I've put it off for quite sometime but I finally gave in this week and bought a printer. I just bought a 3 in 1 before I left home that my parents are using and now I had to get another one. Of course I went overboard on online research to find the best deal and I think I did pretty well. When I first visited the mall here I noticed a rather flashy shop called Argos. From the outside I could see that it sold a wide variety of home electronics. Inside the store I was a little surprised to find nearly no merchandise but instead catalog stations a bit like pattern books at a fabric store. You go in, flip through the catalog and pick out what you want. Then you go to one of the pay kiosks or an actual line and pay for your item. You're then given a ticket and go to a DMV style waiting area to pick up your purchase. So odd. Even though I'm a big fan of being able to see merchandise this is cheaper and it's super fast.

Here's a clip of Michael McIntyre a fantastic British comedian talking about Argos. His stuff is about 94% family friendly. I should make a playlist of the best parts. He talks about Argos on this clip until about 1:11.

This afternoon [Dec 29] there was an email from Louise about an open mic night in Harrogate. She had mentioned this in an email last week and I tried to push it from my mind. When I read it this afternoon I knew that I had to go even though there were many reasons not to. Harrogate is a posh touristy town about 10 miles north. There's an express bus from down the street right into town. It was really odd because once we left my neighborhood we were out in the moors and it was dark and you couldn’t see any of the countryside outside the bus. It will be very interesting to go again in the daylight. Once we hit civilization and what I assumed must be Harrogate I spotted the West Park Hotel and rang the bell. I had to do a little back track walking but at least I knew I was in the right place.

So I headed to the hotel, took a deep breath and headed in like I knew where I was going. I figured I was in the right place when I found the grand piano. I pulled up a chair and whipped out my phone so I could read blogs and facebook and look occupied. There were a few other people around and the band was getting set up. The emcee for the evening came around to get people to sign up. I told her that I'd probably have to leave by 10 to catch the bus back. There were a few singers sitting around me with stacks of charts and some friends. Another singer came along and ended up sitting next to me. She started chatting with the man seated in front of us and I heard her say that she lived in my neighborhood. Hmm.. About then we got start. It was 10 to 9 and then band did two tunes and then Julie did one and then she had me go first.

I did Devil May Care and it went pretty well. I’m always amazed at how my voice just goes a but crazy when I’m performing. I really need to work on varying melodies. The opening singer had had the lyrics on a stand in front of her. I am totally against vocalists using lyric sheets. I know that in the heat of the moment your brain shuts down but I think it looks naff and you really ought to know the tune, look up and communicate. So even though I ended up with an extra copy of my chart on the stand I tried not to look at it. I noticed that since I had been sitting in the front I could now see how many people were there and that most of them in the back, seated and at the bar were giving me their full attention. It was pretty cool and I had this out of body experience- I love this, I can do this, I should be doing this all the time : ) I even took a chorus of scat. I hadn’t heard too many singers before me so I didn’t know what the temp was on scatting but I did it because I like it and it went okay. [There was a little scatting later and it was scary]. Then Julie asked if I wanted to do my second tune. I had introduced the fact that I was from Seattle and so when Julie said that I would do two tunes because I had to go catch a bus the bass player said, To Seattle? Yeah, that would be quite the bus trip. So then I did Clouds. The rhythm section got a bit lost during the last chorus or so, not for lack of a clear chart but I think I pretty much blew everyone’s mind. They’d never heard it before and I imagine it’s a bit more ambitious than most open mic vocalists will do. Hard for the singer, easy for the band. It wasn’t as good as I could do it but I was a bit nervous and I haven’t done it for a while.

So that hurdle was over. Everyone in the room now knew what I could do. That’s good and a bit weird for me not really hearing anyone else first. Having sung the ice was broken which was so nice to be past that phase from the first 40 minutes of the evening where I was just sitting there while people around me were chatting. The woman next to me asked me about the chart and I was very brave and asked for a ride home and she said yes. Blessings!

Several more singers and instrumentalists or varying abilities performed throughout the evening and I took lots of mental notes of things to do and not to do. After the gig I chatted a bit with Julie and Andy the pianist. I am so delighted with the outcome of this evening. It’s so good for me to have to do things on my own and be brave and get out there. I mean there were definite huge steps forward as far as talking to people tonight and it’s a big deal that I had no other buffer people there to lean on. Also it rejuvenated me to get back in the game. I really love this and I need to be out and doing. It was a very important step in my road to gigs.

