(no subject)
An update has been a long time coming. I'm currently sitting in front of a really fancy, jacked-up computer with 2 flat screen monitors, a synth workstation, and a 24 channel mixing board. This would mean, of course, that I'm at a public school music program. What? Yes, my new job day has started working for choirs in a school division in Irving, TX about 45 min from my homebase in Denton. The 2 choir teachers at the high school have managed to buy an enormous amount of equipment and instruments (I would guess that they have about $7000 in keyboards alone) and take numerous trips, retreats, and hire professional musicians to play for their concerts. They're very good at what they do though. Very enthusiastic and demanding - and they know how to motivate kids with a mixture of classical, pop, and jazz stuff. They're beginning choir is doing "Let's Groove" by Earth Wind & Fire, for example. They'll hire a full horn section, bass, drums, and guitar to play with them. Crazy. I've gotten the gig down to 4 days a week which is great. They've been very flexible and gone to bat for me already to make sure that the paperwork goes smoothly. They're really fun. The drive is a bitch in the morning though and it's EAR-LY on Tu,W,Th.
I recently had a gig go awry at a restuarant in Addison, TX. Without running the details down yet again, suffice to say that the gig has never been good because of the intrusive management, low pay, and late hours. Also, the stage space is the worst I've ever had including cruise ships and orchestra pit work. As a result, the bassist tripped over my power adaptor for my keyboard - twice. My spare was with JH (no fault of his) and so I was without an instrument. I sped over to a nearby Walmart and acquired a new one, but we lost about 45 min without the whole band. We made up for it with a long set at the end, but the owner who was there that night wanted to stiff us for part of the pay. Our band leader balked and we got fired. I'm relieved frankly, and fortunately the band leader was too.
Things are settling in well with the new roommate, DHjr who has been a lot of fun. She and some cute girlfriend of hers are here for the labor day weekend which should be kind of funny. I expect them to be doing a lot of giggling and making catty comments. DHjr has a propensity for saying things like "look at you" and "true story" [instead of "I'm/you're right" or "that's true"] or, best of all, "p.s. she's fabulous." I almost think she needs a gay roommate to be able to engage her in this kind of banter. Instead, I end up laughing at her and she throws something at me. Precious.