Thanks to this blog, and especially my Thumbnail guide to open mics in Paris, I had the most interesting and gratifying evening of music and a meal last night with a beautiful African princess named Zahra Universe. Huh? Yes, and this lady is from Virginia, U.S.A., and whiter than me. And her natural singing voice is located somewhere in the region of Tori Amos, Rickie Lee Jones, Madonna, Adele and Amy…. She is a globetrotting singer songwriter who is at ease in techno dance music as she is alone behind the piano, like last night at the Swan Bar. But let me backtrack a bit….
This blog sometimes goes way beyond my wildest expectations in terms of what it gifts me with. Especially that list of places to play in Paris. So many times I’ve had people come up to me at open mics saying, “Hey, I found this place thanks to your list….” I met Zahra after one of her friends and band members in the U.S. found my list and queried me on where Zahra might play in Paris – ie, where there was an open mic and a piano. So I directed them to a few places, including the Swan Bar. Within a day or two I learned Zahra had just arrived in France and immediately booked at gig at the Swan Bar. That hooked my interest, so I went last night to listen.
I had heard her dance music stuff on Zahra’s web site and was curious to hear what she might sound like alone behind a piano. I was not let down. It was intimate, the voice was real, strong and sweat – as was her presence. Which brings us back to the African princess bit. It turns out that Zahra has done charitable work in Africa, that she was there last year to record a video in Cameroon with the musician Wes Madiko, and that during that visit she was honored by a government official and given the title of princess in Cameroon. Her latest CD, Dancing by the Fire, also features another Cameroon-born French rap star, Soprano. And last night she was at the Swan Bar with a couple of Cameroon friends and business connections, and we all went off and had a dinner in an Italian restaurant next to the Swan Bar.
There I learned Zahra will also be singing the opening song at the 2012 Africa Nations Cup, the biggest international soccer tournament in Africa next January. That’s kind of like the equivalent of the Super Bowl in Africa. What can I say to all that? “Holy shit!” seems the best, most honest, expression.
It is difficult to figure out which angle to swoop in on the Caffe Vivaldi open mic experience, that I went through last night. Although the Sidewalk Cafe open mic is often cited as the main one of Monday nights in New York City, while I tried to figure out where to go – to avoid the legendary No. #381 position at 3 AM at the Sidewalk Cafe – I kept on hearing from people about how I should go to the Caffe Vivaldi.
Located on Jones Street in Greenwich Village, I decided that I would go there and forgo the Sidewalk Cafe, but it was partly also because I had to run off to interview someone for my open mic film right in the middle of the open mic, and I figured I might succeed at the Vivaldi but would be too far away at the Sidewalk, among other considerations. So I went to the Vivaldi, and I had the most comfortable, wonderful night, beginning to end.
This is a phenomenon. It is run by Kate Sland, who is a fine singer herself, and an exceptionally talented organizer of open mics; she is authoritative without being pushy. She is fair, too, and kind and appreciative of her singers. In fact, the Vivaldi is one of the great examples of “community” in an open mic. Kate has her people who come regularly because they love her and the Vivaldi’s vibe.
I got there at 5:30 PM for the sign up, as the open mic starts at 6:30 PM, but you have to be there early. I was the third musician to arrive, but within 15 minutes there were around 30 musicians. They all stood in an orderly line waiting to sign up and then choose their lottery number for order of appearance. This is a method much in practice in NYC, but which I rarely encounter elsewhere. It’s also a system I cannot understand.
I lucked into No. 13 – but it turned out to be bad luck, as I will say in a moment. Kate puts a maximum of 30 performers up, and up to 10 PM each one has two songs, after that one song until it ends at 11 PM. In fact, she fit in a few more people and went on until after 11 PM. That is when she did a fabulous singing number at the bar with a local regular old-time singer guitar player named Erik Frandsen, who is a long-time Greenwich Village songwriter, actor and co-author of an off-Broadway musical called “Song of Singapore.” (Frandsen has also played with Dave Van Ronk and Bob Dylan, by the way.)
