A day in the life
I did not set the alarm on Friday night, but slept only as late, on Saturday morning, as Bob the cat would allow. Which was not very late. Those of you who live without pets might not be aware that a little grey-and-white cat can stare a hole in your head that will wake you from the deepest sleep. In his younger days, he had to meow, or bang on the sliding closet doors with his paw. When my dogs were still alive, he would wake up them up and let them take the heat for ripping me out of a dream. But he is eighteen now, and has so refined his technique that he can fling me into consciousness without making a sound. Just those huge green eyes, and Feline Mind Control.
So I got up and fed Bob, (who ate and then, of course, went back to sleep). I ran some errands, and then warmed up my voice and got ready for two gigs - an afternoon concert at a senior residence on the Upper West Side, and an evening performance at a yacht club on CIty Island. Walked out the door lugging a backpack stuffed with CDs to sell, pretty shoes ("pretty" being short for "pretty uncomfortable"), makeup, set lists, a lyric sheet for a requested song I haven't sung in 3 years, and a microphone. I joined up with Tex, and we traveled down to the first gig.
When you perform in senior centers, you have to be prepared for every possible response to what you do, including, every once in a great while, no response at all. But these are wonderful gigs. We humans are wired for music, and even people facing tremendous difficulties with memory and attention seem to remember melodies and lyrics, and to be able to focus better when they are involved with music. I can sing very obscure material from the 30s and 40s, songs that nobody knows, and there will invariably be someone singing along. It's thrilling to me. These places are always overheated, though, and that's a challenge for us, and for the pianos, too. They spend their lives in hot, dry rooms, and they suffer. It would have been great if I could have fit an in-tune piano into that backpack.
The second gig was out on City Island, at the western end of the Long Island Sound. When we arrived around six in the evening, the sun was still gilding the water, and the air smelled of salt. Jon Burr was there to play bass. We hadn't worked together for a couple of years, and Tex has written some new charts, so we rehearsed for about an hour. Then we were ready... to wait for a longish until the audience was ready. By the time we had done our sets, and chatted with everyone who wanted to chat with us, had a little dinner, and driven home, it was already Sunday.
From the time I locked my apartment door on leaving to the moment of unlocking it again onreturn: 11 hours. A not-unusual working musician's day.