You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Weird, Worst, Embarrassing, and ...Celebrities?

Episode Date: December 9, 2022

Adam and Peter kick off a new series talkin about gigs that either went weird, bad, embarrassing, or became intertwined with a celebrity. Have a question for us? Leave us a SpeakPipeCheckout courses from Adam, Peter and more at Open StudioLet us know what you think by leaving a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ review, or head over to our YouTube channel.Follow us on Twitter | Instagram

Hey, Peter. Hey, man. This was a good one. This was a good one. This was a fun. I think I saw you smiling and laughing more than I have in, I don't know about any episode, but in a while. I mean, you actually were speechless for a minute in laughter. And I learned some things about you.

Like what? Some embarrassing things. Yeah. But you willfully gave those. Some weird things. Yeah, we got into some deep stuff. These were like, this was stories today. This was some stories.

Enjoy. About. Oh, okay. That's right. They're about to hear it now. Got you. Okay. I'm Adam Manus.

And I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to The You'll Hear Podcasts. Two guys that happen to play piano talking about music. Talking about music. Today we're talking about some possibly embarrassing things, Peter. I don't know how this one's going to end up. Well, I'm looking at your prompts. Let me just throw a couple of words out there.

Weird. Yeah. Worst. Embarrassing and celebrity. That seems like me. Yeah, that seems like me. Well, no, not altogether. Those are four different parts of four different prompts that you have proffered.

as part of our upcoming series entitled Prompts for our listeners. So, listener, we want you to leave us to speakpipe about four specific things. So it could be, and don't try to put all four on the one speak pipe because you only get 90 seconds on a speech pipe pipe. I don't know if you knew that, Peter.

So we need brief stories. That's because we're on the basic plan. And we have four prompts. And then we're going to do episodes with these prompts, hopefully compiling a bunch of our listener stories together. Yes. So the four prompts, and today, Peter and I are going to talk about each one of ours.

Yes. We need to call into it. to the speak pop ourselves or can we do it directly? We have the direct line. That's right. Now, the four prompts are, number one, what's your weirdest gig ever? Right. So I'm talking about were you at six flags over Pennsylvania and you were dressed as Yosemite

Sam playing barrel house piano on a 99 degree. With an upside down diaper. What is your weirdest gig experience? I have some that involved weddings when I was like 18 and saving money to move to New York that are pretty tasty. Okay. Should we answer this or you want to go through? Should we go? Do you want me to jump on that one? No, I want to go through the list and then we can go down.

Number two, what's the worst rehearsal experience you've ever had? So again, you can call in to the speakpipe. So go to you'll hear it.com, leave a speak pipe and tell us what is the worst rehearsal, specifically rehearsal experience you've ever had. We've all had rehearsals that have, I mean, I've had rehearsals where the gig got canceled. It was so bad. Right. And number three, what's your most embarrassing performance story?

Okay. So that could be a bit of a porcupine. That's a squirly little porcupine. Elephant in the room there. So number three is what's your most embarrassing? So not the weirdest or the worst gig or the worst rehearsal. Is it possible with some overlap between these? Well, yeah.

Well, no, one's embarrassing. One's weird. One's the worst rehearsal. What's the most embarrassing performance? A performance where you were completely embarrassed. And then number four, what's your best celebrity encounter on a gig? It could be a celebrity musician. It could be a movie star.

It could be just a local news anchor or something where you've had like you're playing the piano and you look up and you're like, oh, it's Julia Roberts. Right. Yeah. Oh, that's mine. Oh, perfect. Maybe. We'll have to see. All right.

Those are great. Okay. So number one, can I state it and then we'll answer it? Go. Okay. Number one. What's your weird? The weirdest gig ever.

Yeah. For me? Yes. Okay. My weirdest gig ever was actually my first gig ever. My very first paying gig. I was 15 years old. My band director, shout out to Jeff Melsha at Northwest High School.