Speaking of “old-time,” that is exactly what the Vivaldi is all about. And if the Bitter End has landmark status, so no doubt should the Vivaldi. It was founded and is still run by an Indian/Pakistani immigrant named Ishrat Ansari. It has been running for 28 years. The feeling I get and the buzz I hear is that this kind of old style cultural and musical bar in Greenwich Village and the Lower East Side – like Banjo Jim’s too – is under serious threat of extinction. Where the buildings in the past were owned by individual landlords with more than the bottom line as their goal in life, such real estate has been bought up by massive corporate entities that are closing them down for reasons linked to the bottom line. Or they are raising rents so high that small businesses cannot afford them. The area risks losing its character, and above all its culture.
But for the moment, the few places like this that remain, are still delivering. The Vivaldi was used by Woody Allen as the set of a film, it was where Joseph Brodsky to give press conferences when he won the Nobel Prize, actors and actresses pass through, people like Sissy Spacek. There is just a massive history. And the business model is beautiful: Ansari has musicians playing every day, up to four acts per day, and he does not charge a cover charge. Moreover, the food is not bad at all – I started ordering one dish after another.
Anyway, why was No. 13 bad luck for me? Well, I had to rush out after signing up and taking my number and listening to the first four acts. I calculated that I would have an hour and a half to go out, take a cab, do my interview and return and do my two songs. When I returned, however, within the hour and a half, I discovered that I had JUST missed my turn to sing and play. Kate said that she would put me on later, however, but I would be in the final part of the evening, the zone where you get just one song. I could not complain. She lived up to her promise, and when you considered it, it was fair. You know you are in good, honest hands with Kate Sland – as with the Vivaldi itself. The level of the other musicians was very high, as well, and one of the beautiful things here is that you know you are going to be given a chance by the audience too, which rates listening to the performers as a higher priority than talking.
Since last year all I have done is complain about how Valencia, Spain is the world’s crappiest city for open mics and jam sessions and live music. It was the only place in my two and a half year journey three times around the world where I failed to find a place to play. This year so far, although I played a few songs on a restaurant terrace – thus marking my territory, unlike last year – I must say that I can blame myself for a little failure this time.
First, I learned on Thursday that there was a massive beach party on Thursday night where someone at the F1 circuit told me I should go to play – that people would be playing music on the beach – and later that night the waiters at the restaurant said the same thing. That is not at all an open mic or jam, but it is a place where music is played in public.
Okay, I could swallow that one. But last night, I met some buskers on the street in the old town and asked if they knew of a place to play, maybe a jam session. They told me there was the French Institute of Valencia that held a jam on Sunday night and that I should not miss it. They said it was not far from there, so I set out to find the address immediately, to ensure that I wasn’t going to miss anything.
In fact, I never found the institute. But today when I decided to look into its exact address and confirm there was a jam, I saw that the jam took place last night. In fact, it might well have been finishing up while I was walking up and down Ca. Moro Zeit looking for the place.
That was two potential places to play that I missed out. Of course, coming from Paris to play at the French Institute makes little sense. But I still feel as if there must be some hidden jam or open stage in this city that I have missed.
I got so desperate last night, in fact, that I looked up on google for karaokes in Valencia hoping that maybe they would allow a guitar player/singer, if there were any karaokes. Something led me to believe also that they may use the same word for karaoke and open stage. So the first place I went, not far from my hotel, was entirely empty. I spoke to the manager of the place, and she said they hardly ever have karaokes because it disturbs the neighbors…. She sent me off to one on the other side of Valencia, however, which she said definitely happened, at the place Canovas del Castillo.
I walked through the entire city, found the square, and searched all the side streets and the square itself, and found nothing at all. I walked back to the hotel, having walked in a complete circle of several kilometers, with a stop for a cheap paella dinner. They may not specialize in music here, but they do specialize in paella. It was invented here.
