STARFISH BALL Jan. 5 Atlanta’s most festive Mardi Gras celebration at The St. Regis Atlanta includes a formal dinner and silent auction. The benefit supports the nsoro Foundation and its student scholarship. A nsoro scholar who grew up in foster care, graduated high school, and currently maintains a GPA of 3.5 at college will be honored. $500. Patron sponsorships begin at $2,500. Call 404/574-6763 or visit thenf.org.
That gives you an idea of the crowd here. No punches were pulled. There was a DJ set up outside of the ballroom. After we finsihed, an R&B trio (keys, bass, drums) played more music for the wee hours party people.
My P-bass sounded good - no buzzing no unwanted noises. It just doesn't like certain grounding situations. I was driving the bus of a nice, large band - keys, guitar, drums, sax, trumpet, and 2 vocalists. Like I said, they didn't spare any expense! A great group it was: Judy Boehm on keys, Ed Sanker on guitar & vocals, Brent Whiten on drums, trumpet, & vocals, Verna Law on vocals, Kirk (didn't get his last name!) on vocals & dancing, Ed Blake on tenor saxophone, and Melvin Jones on trumpet. I had heard of Melvin before; he keeps good company with Tyler Perry and Patti LaBelle, to name a few, along with many of Atlanta's finest jazz musicians. Check out his web site here.
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| Melvin Jones has his own logo. Tasteful. |
We had some nice jams: Route 66 gave me a chance to play in-the-pocket swing-blues. That is important on a bandstand where I'm meeting half of the band for the first time. I want them to relax and trust that I'm going to groove and not make it an ugly event. Jr. Walker's Shotgun is a simple riff-tune that got quite a nice response. It sounded like we were playing Mustang Sally at first. Then I realized we just hang on the "one". We did eventually get to Mustang Sally, with a special guest appearance. Also played Can't Take My Eyes Off Of You, down a half-step and no modulation up a minor third. Mr. Sanker does a great job with this one. What party is complete without Play That Funky Music? I gave 'em that Dazz (Brick) riff during the solo. The horns turned around but I'm not sure if they liked it or not. I filled in for Judy's husband Jim, who preferred to not take part in the playing but perform equally important roles on the side. He was the principle videographer and worked in conjunction with the front-of-house (side-of-house) audio technician. Speaking of whom, he controlled his setting via his iPad. Pretty cool for a cover band! He later came over to me to explain that the XLR cable has an on/off switch - a red ring that can be rotated. Mine was set to "off". No wonder I couldn't hear myself! It was just in time, as the next song was my vocal feature of Love Shack. As a singer, I've often striven to emulate Fred Schneider. Judy kept it going non-stop. A glorious celebration in song and dance, and all for a good cause.
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