Friday Night at the Bakery

Last Friday night I had the chance to play a real live gig for the first time in...30 years? I mentioned in my recent post about my fretless bass that I've been playing bass in an acoustic trio, and we had our first gig together at a local bakery (full details here.)

Our job was to play from 6:30-8:30 (two sets with a short break in the middle.) We'd been rehearsing fairly intensively, and I was pretty sure it would go well, but I felt a little nervousness on Friday. I wasn't nervous about not knowing our set - on the contrary, I felt very comfortable with all our songs. I'd rehearsed them often enought that they were all "burned in", and we'd rehearsed together enough that we could make fairly seamless on-the-fly adjustments and stay together.

I'd been told that the "stage" area was small, and it was even smaller than I'd imagined. The three of us were in tight formation - so much so that one had to be careful about swinging the neck of one's guitar, or you'd bonk the person next to you. That wasn't a problem, and it actually turned out to have advantages.

The inside of the bakery was small, with maybe 10-12 tables - and the tables were all full. There was also an outside deck overlooking French Creek, with more tables and more areas to stand.

We launched into our set shortly after 6:30, and it went great. Darling Wife, who was part assistant sound man and part master of ceremonies, gave us the thumbs up about the sound mix. One thing that our rehearsals didn't account for was the background noise. The bakery was full, and people were talking as they ordered food and ate and watched, and it was loud. So much so that it was a little disorienting at first. In our quiet basement rehearsals, I could literally hear the sound of fingers on a guitar string and adjust appropriately. Now I didn't have that feedback I was used to. It wasn't a problem, but I was paying *very* close attention to what the others were doing.

I mentioned that the physical closeness had advantages - the primary one was we could exchange a few words. If one of us said "another chorus", we all got it and reacted appropriately. And we did make a number of adjustments to songs - mostly just reacting to the moment and following the singer. It all worked out great.

The two hours passed in the blink of an eye, and the night was a complete success by any measure. We got many kind words afterwards from people, and the bakery gave us all the pizza and pastries we wanted (and a take-home goody bag of pastries for each of us.) And our compensation wasn't limited to what we could fit in our bellies. We had a tip jar, and the contents at the end of the night were enough to put a little cash in each of our pockets, and we (the band and Yoko Darling Wife) decided to go next door to the St. Peter's Inn and blow the rest of our tip money on a bottle of wine to celebrate an insanely fun evening.

There are a couple of videos and a number of pics of the evening on the Facebook page. Here's one more video.

We'll be back at the bakery to do it again on Aug. 9. And we're working on other gigs. So here's to a fun and musical summer.

Chip, Sandy, Dave