But that is another story. First I want to say that I also wrote last year about my trials with Vueling, the crappy Spanish airline that hates musicians and guitars. This year while going to Barcelona I booked a flight – as I did last year – with Iberia, the big Spanish airline. But when I got to the airport I learned I was on a Vueling flight. And although I managed to get past the check-in desk with my guitar, I got aggressed by a flight attendant as I boarded the airplane. He asked me if I had booked a seat for my guitar. I said no, and he said it had to go in the hold – and he took it from me. Meanwhile, there was lots of room available in the overhead luggage compartment.
So with that in mind, and last year’s trip in mind, when I booked for Valencia I decided to keep away from Iberia and Vueling, and I found a flight on one of the Skyteam airlines, some small thing called Air Europa. At the airport I realized it was apparently no bigger than Vueling, but at the check-in desk, the woman smiled at me and asked if she could please put a “carry on luggage” label on my guitar. Damn right you can!!!! What a difference an airline makes. Oh, and the flight was entirely full yesterday, not a single seat free from what I could see….
So anyway, as I walked depressed around the streets of Valencia last night, thinking I would not find a place to play, I decided finally after a few hours to return to my hotel. It is no huge big deal to NOT play here or not do a segment on my film here, because I have already had a very fruitful time on that level in Barcelona, so I have marked my territory in Spain. That’s the main thing.
It also turns out there IS a jam session in Valencia, but only on Monday nights, at the Black Note club. I will have left by then.
But as I returned by foot to my hotel I suddenly received a call last night from a Formula One journalist friend and colleague, Patrick Camus, of AutoHebdo. He said he had just seen me walking down the street with my guitar and he was at a restaurant on the terrace and would I join him? So I walked back, only to find that he had somehow managed to recognize me through my walk and guitar from a very far distance – I could not make out any of his features from the crossroads where he saw me.
It also turned out he was on the terrace of the Carpe Diem restaurant, sitting exactly opposite the hotel I stayed in last year. He was with a friend and we spoke and he asked me if I had repaired my guitar yet – after the Malaysia mishap – and I said I had not, that it still held together and I feared fixing it might make it worse. So I opened the case and handed it over, because Patrick plays guitar too, mostly Bossa Nova.
After he played a little bit I took the guitar back and decided to play a song, he and his friend asked for more. So I did two more, and I received applause from the waiters, some people at the other table and people walking down the street. So it was a wonderful moment, and suddenly I didn’t feel so down and low anymore. But I also had to stop because it was after midnight, and a quiet street just beneath the hotel windows….
Patrick had never heard me play before, either, so it was fun to show him what I’m up to doing all this music all the time at the races. I think he will probably not call me Django anymore though, as he will have seen that my guitar playing is pretty basic….
Another thing worth noting was the protest in the main square of the city that reminded me of the same thing that was happening in Barcelona when I was there, about the problems with the economy. I did a bit of video footage, but have not had the time to put it up. May do so tommorrow.
Sitting in the restaurant above Grumpy’s Bar eating a lobster and greasy fries last night, I looked out the window onto Bishop Street and wondered how it was that Mordecai Richler, one of the great Canadian writer of last century who died on 3 July 2001, had created the world he did in his novels. I kept thinking of Richler, and of the last novel of his that I read, Barney’s Version.
I would only learn at the end of the evening when I spoke to the guy who ran the bluegrass jam session in Grumpy’s bar, beneath, that Grumpy’s was one of Richler’s favorite hangouts, and that in the making of the film of Barney’s Version they had filmed scenes in Grumpy’s. I am trying to dig into my memory, thinking maybe he had – in fact, he must have – written about Grumpy’s in the novel.
In any case, I still wondered and kept thinking all dinner time – before descending to the bar to listen and play music – how it was that Richler had created this fantastic and credible fictional world out of Montreal. I liked Montreal yesterday, I liked Grumpy’s and I liked the restaurant above. But since I am a Canadian myself, I always see it differently to how a foreigner might see it. And for me, the Montreal that most people like for its European-ness, is anything but. I abhor the pretentious Canadian efforts to imitate Europe, in fact. But Montreal doesn’t have to, there is enough originality in this city to make many other North American cities jealous.