It was very supportive and got- Go Bears! Yeah. As soon as, when he heard me, my sophomore year in high school, when he got the job, he was like, you need to start lessons with Carol Beth True, who was a legendary local jazz piano teacher here, and really got me on the track to even be where I am now. So shout out to band directors everywhere

from being supportive. But Jeff got my first gig and it was with a lovely band. I think they were there was something with Dixie in the title so it's a bit problematic but it was a sort of What year was this? This was 1990.

Well, I can tell you what year did the Rams come to St. Louis? Because it was the year the Rams came to St. Louis. I want to say 94 or five. Was Jerry Jones involved with this because from the title. It was a, and it was weird. So this was a, it was with a, we'll call it a trad jazz band.

That's not what they called themselves. And it was at, alt-right jazz. It was at the opening of a gas station, of a shell gas station at the corner of Manchester and 141, way out in West County. Was there a guy, a blow-up guy there? This is decades before those things even existed here. But it was the summer that, right, right before. for the Rams first season in St. Louis.

And at the Shell Gas Station was this trad jazz band, which I had no part of being in. I knew some jazz chords, mostly from Oscar Peterson, Bill Evans. What about like Saints school March? Did you guys play Saints? Three times.

It was that kind of gig, right? And then I remember it distinctly because I was 15, and there were Rams cheerleaders there, like right in front of us for the whole gig. So it was such an odd experience. I'm 15. I'm playing my first ever paid gig. I feel a little bit awesome about that. But then also, like, I have no idea what's going on. Because we're playing like traditional ragtime, you know, New Orleans. I've never heard that music really, aside from cultural

things and movies and stuff. So I'm trying to fake my way through it. I only know some basic chords because I've been studying, you know, the theory of the stuff for just a couple of months. And then there's like, and I'm 15 and there's like six cheerleaders dancing right in front of me. It was the, and my dad is like, my dad is like, my dad. My dad had to drive me there. We're out in the sun at a shell station in the middle of the suburbs. It was the weirdest gig, man. Wow.

That's pretty weird. I've got a couple of weird ones, but I got to up my game. I've got to find the weirdest one because that's weird. So I'm going to go with, okay. So one of the first gigs that we had, we had a little band. We actually started when we were in middle school still. And we kind of, it started flowering a little bit. And so a nice little group by the time we're in high school.

But when we first started out, It was the same thing. Like, we didn't know what we were doing. Like, we knew a couple tunes, kind of. But we knew, like, from big band charts that we were doing, like, the theme from Rocky, just little things that we were do. But we somehow got hired to play a, it must have been 50-year high school reunion. Because these folks were old, old A-F.

So 50 years would have been, oh, not that old, actually now, 60, like late 60s. Maybe it was 60. I mean, well, at the time, this would have been, like, mid-80s. Right. Like, their hit songs that they wanted to hear were from, like, pre any kind of jazz we knew. And the thing was, all we knew was, like, the theme from Rocky Chameleon, Bump, don't, da-da-da-da, because we did that in marching band, you know, bit, do, be, boom, boom, uh, George Benson.

Yeah. I can't remember any name. Anyway, like, literally was only three songs that we knew. But, and so, like, there was some older folks that were like, we want to hear, like, they're naming these songs that we'd never heard of. But the thing is this was University City High School, like, 50-year, and it was out at, like, at, like, Westport at some hotel ballroom. And they got this crappy middle school band. What genius did that? But because we didn't have a bass player at that time or a bass player couldn't make it, we, Jeremy's, Jerry Davenport's dad.

Big shout out to Jeremy and to Roger Davenport got us a bass player that he knew, which was none other than Jeff Anderson. Oh, great. And that was my first time meeting him and playing with him. And he was, you know, a little older than us. And so he kind of realized that it was about to turn into an angry mom. if we kept playing Herbie Hancock's Camillion over and over. I mean, like, we're looping songs.

