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Vance = IL, IA, WI + MN, and stuff

Monday Muse on a Tuesday afternoon.

Hey VanceFanFriends,

I Play Here-

3/15 - Friday, Cedar Rapids, IA www.legionarts.org
3/16 - Chicago, IL - FolkStage https://www.midnightspecial.org/fsschedule.htm
3/17 - Madison WI - Email annedave@chorus.net if interested in coming
3/23 - Minneapolis MN - Pantages Theatre w/Paul Reiser https://hennepintheatretrust.org

First off - if you drive north enough, west enough, and long enough from Boston towards the top of New York State you’ll end up where this sign says. That just doesn’t seem right...



Secondly - ok - I’m a big old elderly cranky get-offa-my-lawn categorizer this week, but they lovely get their due too:

Humility -
~ Ellen & Mark Wahl of Oswego Music Hall for strongly demanding their roles be down plays and the volunteers presence be emphasized in organizing this past Saturday’s show in Oswego, NY. Thanks.

~ Opener Mike Powell, who not only sounded like a million bucks during his set, had to be pressed for details that he is a noted area furniture maker and a world renown retired professional lacrosse player. Wow.

Privilege/Arrogance -
~ Ma’am, your discomfort in my impromptu invitation of both the dulcet, aforementioned Mike and the hyper-enthusiastic singer/songwriter/M.C. John up for my encore is all your own. Anyone over 30 with a radio can mouth along the 4 words of the chorus to Just Like A Woman. There they are. The fact that John looked to you like he couldn’t pick that up in one pass did not give you the right to corner me *as I left the stage* while the three of us were talking with something you “just had to say to me” about you being embarrassed for him. You have no right.

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Humility -
~ The volunteers at Bound For Glory, Ithaca, that help Phil Shapiro put that shindig on and have done so, very quietly, for years. Thanks.

Privilege/Arrogance -
~ Really, you two folks sang on everything I played in the first set, loudly, from the front row? Everything. Songs you couldn’t have known. Everything. Did you see the people around you glaring? Is it because the show is free to the community and you figure you can do what you like? Everything. Until I did Round Midnight. Why not on that one? Discrimination by process of elimination? Oh, folks sung along stunningly later on Gentle Arms Of Eden. But you? Stay your asses home next time.

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Bonus Privilege /Arrogance -
~ The lawn/snow removal contractor guy that lives a mile from here, that when I panted “Good Morning” as I jogged by with my dogs shouted “It’ll be a good morning as long as you keep your dogs off of my lawn”……

Me: (startled) ”But I’ve…they've never….”

Him: (aggressively) “Keep it that way…and take that back as a message to your wife who doesn’t seem to like when the leaves are blown on your lawn.”

OK, I get it now. I had to get home and ask about this one. Besides your red herring but ever present leaf thing, Town Law requires that you only run a maximum of 2 leaf blowers at a time, and she (uh, not my wife, by the way) asked repeatedly that you abide by the law, as you often run 3 or more. You told her to go screw, and just kept going with the triple blowing. She called the police. You got talked to. So now you mad at my whole house, bro? I get it. My comeback to your just-east-of-aggressive harassment? I still cheerily say “Good Morning….Joe,” if you’re out. Only difference is yes, I call you by name.

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Humility -
~ Hey, Rich, Your Mom, Louise. Speaking of my town, she’d be driving by me jogging here in Arlington and always with a kind word to me or a complement towards the dogs, asking if I’d seen you recently. I just now learned of her passing and read her obit. It reads like a realtor/housing resume/treatise for Equality and Eairness in housing. Awards for such as long as my arm. Entrepreneur in affordable kid's clothing. Good Lord. Could I feel more insignificant? Why do people have to die before you know all the good stuff they do for others?

Privilege/Arrogance -
~ Me. I haven’t called you in over a year. And I've know you to be quite ill most of the time. I keep thinking "tomorrow". And then I’ll call you to take a look at something we need fixing, like our steps, or the walkway, or something. And next thing you know I’m all blubbering about getting old or feeling irrelevant. Like I have forever in these shoes.
I’d better get my damn house in order. I’m calling you today for lunch.


Have I talked about coaching songwriting, performance, voice? Have I mentioned that I do private partiies? Have I mentioned that I knit sweaters for slugs?

Did I say anything about donations for the new album - which we are mixing this week and more - are still accepted, and that the details are at vancegilbert.com, and that the upshot is no matter how much or how little you give your name will be on the album?

Did I say that stuff?