On the other hand, the jam session at Grumpy’s last night was anything but “Montreal” or French Canadian or even old world English and European. I was amazed to find a bluegrass jam in downtown Montreal, where the organizers were very adamant that it had to be about bluegrass and what they called “old-time” music. When I asked if my old English, Irish, Scottish, music would be considered old-time, I received a curt: “No, this is not a Celtic jam. There are other places that have Celtic jams.”
Hmmm. All right. So I was even more surprised when I found that the banjo player in the jam was on a three month visit over from England, and he originated from Manchester. Still, “Shady Groves” was played twice last night, and as many fans of that song know, it is simply an American version of the English folk song, Matty Groves. So it all comes down to names.
But this is certain: I loved the jam session last night, and there were some fine musicians, including the leader, the MC, Mike. He had a bona fide authentic voice – reminded me a little of that of my friend Texas in Paris – and he played some mean guitar. Bobby, the girl singer, also had a voice that just grabbed me and demanded my attention every time she sang.
One guy came in with a cowboy hat and a resonator guitar, and I could see he was in a little the same position as I was. “I mosly play the blues,” he said. But he played along with the bluegrass and managed to get the closest thing to acceptable in his repertoire to slip in to the theme. It went down well.
I searched through my whole repertoire to see what could possibly work, as I do not play any bluegrass and my traditional English stuff had been ruled out. I came up with Hank Williams, and “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry.” This hit the soft spot with no problem at all, and everyone played and sang along too. Unfortunately, I had built up such a layer of nervousness and I had been wrestling so much within myself to figure out what I could contribute, that I made a massacre of the song, with my timing being thrown way, way, way off.
I also had a hard time with the format, as there is a central microphone and everyone sits around in a circle and joins in or leaves the circle as they wish. But I had no idea of how my voice carried, and I could not hear my voice, and so I got really close to the mic – which is in fact mostly made to pick up everyone, not just the singer. So it was a little bit of a fiasco.
But I also played along with a few of the other songs they did, adding my three chords and messy lead here and there as I could. I desperately wanted to take part and say that I played in a bluegrass jam in Montreal. Mike told me that it turns out bluegrass if popular in Montreal, and there is even a bluegrass open mic on Sunday nights that attracts some of the best bluegrass players in the city, at Barfly, on St. Laurent And I did. And on top of it, it turned out to be at a favorite haunt of one of my favorite writers.
Going to the Brasserie Lipp to celebrate my daughter Emily’s 18th birthday, I decided nevertheless to take along my guitar, since that legendary brasserie is located in the same Latin Quarter neighborhood as the Tennessee Bar and the Galway Pub and it was Monday night and that meant the two open mics;
So we had a great meal at Lipp – with my son Paul and daughter eating the same dish of pig’s foot, not for me, and I had the famous choucroute – and of course we all had a nice Beaujolais to go along with it, since the legal drinking age in France is 18 and we had to celebrate that. We finished eating and got out of their at around 10:30 and headed over to the Tennessee Bar where the action was hot, the room was full, and some hard hitting and hard singing guy was on the stage. I took one look around the room and knew that I’d probably not get on – too many performers – and anyway, I had known that from the beginning but just wanted to show my son and daughter the Tennessee joint where I hang out so often.
So we stayed for a bit of this guy and then went to the Galway. My timing was perfect, as Stephen Prescott put me up as soon as we arrived and I did four or five songs. Then Stephen spent much of the rest of the night trying to get my son up on the stage, as I had told him before that Paul has a group, called The Last Waltz, and that he plays guitar and sings. In his band, in fact, he only does the occasional backup vocal, so he is not really used to singing in public – having only done it once or twice before. (To my knowledge.) Eventually, at the end of the evening, with Stephen, me and my daughter pushing Paul, we decided that he and I would go up together and jam a bit. Or rather, I’d sing some songs and he would do lead, some rhythm guitar, whatever.
