New Series- Live At The Ritz

dekotaj
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Joined: Tue Apr 07, 2009 11:23 am
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Wed Sep 09, 2009 6:01 am

Hi Gang,

I have recently come across a home video that was shot last September (2008) of a live performance I did as part of a trio. This is they type of gig musicians refer to as a 'casual'- mostly background music and not really structured. We were just part of the atmosphere for a private party, outdoors on a cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean in Half Moon Bay at the Ritz Carlton Hotel. As something I don't do very often, this type of thing can be a lot of fun. My friends Suzanne Weller (flute) and David Hollin (bass), and I really just improvised our way through a bunch of jazz standards and classic rock tunes, working from charts I had put together, as well as some from a popular book known as 'The Real Book.'

Events like this can be fun because the approach we take is nothing at all like we would for a concert performance. We really are free to play whatever we want, anyway we want, for as long as we want. Most of the tunes then are stretched out into jam sessions and really created on the fly. As such, we are certainly not worried about mistakes, and especially about correcting them, as we are creating a new soundscape as we move along. As a matter of fact, I would even have to say that there were no mistakes at all the entire evening. Now, there were plenty of 'unplanned' notes and events, but it all contributed to a good time had by all.

I hope you can excuse the overall quality, as we were not really focused on making a professional recording. We just wanted a personal archive for the family scrapbook. The 'Live At The Ritz' videos are over in the In Concert section under the TG Videos tab.


Neil