We’re back at Cuppa (552 25th St, Ogden) to welcome spring. Friday, March 22nd, 7-9 PM.
Drop in for informal atmosphere, a grand piano, good vegan fare, and some new songs. This is our first gig since a couple of recording sessions, so it’s fun to break out things that have been on the back burner as well as show off things that are really well rehearsed at this point. It’s all changing, all the time. We like to return to Cuppa because they’re so welcoming and it is like we’re playing in a really great living room that just happens to be lofted above a fantastic kitchen.
We get to play this Friday in the monthly Van Session series, a short set to go along with First Friday arts in Ogden. We’re hosted at The Monarch, and The Banyan Collective provides the podcasting and amplification. We play at 8:00, after Michelle Moonshine at 7:00. It’s a good chance to play some music and talk to the Van Sessions folks about … well, who knows what: Our music? How we work together? Our feelings? We’re excited, come what may.
Details are here, but something to anticipate is that we’ll be outside under tents while The Monarch continues to get its finishing touches as a hub for artistry. So it will be cold. Also, it will be dark. But, maybe it will snow, too. We’re looking forward to it. We’ll wear coats and play loud to help everyone keep warm.
Remember that time we got to play Jazz at the Station? We’re still tickled about that. Being up on a stage in that giant hall where the sound hangs in space, all in front of old friends and new friends — this all makes for a really fun gig.
People Get Ready We’re using the train station theme. Listen to the end when Caryn gets the audience on board.
Since then, we’ve been keeping to ourselves but busy working. In the next couple of days we should have something new to share!
Edit: A few days later in the studio, we’d record a demo of the same song while we were checking microphones. It’s fun to play with the variation the song affords.
We’re really, really excited to get to play Jazz at the Station next week. This venue is made legitimate by a long list of accomplished and talented musicians engaged there each month. You should go even when we’re not playing, second Wednesday of each month. The music is good, it’s free (thanks to support of Weber County RAMP funding and the hard work of Caril Jennings and Benjamin Jennings), and it’s in a grand hall of an old train station. This makes it a great place to spend an hour, even if there weren’t music playing.
On Wednesday, there will be music playing and it will be ours. We hope to see you there:
Jazz at the Station Ogden’s Union Station, Grand Lobby Wednesday, January 9th, 2019 7-8pm
Besides rehearsing, we’re tasked with figuring out what to play. We’ve reached the point where we have material to choose from (in addition to new things we’d love to try out soon), and to squeeze it all coherently into an hour is a challenge. We’ve flashed back to making mixtapes for loved ones, an extinct hobby but one that is responsible for the existence of many of our students. How else would your parents have fallen in love with one another if it weren’t for the artful sequence from Peter Gabriel to Abba to Fleetwood Mac? Um … hypothetically speaking, of course.
Our setlist has some of the same considerations. How do you open enthusiastically but not too over-the-top? How do you sequence from one piece to the next, from fast to slow or from a standard to a re-invention? How do we make sure that Caryn has a chance to breathe in between songs? Where can we work in a subtle reference to trains? And, maybe most important, how do we build up and close the set? You’ll find out on Wednesday with an hour of music that spans most of the last century, but with our own recent spin and whimsy.
We’re excited for a gig at Cuppa (552 E 25th St, Ogden) from 7-9 PM this Friday, December 14th. We’ve got a few new things we’re excited to share, some holiday tunes that we’ve been having fun with, and a few of our old favorites. We love playing here: great food, comfy setting, a welcoming staff, and a grand piano. Drop in for something to eat and drink and listen to us create new variations on old themes. (Can you imagine a Latin rhythm on an old Bing Crosby tune? We couldn’t either until we tried it.)
(And, mark your 2019 calendars. We get to do Jazz at the Station on Wednesday, January 9th, 7-8PM!)
Standards & Substandards 