How God Saved me on a Gig

[dcstudio]

Well that got your attention now...huh?

   When I was 32 I was fired from my job, won $5k in music equipment, and landed a jazz gig in a bar--all within a week..and we aren't even at the amazing part yet.

at that time I had been playing the piano for 28 years, I had 900 or more piano lessons, and 3 years at UNT, with a front running jazz instructor.  I thought--"no problem, I can play this gig."  I had never performed in a situation that required me to fill 3 hours with continuous piano...that was bothering me. So I brought volumes of fakebooks to carry with me, plenty of sheet music, and two hands that were just full of the finest training you could get at the time--at least I thought so.  Thank God my husband booked this gig for both he and I and I would have him with me there.   
   me and my highly trained, classical performance turned jazz studies, turned college drop out, and now cocktail pianist hands marched right up to that piano and sat down like I was at Carnegie Hall. I turned and smiled at the audience confidently--gave them a wink and a smile--  and looked---

then I completely froze

there was nothing in my hands, nothing in my ears, my head--I could not have told you my name much less how to play the piano.  everything about me said this should not be happening and yet it was.  when it came down -- and I needed it--all my training just left me.

I called out to the composers I had idolized my whole life

Ludwig, Johann,  pleeeeaaaasseee give me something...anything...this is a jazz gig but I know you are still in there somewhere--save me!

no answer...

I went straight to the big band leader in the sky

Almighty God....tell me what to play...pleeeeaaaasssseee...I will give you my hands... i really need this gig, I need to support myself this way.  I WILL NOT WORK AT MCDONALDS

a voice came...."better start playing or you won't keep this gig"

so I said, to hell with it--I threw my hands out there and prayed for the best.

...it was amazing...I heard the piano playing and I knew my hands were moving but everything else is just a blur.  I heard the song I was playing.  I had been told for years by people close to me that it was a stupid song, and I should never play it on the gig because it was not really "jazz."

It was Vince Guaraldi's Linus and Lucy...I listened and learned it by ear years earlier, it was always right there in my hands,  I just needed a reminder.

Since then I know, does not matter what my hands tell me--Vince Guaraldi will come and save me any time I get nervous--ha ha ha

and that, my friends, is how Linus and Lucy saved my musical soul....

thanks for reading my life stories guys.  these are stories I tell my students...

Laurie

[dcstudio]

sounds like a read every single Stephen King novel out there....

thanks Stephen King I will recreate your universe.

Laurie

compose and improvise cause you got the whole world in your hands

come and see me anytime i am here

LOVE AND PEACE

[countrymath]

i just love peanuts.

I'm glad it saved your soul =p.

I may start learning the peanuts theme

[stephenv]

you've got my vote as the music instructor with the BEST stories...!!!
inspiring to the max..

[dcstudio]

thanks guys, stick around...I got a million of em

[keyboardkat]

The classical pianist Martin Berkofsky tells of a dream he has had repeatedly.

He is walking onstage in front of an orchestra to play a concerto which he HAS NOT STUDIED!
The orchestra begins, and he tries at the piano to pick up threads of themes, until he is driven off the stage in a chorus of boos and a barrage of rotten tomatoes!

I think I've had that nightmare, too.   But in your case, it wasn't a dream.  It really happened, but you came out okay.

[dcstudio]

It is amazing to face your worst fear--and realize that it was nothing really.   

btw--I can't tell you how many times I have had the walk onstage and play the concerto I have never heard or studied and there is no music and the orchestra starts playing....dream or nightmare...
at times I have even dreamed that I faked the concerto and improvised and actually fooled everyone but then I realized I was actually naked the whole time.....awww well....   the thought I have before I wake up is..."wonder if they notice..."

musicians neurosis...