Sonoita Singer

Saturday February 9th, with bookings in Tucson and Sierra Vista, was one of my most challenging performance days yet, but the wonderful reception from the two audiences made it worth it.

My first engagement was my long planned cabaret style show at Tucson Estates. You might call it a “Matinee Cabaret” as the show was at 2:00 in the afternoon. One of many clubs in this active retirement community, “The Cat Mountain Jamboree” which usually hosts weekly Blue Grass, Gospel, Folk and Country Jams, booked me for the performance and handles all of the business aspects of the show. The members were wonderful hosts, helping me set up all my sound equipment and emceeing the show. Then challenge for me was singing for nearly two hours. The show was divided into two segments with a 15 minute intermission between. That intermissions allowed for the audience to stretch their legs and get refreshments while I rested my voice for a few minutes and changed costumes for the second act.

During the first act, I sang standards with jazz style arrangements. I like these arrangements because they allow for a more informal and personal connection with the audience. When I sing song like “It Had To Be You” and “Someone To Watch Over Me”, I try to pick different members of the audience and make a personal connection with them as I sing. The stage was set up so that I could come down and walk among the audience. It also gave me a chance to shake hands with a few of the people that I knew in the audience. Several of the audience members commented that they loved hearing those old songs and that they brought back many good memories.

The second section of the show had a more theatrical mood. It included songs from Broadway shows with more dramatic, theatrical arrangements. With each song I tried to create the mood of the original Broadway show. The audience members seemed very familiar with most of the songs in this segment also.

I finished the show with one of my favorites, “The Girl In 14 G”, a really fun song about a girl who gets what she thinks will be a quiet apartment and then she finds she’s got an apartment between an opera singer and a jazz singer who seem to practice day and night. It is a fun song that works really well for singers like me who like to sing both Jazz and Classical music, as well as show tunes.

After packing up all my sound equipment and saying my goodbyes to my gracious hosts, I headed for Sierra Vista to perform for the Cochise Children’s Choir Benefit Gala. They too were very gracious hosts, and I also saw a few familiar faces around the audience and also in the entertainment line-up. Our jazz trio of Rick Stahl on key board and vocals, Pete on the Saxophone, and me, providing additional vocals preformed around 8:00 pm. We sang some of the songs from my earlier show, but this time with live instruments. I really liked singing with the live instruments, especially when the saxophone and I seemed to resonate together. There were many fund raising activities going on through out the evening including a silent auction and “job shadowing” auction. The evening seemed to be a big success in raising money for the children’s choir, and I was glad to have the opportunity to contribute to the entertainment portion of the show.

I hope to post some pictures and video from the Tucson Estates show soon.