He and I never play together at home. His music is his music, mine is mine. We did jam a little in the early days, but never seriously. And we never learned the same song. So this was not just our debut performance in public at an open mic, it was our first time playing what ended up being four songs together without break or practice, from beginning to end. We started with Marc Bolan’s “Cat Black, the Wizard’s Hat.” Then we did “Unchained Melody,” then we did, “I Shall Be Released.” By that last song we were starting to get the feel for things, and afterwards we would be complimented on that one. But none of it really showed off Paul’s best talents – he writes his own songs and learns the classics note by note -, and just before we left the stage he started playing “Little Wing,” and I said, “Crap, you should have played that and I’d do and improvise the singing.”
But there it was, a birthday and a birth – of a father and son duo. Well, probably not. But he might go again with The Last Waltz.
Too bad we didn’t get any of it on video, but there were some other high moments in the night – like Stephen’s “Common People,” and Sven Cosnuau singing with Pierre Doucet playing backup guitar.
Istanbul pulled through again last night as it has in the past. Just as I despaired of finding a true open mic or jam situation in this most musical of cities, it all fell together in the most memorable night to date of any of my musical experiences in Istanbul.
I mentioned in yesterday’s post that I had met a Frenchman at Molly’s Café who played the flute and who lived in Istanbul and who gave me a couple of leads on where I would find a jam session. Last night, arriving back in the city late from the race track, I went directly to my hotel, posted the post, then went and ate at a fast-food buffet on Istiklal Street – Borsa – which has excellent food cheap as hell, and wine.
I then looked at the instructions I had written down for the place the Frenchman had told me about. All he said was the place was called Kooperatif, and it was located in a back street behind the mosque at the top of Istiklal. I knew the mosque well, as I passed it many times on my way to Blues Live bar in the past.
So I finished my meal and headed over to the Mosque, turned right behind it, then took the road around to the left, and barely, but just, noticed a stairway leading into a bar in a basement of a building. I saw the name: Kooperatif. Inside I learned its full name is Kooperatif Art & Performance Hall.
It is a bar/club, performance space with several rooms, a low ceiling, a stage in one of the rooms, tables spotted about everywhere, and yet a very intimate and warm feel. So too was the reception I received as I walked in and headed toward the bar with my guitar on my back.
At a table in front of the bar sat a Turkish man, probably in his late 20s or early 30s, next to piles of instruments in bags and cases, and one or two traditional stringed instruments that were not in bags.
The rapport was instant, with him, and with a couple of men sitting at the bar, one of whom I would learn was German, but who has lived many years in Istanbul. I was almost instantly invited to show my guitar, and then to play. I didn’t even have a chance to order a beer or sit down before I was asked to reveal my instrument.
And because I had come to the bar specifically hoping that I would find a musical jam situation, an open mic or open jam, I pulled out the guitar and began to play with no hesitation. In fact, with great pleasure and excitement.
I will try not to make this post as long as yesterdays. Let me just sum it up by saying that Kooperatif is the bar of the young man I mention above, whose name is Şafak Velioğlu. Şafak loves music and he has turned the bar into a musical performance space, and he encourages jam sessions. In other words, it’s not a case only of a Monday night jam, or an open mic every Wednesday. It is a place where musicians can and do walk in and play any time they want. There is, however, a jam session on the Wednesday and Thursday nights, and one regular attendee told me it was quite experimental. Şafak also lets his friend’s bands rehearse there when they want. The vibe, in short, is completely music – and young and hip, like Şafak .
There were a regular stream of clients coming to take drinks, smoke and chat, and listen to the music in this genial environment.
I began by playing songs that I know – covers and my own – and Şafak played along with me on his strange stringed instrument from Iran. It sounds a lot like a banjo, and that is partly because it has a table made of skin, like a banjo.
Soon, I was joined by a man who does come from Iran, who is a local luthier who builds all sorts of instruments, and who joined us on a box drum that he had built. And then that German guy, who had been very encouraging and loquacious since my arrival, and who wanted to try my guitar – which he loved – became very enthusiastic and asked Şafak if he could get his saxophone and join in.
“Of course,” said Şafak.
