Every Little Bit Helps

[jeffl]

I sat in with the best band I've ever played with on Wednesday night. I drove up to their gig at Famous Dave's in Minneapolis, basically to support 'em, 'cuz it was on an off night, business wise. They asked me up for the last set, and I was a bit nervous, 'cuz they were a notch above what I'm used to, and I've never practiced with 'em. I did have the benefit of listening to 'em for an hour, so I knew I'd work with 'em. I got lucky, 'cuz I played thru a stage vocal mic and jumped in on the break in the first tune, and everything was perfect: the volume, the mix... everything. I got an immediate rousing welcome from the crowd at the end of my break, and settled right in for another hour or so. The band was a bunch of pros, so they took real good care of me. You "part-timers" out there can relate to how much this deal did for my confidence level. The bass player told me afterwards that he'd played with alotta harpers, but never anybody who knew how to actually play one. It was comforting to know that as long as I stayed within my limitations (and there are many) and didn't try to do too much, I could play with that caliber of players.

[ricochet]

That's great, Bubba!

[grady]

Way cool Bubba !!

We had a Tornado hit in Roanoke, Va at my gig Tuesday night.
It touched down just one street over from where I was playing.

Not much fun at all.

[bluejay]

Cool, Bubba, cool.

[jeffl]

I'm glad you're safe, Grady. I hope everybody else is OK over there. These tragedies have been causin' unbelievable grief and hardship to those involved. BTW, I hadn't played real overdriven amplified blues for a coupla years (other than my amplified practicin') before Wednesday night, and I hadn't even thought about most of those old tunes, so I was kinda worried that they'd ask me to play a tune with a signature harp riff and I'd forget the stuff, but they were smarter than that...they'd never heard me play; it was a referral from a mutual friend. I sure miss that hard dancin' blues!