You know, and so he was like, let's play in the mood. They'll love that. And we're like, what is that? He's like, just follow me. And so we slopped our way through in the mood. That's when I first learned it. And we looped that sucker,

and they danced to it and kind of liked it, but we're a little bit pissed off. And that was the night. And we ran out of there in shame. It could also go down as the most embarrassing one, too. But I got another one for that. I got a good embarrassing one, too. Well, let's move on to our next prompt,

which is, worst rehearsal experience you've ever had. I've got a good one ready to go. Okay, please. Okay, so when I was a senior in high school, and I might have just graduated in high school, is right before I was moving to New York, I was in a dance band,

and it was mostly, like, Parliament cover band. That, like, Parliament James Brown called Son of Star Child, which had a pretty big following here in St. Louis, which was really fun, and to learn all that music, to learn all, like, Bernie Warhol's parts. Yeah. And all the James Brown stuff was really fun.

And just to play dance music where, like, people were super into that band and super into dancing. And to play for people dancing every night was unbelievable. And I actually miss it. But anyway, we had one rehearsal. We had a backup background singer. BG! I won't say her name. Because we had several in the band during my tenure.

But this particular background singer came from a very religious. background. And we had one rehearsal. We rehearsed all the time, like twice a week. And we had one rehearsal at this crummy little rehearsal space that's no longer there. It's right at King's Highway down here in St. Louis, right down the street from where we are now. It was like definitely a fire hazard, this building, right? Definitely like going to collapse on someone at some point. But anyway, we're in this rehearsal and about halfway through the rehearsal, knock on the rehearsal door. And, you know, we think it's like some of the other people in the rehearsal spat, probably wanting to like borrow a bong or something. But it's the dad of one of the

background singers and he's a very religious man. Yeah. And he, we find out, was not an all approving of his daughter who wasn't like young. She was probably in her early 20s. Oh, yeah. But like. She was of age. Yeah.

But she like he, so basically he came in and spent literally an hour and a half berating us. Like we, like he was standing in the door and he was kind of a big guy. And he was just like, we're all going to hell. for playing this music. Wow. This is the devil's music. And she's crying and also like, you're right, you know. Like, it was the, by far, the worst experience I've ever had in music, maybe, just to be like,

sermoned at in a really negative way by this dude who was upset that his daughter was playing in a parliament. Spiritually degrading, I would say. Spiritually degrading. And just kind of a weird thing to do to hold a room full of people kind of hostage with your. And we were all so young. so we were just like, yes, sir, you know, but also, I think at some point someone was like, man, what is the point of this? You know, and so we ended up leaving.

It was just so awkward and so weird. Obviously, that was her last rehearsal with the band. Right. But, you know, just in the spirit of all things and well, years later, you guys are still married. You have a beautiful family that you had. Glad it worked out. Shout out to my father, though. He finally blessed the wedding.

Yeah, that's good. Well, that's good. That's great. That's worst rehearsal. Okay, so I've probably had some more that I've forgotten because I really, I hate bad rehearsals. I don't even like good rehearsals. Try to block them out, man. I try to block them out.

The best rehearsal is the one at the sound check for six or 50 minutes. When everybody's shredded their parts and they just come together. Exactly. But there was one and I cannot name the orchestra or the conductor because it's kind of a big time. I mean, bigger than you would think. Yeah. But not really big because this wouldn't have happened if they were that big time. But I mean, a respect, like, if you heard it be like, oh, you're playing with a such and such.

So that must have been great. Well, no, not in this case. And this was with Diane Reeves and the band. And, you know, we've done a lot of these orchestra gigs. Yeah, you guys are pros at those. Yeah. But we had a conductor that was just, I mean, I don't think he was licensed by any state or, I mean, he was, he should have had his baton taken from him. First of all he had a baton.

That's always a bad sign. When they have a baton? Yeah, when they have a baton. Because a lot of, I mean, a lot of times. Don't all conductors have a baton? No, a lot of them just, you know. Okay. Yeah, go saul's baton.

