, and the rest of us had to finish it for him. Most delicious.

Mac N Cheese

Mac N Cheese

Good food + good conversation + great show = great evening! :-)

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