For several days after the beautiful House Concert at Juan’s place last week, media has been streaming into my DropBox. Super cool, photos, videos and stereo recordings.
I’ve been putting some of it together and want to share some of it with you now. The shear volume of stuff far exceeded my expectation. I thought I was going to have to upgrade my DropBox account! It will take awhile just to post everything, but here is a start.
Nardis.
Don’t You Realize
Armando’s Rumba
All-Star Jam
Thanks so much to those that played, attended and participated in some way. More to come…
This past Friday, April 10th 2009, we had the good fortune to follow through with a House Concert that was orchestrated, end-to-end on Twitter. With our new Twitter friends Steve Uccello and Gustaf Fjelstrom, we set about establishing a venue, organizing talent, inviting guests and in doing so, a magical event occurred.
Steve found a gracious and enthusiastic host in Juan Candelaria who has a gorgeous home in Capitlola CA. He was a wonderful host who helped set the magical tone for the evening.
The dialog for the planning stage of the evening were all conducted in the public time line on Twitter where anyone interested could ‘listen-in’ and contribute to the project/ conversation. Several good people did just that: Zach Parkes, bass player, blogger and overall positive guy took photos. This was all surprisingly effortless and crystalized very rapidly. No mainstream media (radio or print) promotional avenues were used. All planning and correspondence was done via Twitter. Advice and well-wishes came from all over the world, including from our good friend Steve Lawson, who, is my personal House Concert Guru (Thanks Steve!).
The eclectic mix of music presented (Categorized “Neo-Chamber Music” by Zach) was a blend of rootsy singing by Aaron Ford, looping magic by solo bassist Steve Uccello and magical soundscapes by Gustaf’s electric cello, preceded the Atmos Trio set. The Concert concluded with us inviting all the performers back for an impromptu musical exchange. Made-to-order Magic!
Thinking it might be fun to continue the theme of community that emerged on twitter, we encouraged guests to take photos and make audio and video recording of the concert. We supplied a URL where they could share their content–and share they did. Over the course of the next couple of days, over 3 gigabytes of data arrived on my desktop. Sure, I saw some cameras and microphones strategically placed around the room, but the extent to which this event was documented really surprised me!
This is one of the things that make House Concerts special: Everyone can participate. Everyone is involved.
If you prefer to participate as a spectator, you certainly have that option. If you want to be more involved–that is welcome as well. In this setting, the audience members are not merely “asses to fill seats.” The audience is a significant component to the event. They have stepped up to fill the valued roll as a collective collaborator.
In the coming days, I will post video and audio content and, if there is interest, make it available for you to edit remix and share any way you like.
Want to host a House Concert of your own? You can learn more about it and have the Atmos Trio play in your home.
Though the Atmos Trio is one of Rob’s most visible musical outlets, there are plenty of other settings in which the keen listener can find him: One is the “Joe Henderson Memorial Big Band.” This group is lead by long-time Joe Henderson sideman, trumpet player Warren Gale Jr. “Warren has a deep understanding of Joe’s music and it’s a real privilege to be playing alongside him, as well as many of the other world-class musicians in the band: it’s a super-strong collections of musicians. It’s also a real challenge to, not only play this advanced modern music authentically, but to have to follow one of Warren’s masterpiece-grade solos with an improvisation of your own—it’s a ‘kick in the backside’ that I welcome–but sometimes I think: ‘What am I supposed to play after THAT?’
The “Joe Henderson Memorial Big Band” performed at Yoshi’s San Francisco.
Here is the band playing Joe’s
Trumpets
Warren Gale
John Christensen
Dave Fava
Trombones
Jules Rowles
Chuck Bennett
Saxes
Mel Martin
Pete Yellin
Jean Fineberg
Dave Tidball
Jim Rothermel
Rhythm Section
Rob Michael: Guitar
Dave Udolf: Piano
Paul Smith: Bass
Bob Belanski: Drums
Taped live at Expressions College for Digital Art.
We played this concert only a few days after the “Atmos Plays Waters” recording session. Look for details about the CD as well as video footage on our YouTube channel in the coming days.