I realize that I haven't blogged a lot about school. That's because it's a whole lot of new things to take in and I'm still sorting it out in my brain. But it does come down to the fact that I'm here to learn how to be a performer and so I should probably start performing. Step one- the sit in gig. The pop choir director, Nicki Allan, who is a voice teacher at the college invited me to come and sit in on one of her gigs last month. This is great because it's her band and I just show up with a few tunes and go for it. The first challenge was was that it was in Bradford and I had to get myself there. But I am so public transport savvy now...

The Bradford rail station is conveniently adjacent to the bus station and so I made my way there and found the bay for the bus I wanted. It’s exciting to wander through a new town, made even more challenging in the dark. But I’d done my homework. I didn’t ask the bus driver which stop. I had a vague idea, I knew the street name and so every time we stopped I checked the signs. I found the right one, hopped off and headed up a dark residential street. I was a littler nervous. When I got to the top of the hill I found that it wasn’t a through street for cars but you could walk through and I could see the cricket club- hooray! As I came walking up I saw someone loading gear out of a hatch back. I asked if I could help carry anything in to which he readily agreed. This is a great way to get in with the band. Turns out it was the pianist who teaches at the college and Nicki introduced us. It’s also nice because it gives me something to do.

Once everything was loaded in they got all set up. It was kind of nice that out of the Nicki Allan sextet it was only her and her pianist, Graham, who were there. Everyone else was a a dep (sub) and so there were lots of introductions going on so I could slide my way in there. [The pic is of her usual group.] The guys were all looking over the book of Nicki’s charts and so she encouraged me to give my charts to them, which I did- well at least the pianist, bassist and drummer. I had met the pianist and so that was nice. The bass player I had met in October at the Marsden Jazz Festival when Louise sang with them. He’s very easy going and fun. The drummer who’s name escapes me was the situation where I was brave and just introduced myself and gave him the charts. There was also a trumpet player and sax player but I didn’t know yet if I wanted to have them play or not.

The portion of the club that we were in was a long narrow room with a bar on one end and rather cozy low ceilings. The parallel wall from the band had built in benches and lots of seating. The crowd was mostly older folks, regulars and some jazz aficionados. Nicki introduced me to the owner who’s in charge of booking groups and told him that I was going to be singing a couple tunes and recommended to him that he should have me come and do a gig. He’s booked up until June but sounded interested. After I sang he took my name and said I should come in August or September. That would be perfect because I could road test my recital stuff.

Nicki sang the first set and it was quite good. I had heard most of her tunes at the concert last month but it was really fun to watch the communication in the band as they sight read them. As I was walking up that dark street I thought to myself, I may not be loud or push myself on people but look at what I’m willing to do to get a gig. At the end of the set Nicki announced that there would be a special guest singer on the second set ‘all the way from America.’ She’s rather fascinated by my accent. During the break she said I looked really calm and asked if I was nervous. A little bit but really I know these tunes, I know what I’m doing and I’m just REALLY excited. I think I usually look calm on the outside. She asked if I wanted to talk the band through anything. She took me over to the bar and introduced me to the horn players. I was so glad that before I left school and was printing out charts that I remembered that she had horn players and I actually printed off a copy of Chega in Bb. The sax player was super impressed by that.

I start with Chega de Saudade which was a bit of a risk to start singing in Portuguese. I don’t know quite what they made of that but I sang the head out in English so it was all good. I had the sax player take a solo and it was great. He and the trumpet player made up backgrounds on the way out which was really cool. I think that tune was a hair fast though and didn’t quite sit in the pocket. It’s amazing how your voice and brain power go when you get up there but I survived. Then we did Devil May Care a bit slow but it was fun and I scatted a whole chorus and I don’t think I embarrassed myself. I’m not quite sure how your average crowd responds to scatting. But the bass player made some comment about it later and I think it was good.

I watched everyone very closely. I want to know everything about how this works. Gigging is the new frontier and I don't know enough about it. I'm beginning to realize how much pressure I put on myself. I'm SO wound and driven. I've had misguided idea that I had to CD perfect before performing for anyone, and that every time I perform for people that I’m being judged as harshly as I judge. I just need to get out and gig more as I am. Afterwards several people came up and told me they enjoyed my singing. One lady asked if I was on tour here.

It was raining buckets as we finished and it took a little while to get all the gear loaded in Nicki’s car. I sat crammed in the back seat, grateful for a ride home. However I had a wicked headache and was a bit sick to my stomach having only had two pops in the last 3 hours I couldn’t wait to get home. It feels like it takes a long time to get anywhere around here, it’s so dense and there doesn’t seem to be a true highway where you can really stretch out and get places. I got home around midnight and I felt some how a little different. I think having a gig was a good step forward. Every day changes me.