It's okay. have to have it, but it's a little bit of a red flag sometimes. And if they have a baton with a case and they open it up, that's a big red flag. Yeah. But this gentleman, this conductor, and I use the term, both terms very loosely, did not know the music. Like we have, you know, arrangements that have been vetted and like really good parts. And, you know, some of this stuff's kind of hard, but nothing's unplayable. But it's one of those situations where we only had one rehearsal and it was like a few hours before the show.

So it was already, I don't like doing those when we're rehearsing. And for Diana's hard because she's got to get. ready to sing and you know you've got like a two-hour rehearsal to do a 90-minute show and they want they need to take a break and you're going to be doing it in a couple hours it's hard you know so we get in there and this conductor like from the beginning like I could tell like he didn't know he hadn't listened to it he hadn't looked at the charge and like we started um embraceable you which is a fantastic billy child's arrangement that that that he did for diane that we've done a bunch of times it's incredible he started it like it's kind of an eight though the way it's written you know

instead of in four, like a typical thing. And so he starts it twice too fast, because he's trying to do it in four. And I was like, hold on this to four. And he's like, oh. But I mean, it was so bad. Like everything that we're doing, the orchestra couldn't follow him.

We couldn't like, I had to start conducting while playing, like kind of behind the, because at first I'm trying to cue the conductor, but I'm like, he's worthless, but I'm like, we're gotta do a show. Yeah. So I'm like cueing and the concert master. I'm sitting right by them with the piano and playing

the concert. We're watching you. And so it was horrible. And I mean, And everything just becomes like, how can we pull this together just to get through the show instead of like, let's have fun when we get there. And there's all this hard piano stuff. So I was playing. I didn't play well, but we barely held it together.

But that was bad. I mean, that was, it was unprofessional. I have a brief conductor story. Big shout out to the New York Philharmonic! Yeah, right. I have kind of the opposite story once with the conductor. I had arranged a whole show and it was not classical music. It was kind of like along the lines of country music, you know, for a really great orchestra.

And there was a guest conductor coming in to do it. and I met with them to go over everything. And they were like, do you like this music? And I was like, yeah, I kind of like this music. And I was like, you know, wait, I'm about to play the show. I arranged the music. But to their credit, like, they did a fantastic job. Like the score was marked up.

Right. They just didn't like it. They knew that, yeah, they were just like very open. Like, I don't like this. And I don't think like they were talking about my arrangements. I think just the concept in general. And you know, which I understand. Some of the pop shows can be a little whatever.

Yeah, yeah. Okay. Next prompt. what is your most embarrassing performance story? I have a quick one. Okay, good. I'll try to think of a quick one too then. All this stuff kind of happened.

That's, you know, my like end high school career, up until the time I moved to New York, I was still finding myself. I was doing a lot of various things. So I have a lot of great stories from that era. But I was also a, I was a big guy. I was about 100 pounds heavier than I was now. What?

Oh, yeah. I was pushing it, pushing it up there. And I had a, you know, one of those keyboard benches that's like an X, and it's got a board. like a cushion. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then it kind of comes out, I had one of those.

I had somehow left it outside and it got rained on. And I was like, okay, well, I'm going to just dry it out or whatever. But some weeks went by, it dried out, everything was fine, and it didn't smell, which was just great because I'd left it out in the sun. But come to find out that particle board

in that seat had rotted. And I was quite large. So I'm sitting down to play a gig and I literally sit down for the second set and I go through the ex stand and I fall back. Oh, well, you're okay? And it was the most embarrassing moments you could.

I'm on stage. Did you hurt yourself? I was fine. Did you get up a bobo? My ego died a little bit, which was good. It was good. Is that when you started keto the next day? I might have started keto not soon after that, yeah.

Okay, embarrassing performance. Well, one, I mean, I've had several. Again, like I kind of blocked them out, but there was one in particular I remember where I was playing, and it was sort of a gala thing for, like a small, it wasn't really a small event. It was actually quite a few people there, but it was sort of a gala, and I was accompanying a saxophone player who will remain nameless because I don't want to implicate him or her along with me.

