Busy day!
We started off with Gig #2 - our "Southern Fried Gospel" concert! We were invited to perform a 45-minute lunchtime concert as part of the Music Mondays series. Housed in Toronto's gorgeous Church of the Holy Trinity, this series is in its 16th season, and I've been thrilled to perform there twice over the last 5 years. This marked Gerald's first time with the series, but we led music for several Holy Trinity worship services last summer.
With our "Southern Fried Gospel" theme, we wanted to do songs that reflected what we're learning and writing in Nashville right now. We did a few traditional covers, like "I Have Decided to Follow Jesus" and "Do Lord", and the rest of the program was filled with originals. We've always performed as solo artists, but we're working on our skills as a duo, so we tried several new things with our originals. While I played "Infinitely More", Gerald jammed along on the djembe. I played tambourine for "Real Big Fan". We also added djembe to "Sing Me a Song", keeping it really light to emphasize the Celtic feel of the piece. Gerald also debuted his latest song, "Never Wait Until Tomorrow", inspired by a letter written by Erma Bombeck after her cancer diagnosis.
We had a small crowd, but as the first concert of the series, we sort of expected it. But the audience was with us the whole time, and we got to chat with several people after the show.
We enjoyed a little downtown living, before heading off for a quick rest in preparation for Gig #3.
Tonight, we performed at the Moonshine Cafe in Oakville. This small venue has only been open for a year and a half, but they already have a reputation worthy of any great Nashville club. They feature live music every night of the week, and they host songwriter workshops too.
Monday's are open mic and 2 feature writers, and we, as a team, were one of the feature writers. The other was Nancy Dutra - an incredibly genuine person with beautiful songs. Gerald and I did a 30 minute set, with a mix of Gospel and country. We did some of the Gospel songs from this morning, but Gerald added in a few party songs for good measure! We finished with a duet version of "All Her Flowers are Wild", my favourite of Gerald's country songs.
All in all, the past 2 days have been a great start to our tour. We're now almost halfway through, and we've covered 2 cities and 3 completely different performance venues. Tomorrow will be rest, and starting our preparation for a very busy next weekend!
No comments:
Post a Comment