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Daily Archives: December 1, 2011

Bonheur after Paris Landing, Express

December 1, 2011
bradspurgeon

L'Express magazine

L'Express magazine

Arrived back in Paris on Tuesday morning early, as I think I said before, and spent the day working like a mainiac doing stories to close my year of work. Then I went off to the open mic of the Ptit Bonheur la Chance bar, near the Pantheon. I had a couple of reasons for insisting on going, and one was to show the owner of the bar the page out of l’Express magazine devoted to open mics and in which there was a little story about the Ptit Bonheur la Chance, in which my name was mentioned!

It turned out that he had not seen the magazine. I had picked up a copy of it on my flight back from Brazil, and there was my name. The story also covers places like the Bus Palladium and the Pop In. For some reason I find no trace of it online, or I’d put a link to it. But I was able to find it in the Nexis newspaper database, so here is the bit about the Bonheur and yours truly:

    La folie des scènes ouvertes
    AUTEUR: Marie Audran
    RUBRIQUE: STYLES DE VIE NUITS; Pg. 134 N°. 3151
    LONGUEUR: 452 mots
    ENCART: De plus en plus de salles invitent le spectateur à pousser la chansonnette ou à faire l’acteur. De quoi réveiller l’artiste qui est en vous et, qui sait ? susciter une vocation !
    Au P’tit Bonheur la Chance
    Caché dans une ruelle, au pied du Panthéon, c’est le petit bar qui monte. Dans sa cave voûtée, une vingtaine de chanteurs se succèdent, en solo ou en duo, au milieu des spectateurs. Si vous n’osez pas pousser la chansonnette, foncez-y pour découvrir un vivier de talents de toutes les générations, dont Brad Spurgeon (journaliste au New York Times) ou les jeunes membres du groupe pop Apes & Horses, qui y testent leurs futurs tubes. Les mardis à 21 heures. Entrée gratuite.
    18, rue Laplace, Paris (Ve), 01-43-54-42-32.

Now for some strange reason, this article did not have the effect of flooding the open mic with three times its regular number of attendees. Quite the opposite. For some reason there were fewer people there on Tuesday than in the last few times I have been, but that made for both more intimacy and more time to play for each performer.

It was great to find some new performers there I had not seen before, too, including the genial Basile, Brice and Bastien – only the first two of whom made up a group, the other being solo here.

And there was the very unusual act of this young French guy doing a song by Love!!! How did he find them?!?!

Last Day in Sao Paulo, Amazing Jam at the Varal Bar With the Lua Nova Crowd

December 1, 2011
bradspurgeon

bar varal sao paulo

bar varal sao paulo

It is nearly 4 AM on Thursday and I finally have the time to write down a little bit about the most amazing last evening that I had in Sao Paulo, where I finished my 2011 adventure around the world going to the open mics and jam sessions. The last night was so great that I am still recovering from it.

I had a fabulous session at Bar Varal in Pinheiros with the same group of people who I met and played with in 2009 and who I managed to miss in the freakiest way last year. This group of musicians both amateur and profession gets together every Sunday in Sao Paulo to play from around 10:30 PM to 5:30 PM, has moved around the city some five to seven or so times in the last couple of years, so you have to make sure not to lose touch with them!

The first year I stumbled on the place in the Lua Nova bar and jammed all night, then last year I stumbled on the place in another bar in the same area, but had no idea that I had found it and I walked out without jamming, and this year I planned it all in advance after befriending one of the participants on Facebook.

I had an even better time this year with the musicians who played at the Varal. The bar is much better than the Lua Nova, which was a tiny hole in the wall bar. The Varal is on the second floor of a discreet building, and if you did not know it was there and you passed by at opening when there is no music in the air, you’d never know it was anything but a private residence outside.

Once inside, though, this is a very warm and cosy bar with high ceilings with wooden beams, and with photos of Brazilian musicians on the walls and other pictures, and with a long bar in the back and a drum set in the corner at the front by the windows. Tables are set up side by side to permit people to join the open jam.

This year there were three microphones, the regular guitar player, and a few more who came in to play guitar, percussion and sing. It was free, open and more amazing as the evening progressed. I was a little worried at first as there was practically no one there at 10:30 PM. By 1 AM it was kicking, both with the people playing music and the audience that sang along.

I met a lot of interesting Brazilian musicians, and made some friendships I’m sure will continue. I also had a great time playing my own song, Borderline, and some cover songs – it was such a huge contrast to the rest of the evening’s hip and cool Brazilian music, but people enjoyed what I did it seemed, and they sang along.

Speaking outside with some of the musicians I asked why there were not more such open jams in Sao Paulo, and one of them told me that it was difficult to promote such things and they kept on getting closed down because of the loudness of the music going all night long. But he said that they all keep on getting back together because it answers a need. Mostly, he said, the jams are started in discreet bars by friends, and they grow into jams of friends of friends and friends of those… no advertising as such is done, and if you don’t know people involved in them, you don’t find them very easily…. That’s for sure!

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