But basically, we ended up having to kind of wait around. We're just going out to play one song. And they, I don't want to blame others, but I somehow got... But I'm going to. I somehow got overserved in the... Oh, that's no one's fault of your own. Come on. No, they were like, you want something to drink. I was like, okay, fine. And like, we're supposed to, like, everything got delayed.

And they kept saying, do you want something? Would that be something you might be interested in? Well, this was, yeah, I got overserved, and it was hot out, and I think I hadn't eaten. It was hot. It was, it was. We were, like, in this sort of, like, tent. It was really nice, and I don't remember. I didn't really drink a lot, but, you know, it was just sort of bad timing.

I mean, if we're talking drunk gig stories, then we, you know, a whole episode. But then we went out, and I was kind of like, it wasn't until I'm walking up there that. I was kind of like, whoa, a little, but I was like, oh, it would be fine. And we're playing tape five. And just duo. And somehow I could not play it. I kept playing it like six or four. Like I couldn't stay in five.

It's like, bobo do, but. I mean, it was just, and I wasn't sure. I was like, wait, am I playing in five? And the saxophonist is just like looking over me. Like, oh, you know, like, take five. That's the name of the song. And like, I play like one measure. I got it in five.

Shout out to Buddison. So to Budweiser on a summer day. Yeah. So anyway, I remember. Like, that's a good one. It's the only time, I can't say this only to my drink before a gig, but it's the only time I think I've ever been. It's never a good idea. That it's degraded my performance at all.

It was not a good feeling. It's not a good feeling. It's never a good idea. We swapped our way through it. Quickly, what's your best celebrity encounter on a gig? Like, just that's at the gig? Yeah. Okay, well, I wasn't, I got a couple up my sleeve, but you mentioned, what's the actress's name you mentioned at the beginning of this?

Julia Roberts. So she came to a gig with the guy that she was married with two years ago, that the kind of countryish singer, I'm forgetting his name now. Lyle Lovett. Lyle Lovett. They came on their first, I think it was their first date or weekend date. They were in New Orleans. No way.

Yeah, she was record. I believe she was doing Pelican Brief or something. She was making a movie in New Orleans. They were there. They came to Snug Harbor, no entourage, anything. The two of them sat upstairs at a trio gig I was playing with Chris Thomas and Brian Blaine on drums and like stayed the whole set and they came up after well we went upstairs because that's where the kind of dressing room was like oh we really enjoyed it and um she was super nice and like he

was a little salty with us a little bit like protective of yeah sure this is my lady or whatever but i don't even think it was like public at the time interesting or it was just they were there and then like right after that i wasn't paying attention and then they're like oh yeah they're dating now or got maybe got married even like that week i don't know i don't know but this was apparently like their first like out in public date and they were comfortable doing it nuance because, you know, nuance for celebrities is kind of chill, you know. That's good, man. That's a good one.

I was going to bring up, you know, a couple different presidents to you. But because you said that, I'm going to go with that. What about yours? Is this somebody named Doug by any chance? No, it's not here. No, one of my favorites ever, I've had a few, you know, in my time, but one of my favorites ever, I think I just told you this yesterday. I was telling the story to you and our buddy, Sean, was playing at the Chase Park Plaza

here down the street and Huey Lewis was just listening to the whole set just chill in and I got to meet Huey Lewis one of my favorite bands from my childhood so that's awesome that was a really fun time yeah good well thank you for this this was a great idea Adam that I had let's recap so let's recap number one you'll hear it dot com and leave us your speak pipe for either number one what's your weirdest gig story weird I'm talking weird gig stories and we're just gonna say like when you go they just sort of say which one of these four don't try to pick your one and say, I want to tell you about blah. Number two, what's the worst rehearsal experience you've ever had?

Number three, what's your most embarrassing performance story? Yes. And number four, what's your best celebrity encounter on a gig? Right. Yeah, sounds good. Until next time. You'll hear it.