So someone was dispatched to a nearby restaurant where the sax had been sitting, to pick it up and have the German join in. It was a soprano sax, a bent one, not a straight one, and the man said it was his travel sax.
I played “Crazy Love” because I thought it would be the easiest to start with that he could play sax to. As we progressed from song to song I thought this sax player is damned good. I would learn as the night went on that he is a professional musician, he lives in Turkey, and he has played all over the country, on television, with Turkish bands, has done CDs. His name is Herbert Koschmieder.
It took us a while, but between us, Şafak and I figured out what sort of songs and key would be best for him to play his Iranian stringed instrument with me on the guitar. It is quite a unique situation, that combination. It was the key of C, and it worked best with my capo on the fifth fret.
That was fortunate because that is exactly where I put the capo when I play my song, “Since You Left Me.” And so we played that one together, and then later with Herbert. It was amazingly fun, and the Turkish link in the song as I wrote it, played through well with the instrument. (If you listen to the recording I did of the song last summer, my friend Zarby plays a lead that sounds mid-eastern.)
We jammed for a couple of hours or more. Herbert said that Kooperatif was the best place in Istanbul for this kind of thing, and one of the rare places. I had hit the mother lode! And I had done it through Molly’s Café and the Frenchman.
Herbert later suggested that we go up the street to the restaurant of a friend of his where there was to be more music with some musician friends of his.
This was the Espira restaurant, and it turned out there was a wedding going on when we arrived, with two long banquet tables full of guests and a number of musicians sharing the stage. The restaurant usually specializes in Turkish folk music from the Black Sea region, and there were some such musicians on hand, particularly one who played a violin-like instrument.
I will have to do research about the name of these instruments to give this account a bit more weight. But for the moment, suffice it to say that not only did I find the wedding ceremony and its music fascinating, but as the wedding died out and Herbert played some very cool improvisational jamming with some of the musicians on the stage, the whole thing then turned into a jam session around the table.
Herbert asked me to get out my guitar, and we again did my “Since You Left Me,” just to show off to the other musicians what we could do with the marriage of the soprano sax, the guitar and the tarn or whatever Şafak’s instrument was – as he had now joined us from Kooperatif.
After that, we did another jam around the table, as I played some base chords for Herbert and then the other guitar player, Safak and then two different kinds of violin-type players and a drummer to play along with. We jammed for another hour or so until nearly 3:30 AM, at which time I had to excuse myself, saying that I had to go to the track for a full day of work the next day.
I was sorry to leave, but they stayed on and continued to play, and I was at least happy that I had apparently not interrupted the jam session. In any case, it was a musical experience of the open jam session in Turkey like nothing I’ve ever experienced. And I felt that I grew out of the experience – my fingers were falling off, in fact, so much time had they spent playing chords in the jam.
From a feeling of near depression in my early couple of days in Istanbul, suddenly I had climbed bit by bit towards a conclusion of pure joy and a goal achieved of jamming with the locals. Ah, but there’s still tonight left!
At 19 euros a head, I was sceptical before I went to the Industry of Cool festival at the Maroquinerie last night. Industry of Cool is a management company that represents a number of very interesting and exciting young French bands and musicians. I have followed the careers of most of them over the last two years since I started playing music again, and particularly after meeting Earle Holmes, who discovered and nurtured virtually all the bands through his open mics from the Shebeen to the Mecano. Holmes is also a partner in the Industry of Cool company.
I love the music of these bands, but I was still sceptical at the idea that young bands should be charging 19 euros to an audience of young people who have no money. I mean, these bands have records, they have had some radio play, they have had some press. But they are not well known and massively successful bands. So we had performances by Sourya, The Agency, Scale, and upstairs an acoustic set by Ben Ellis, of the former band called Brooklyn. (Ben also played percussion with The Agency, and thanks to his new beard I didn’t recognize him.)
Well, I was not only wrong about the 19 euros, but I felt that the bands are starting to reach a level of quality where if they persist they may well take off – at least one of them should rise up out of the clubs and make it somewhere, somehow. I would hope. Because last night’s festival at the Marquinerie was indeed Cool. And the concert hall beneath the bar and restaurant was not full to bursting, but there was a very, very good number off people in attendance. It felt almost like a well attended concert at the more famous Bataclan, for example.
