A lot of people have asked us what we were doing in Nashville back in August. I will tell you. We flew all the way to Nashville to perform for fifteen minutes.
And it was completely worth it – for the hot-dog carts and honky tonks alone. The occasion was a showcase for Live on Stage, an entertainment company that books community concerts around the country. Each year they put together a roster of forty or so artists to offer to their clients around the USA.
They also put together a huge, awesome weekend of artist showcases. Representatives of concert associations from all over the country fly into Nashville for the showcase weekend and also to hobnob and visit with the artists and booking agents. It felt like a really fun, warm party.
This year, the event was held at The Renaissance Hotel. It was quite a venue. The stage crew and production were top notch and the performers were so, so good. We were very honored to be among them. A couple of my favorites were “The Lost Fingers,” “The Italian String Quartet,” and “The Depue Brothers.” Of course, we were the only act with a trombone player who could make his horn sound like a traffic helicopter.
You can see some of the other artists here. You may recognize some of them such as the band, Exile (whose showcase performance was sweet.)
We were very nervous before our showcase. I think Nathan was crying (just kidding.) We had a fifteen minute sound check in the morning during which everything seemed to work well and during which we were blown away by how solicitous for us the stage crew was. They were incredibly organized. I think they had to be in order to get that many crazy and talented artists on and off the stage smoothly.
Our performance felt very good. There were a couple of moments that felt a little magical to me and we evidently made an impact as we received a partial standing ovation – this from a crowd whose median age was…up there. Sam’s bright orange shoe laces and bandana stole the show. We performed our songs Chemistry, Noon O’Clock, Clueless Joy and Stuff. We had intended to perform The Muppet Show as well, but we timed our set before we left and it put us just over fifteen minutes.
You may wondered how we were connected with a company in Nashville. It’s all thanks to Lewis County Community Concerts in Centralia, WA. In October of 2011 they invited us to be the opening act for the Carpe Diem String Quartet, who were wonderful and also on the roster of Live on Stage. We thought it was brave of LCC to book three musical geniuses and a trombone player to open for a classical string quartet, but Carpe Diem is a pretty rocking string quartet and the interesting pairing seemed to work out well. Our opening set went off loverly. I later sent a demo to Nashville and fine folks Larry McGee and Marie Panesko from Centralia recommended us.
We have played hundreds of shows of many different kinds over the years, some for thousands of people, but this was definitely the first time we have traveled thousands of miles to perform four songs. It was fun and I hope we do it again sometime.
The dates are not completely finalized yet, but it looks like LOS booked Locust Street Taxi at 6 concerts and 8 school performances in VA, NC, KS, TX and CA in 2014. We are really looking forward to all of them.
