Four in Four (including my return to Platinum)

As gig schedules go, most any musician can tell you that there are dry spells and then there are times when you're almost too busy.  Hard to complain about the latter predicament.  That said, it has been a busy week as far as my life goes.  My sister-in-law Celia is expecting her first child (with hubby Cyrus, of course).  Her baby shower was on Saturday, so that was a resource tap for us, as Sabina was hosting it in the Virginia-Highlands area.  Spencer had a tonsillectomy as well as an adenoidectomy on Wednesday, so that was suitably stressful and certainly a sleep deprivation procedure for all of us.  Rough going with the recovery (a regular occurrence to be up with him from 3 to 4 a.m.), but he's only 3 1/2, so it's probably the best time to take care of that.  Jack had been sick this past week, so his birthday party was moved to this Sunday - the day of another important holiday gig.  Whew!

I ended up playing 4 gigs this weekend through all of the madness.  Thursday I was back with Adrian and the Ashes to Ashes Band (aka The Adrian Ash Group, or TAAG).  We always manage, through no fault of anybody's, to play on the coldest night of the week - lately.  It was chilly.  Hey, ya gotta be ready for the elements.  A pair of long johns can make you a bit more comfortable in the chilly night air.  I respectfully would request of Java Monkey to up the ante on their patio enclosure.  If they invested in new plastic curtains, improved lighting, new/more/proper working heating elements, perhaps a fresh coat of paint, well, I suppose it's not my business...  We are out there and nobody else is... Well, really, who would want to sit out there in the drafty environs?  Ah, I guess the expenses would quickly add up...  There, got that off my chest - always grateful for a paying jazz gig and they feed us as well - you know I just want them to be successful...  

The music went well.  We had Guy back with us, and we played some great stuff - a lot of energy for the course of the evening.  Broke out a couple of new charts that Adrian suggested: Steely Dan's Peg and Do It Again.  Good stuff that I've played many times before with other groups - hey, I even sing Peg when I'm with Martay.  

Charts for Peg and Do It Again submitted by Adrian,
meticulously  leveled and cropped by  yours truly.

I played the Tobias and brought the GK Backline 12" combo.  That little amp can put out a nice little thump considering it's size.  My Genz Benz is still in the shop.  I have to say I'm a bit disappointed in the turn-around time for them.  I called last week and it hadn't even been looked at yet.  Do they realize that I'm writing about them - ready and eager to sing their praises, but just as eager to lay it down as I see it.  So far I don't have much with which to be impressed.  They specialize in re-coning speakers, and the owner (or manager) is a bass player himself.  What is the deal?  In these parts, we call it "customer no-service" (a la Clark Howard)!

Adrian, 1 week before his graduation from GSU with a Masters Degree!

Guy on guitar & Jason on flute.

The weekend was special in that I was asked to return to play with Platinum: Friday at The Metropolitan Club off Windward Parkway in Alpharetta; Saturday at Coca-Cola Headquarters on North Avenue in Midtown .  It has been 3 months since I performed with this group.  In my absence, they've worked up a couple of new tunes: Moves Like Jagger and JLo's On the Floor.  It was a great thrill to stand up there next to Gus and Glen and try to remember all of the pretty notes I'm empowered to hit through the course of 2 nights.  Both were high profile corporate parties, one being for Coca-Cola, of course - it really doesn't get much bigger of a client in the city of Atlanta!  We did admirably, as their shows are always a slick production.  It was nice to hear some positive feedback.  Derek, Anton, Gus, and the rest of the gang were very complimentary.  It sounds like I might have been missed.  I certainly did know the songs fairly well, so for somebody else to walk in and play is going to be a bit of a different vibe.  There are many excellent players out there with Wooten/Patitucci/Miller chops, but it does take a bit of humble-pie-itis to truly play for the song and nail all those wonderful kicks that Gus interjects.  Saturday we ended up learning (at the last minute) Whitney's version of I Will Always Love You  for an attendee to sing with us.  She nailed it!  What a performance - we also had a guest saxophonist join her.  Well done all around.  I was also asked to sing Sweet Home Alabama - not easy to get through with all of these great vocalists in the band!  We had to extend the song as one of the guests of honor couldn't make it to the stage in time...  Sadly I didn't snap any pics of us either night.  I think I was just trying to "get 'er done" with little fanfare.  It's a rather serious affair.

Free drinks dispensed from these machines in the main lobby!

Sunday was Jack's birthday party and my gig (plus extended rehearsal) at North River Church of Christ.  Brent Whiten (A-list drummer, lead vocalist, trumpet titan, producer, music instructor, husband/father of 3, bandleader of The Brent Whiten Orchestra, all around seriously nice dude) hired me and for that I am grateful.  The list of tunes was impressive:  Donny Hathaway's This Christmas, The Temptations' Silent Night, The Drifters' White Christmas, Amy Grant's Grown-Up Christmas List - some of these are challenging!  I made charts for them all and sent them to Brent - I think it helped.  He was relieved to know that somebody had been working on them.  The rehearsal took over 2 1/2 hours to get through everything - the show was about 70 minutes in length.  It was fun and actually easy - I was in the orchestral pit along with everybody else.  My Stingray sounded nice - a rare gig that I opted to go without any processing.  Sometimes dynamics are nice!  Here are some tell-tale charts for your perusal.

This bass transcription of Donny Hathaway's This Christmas 
was in a recent issue of Bass Player magazine.
I put the various pieces together to create a 2-page PDF chart, saved here as a jpg.
Donny played this part on keyboard bass - what a performance he pulled off!
I didn't nail the high multi-note licks but I got most of it.

A chord chart for Chris Tomlin's arrangement of
Angels We Have Heard On High.

Chord chart for Grown-Up Christmas List as performed by Amy Grant.
A David Poster production that has his unmistakable harmonic stamp all over it.
This one took me the most time to generate - modulations and unwieldy key centers.

Brent led the precedings and also found his way into the horn section!

2 guitarists watching and learning.

1 bassist not watching nor learning.

Lead vocalist of While You Were Sleeping.