The music all night long was inventive, strong, with good sound, and vibrant performancs on the whole. Now, of course, I have no idea how many people were let in free to the show – what is clear is that a lot of the people from the other bands around Paris showed up, people like Bruno from the band Neimo, a couple of the members of the former French band called Rock&Roll, and others, including producers, bar owners, etc.
I’ll start immediately by saying the common thread between the three musical venues I want to talk about here was Stephen “Danger” Prescott, the Aussie musician of Paris. There may be others, but Stephen is the inimitable one.
My Sunday brunch was a surprise, massive, incredible, jubilant success…there was a salsa lesson and dance going on in the back end of the Mecano at the same time. So that meant that those who REALLY wanted to hear the laid back music of the brunch, got to bunch up in the front of the Mecano bar to listen to me and this week’s guest.
This week’s guest, if you have not guessed (sorry, that’s almost a pun), was Stephen Prescott, of Melbourne and Paris. Who would have thought that one of the audience members would be another Aussie in off the street – but that was good timing, since she knew several of the songs that Stephen sang, and requested more. In fact, Stephen has a vast and varied repertoire, from Aussie songs to the Pogues to Stan Rogers. Because of the salsa dancing and its accompanying music, at Stephen’s suggestion, after he and I did a couple of sets, he suggested we bring the guitar into the room at the front of the Mecano and sit down and just sing a few songs like that, at the table.
That’s when the brunch turned very cosy and informal, and Stephen and I shared the guitar and hammered out songs that are perhaps not always on our repertoires. We even had the visiting Austrian, Wolf, play and sing the Hank Williams song I do, “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry.” And I thank Wolf for doing a vide of me when I sang my song, “Borderline.”
From the Mecano we all went over to the Disquaires, where Ollie Fury was set to play. But his set did not play until near 10 PM, so in the end we stayed only for Yaco and his band’s set.
Then we headed off to the Galway, where Stephen plays MC every Monday night at the open mic. There we listened to the amazing German phenomenon named Yann, who looks, dresses, speaks, acts and sings like an Irishman. Please don’t ask me to explain. But I think I liked best his Richard Thompson song, and the song he did with Stephen – the Stan Rogers one.
A long brunch, in the end, that went on from 2:30 to 12:30. Fun for a Sunday afternoon and night.
That is a very convoluted “headline” just to say that after a full week or more of silence I have returned back on track with my blog. I don’t think I have had too many such silences, but basically it comes down to the Formula One season having ended, and me having a short little illness without consequences to coincide with that end.
Readers of this blog will have noted that I spent the previous nine months traveling the world and playing in open mics and jams and busking all over the place in some 15 or so countries and most of the continents. It was my second year doing that, and with a little luck, I will continue again next year. For the moment, I have entered into what is known as the winter season, or the off-season, in Formula One, where journalists like me tend to tend to other projects and to take holidays and prepare for the coming season.
I will mostly be sticking around Paris, playing gigs (don’t miss the Texas in Paris organized Thanksgiving evening I’m playing at, at the Disquaires on Thursday), open mics and jams. And at the moment I plan a weekly brunch musical afternoon show at the Mecano Bar in Paris, every Sunday. For the past couple of months I’ve been hosting this every Sunday that I have been in town and not writing about the Formula One races. I play two or three sets of my music and cover songs, and I invite guests to play a set too. The guests are my friends and acquaintances in the musical world that I have met, mostly in Paris. The brunch starts at 3 PM and usually ends at 6 PM, although on one particularly lively Sunday with David Broad on guitar and vocals and Joe Cady on fiddle, we stayed until 7 PM.
Yesterday I started up the brunch again and had Calvin McEnron and Rym playing a set each. It was a cold, rainy day in Paris, and I can’t think of any better place to be if you like brunch (it’s good food), music and relaxation. So check it out!!
