Opening night... again

 I'm so tired I will say everything in more detail later but the gist is: it went as well as it could considering. My wireless box for my in ear monitors broke this afternoon and I was wired for the show so I couldn't get off the band shack like I was supposed to. Our band problem is at such a bad level that if he walks into a room the rest of the band leaves. Literally. He talked to me while I was putting on my makeup for 10 minutes and I didn't say a word. After notes with Sandy where he was so laboriously slow and so annoying I can't even explain I had to go tell the stage manager that I would be wired that night and my eyes just kept leaking. Not because either of those things was really the last straw (they both suck, but things happen in shows, it's not the end of the world), I wasn't really having a meltdown, it's just so emotionally draining to be around someone who is that negative and annoying. Marc proved his friendship and vegetarian solidarity by offering to go with me to eat at our usual crappy place instead of the fancy beef fondu place we got one free night at because I was freaking out that I wouldn't get enough calories to carry me through the show. After he realized I was really unhappy and eating my feelings he got totally on board about eating all this cheese. I was ordering cheese curds and he came over and said "How's nachos? Would you eat nachos? I'll order nachos." I couldn't even talk, I just hugged him. It's a strange thing to be so touched about but we are all under so much stress just because of the show not even counting the emotional insanity that goes into the band right now that every little kind word makes a difference.

I don't want to make it sound like I don't love it here. It's just the band member issue. There have been so many wonderful things that happened today too. Opening night was great! did we do things wrong? Totally, but we pulled it together and it was fine. Dana the chief electrician running around at a bar with 37 balloons floating behind her. Ed getting confused and thinking that the strange back kitchen of a bar was a Chinese laundry (I have no idea). Marc counting off Down to the River to Pray (slow gospel that starts with a long laid back fiddle note) double time. It was amazing. As Sandy put it, basically Marc spazzed out for a second and rest of the band ignored him and started it like normal. Even as I am writing this I am still laughing about it and it happened at 3pm.

Opening Night

Finally, a great picture of my chins! Left to right: ME!, Marc (drums), Nick (guitar), Ed (bass)

We got rained out. If there is rain the show does a "rain show" where there is less dancing and more band feature stuff because we are covered and the dancers would fall and hurt themselves. But we have been so rushed to even do a normal show that we had no rain show plans. So we just got cancelled. So the entire cast and crew of the Medora musical did a "bar crawl" of the two bars in Medora.

Gerry my lovely flamboyant southern gentleman and Trish the..... something director, it escapes me at the moment, but she is really cool!

I really am very happy with the cast and crew. I have had nothing but good happy experiences, with one notable exception. We have all been putting between 10 and 18 hour days so for me to say that everyone is laid back and cool is amazing. Someone should have yelled by now (someone has but I shall talk about that when it has been resolved). I am very fond of Curt the director and Sandy the musical director. Last night sandy took a picture of he and I in the bar together to send to Paul (the guy who got me the job). He read me the text he sent with it and it said "she is perfect and we love her." I was so flattered I was kind of at a loss for words. I think I just screeched "awwwwww!!!!" It should be noted that having Sandy think highly of me is so flattering because he is REALLY good at his job and seems to have his life together. I'm starting to feel a little like he is the older brother I already have two of.

Today we have a luncheon where we sort of meet and great so I got up early and got my hair and face all did up. It's kind of fun being a sort of celebrity here. People love the show and being in it means you are instantly liked. I also for the first time experienced the oil worker phenomenon last night. There are lots of lonely guys so I got chatted up a LOT last night. I foresee this happening all summer. But hey, it's good for my ego (like I need help with that) and I am always out with the boys in the band so I am totally safe.

I am just really happy to be here so far. This was absolutely the right decision for me. Check out the tv ad here:  https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=598983357009

Day 10

8am at the Burning Hills Amphitheater 

 Today we got to the amphitheater at 8am. We left at 10pm. 8-11 was sound for the band. 11-1pm was sound for the singers. We are still nowhere near done. But I will say this, at about 11am I was literally in tears on the gazebo pretending I wasn't having to wipe tears off my face because the sound in my brand new in ear monitors was so bad. I kept saying that there was a lot of crackling in my ears but everyone kept telling me that you have to get used to the in ears and that that was just how it was. finally I was sniffing and wiping tears of my face begging the most patient sound guy in the history of the world to make it stop crackling. I just kept thinking "I can't do this all summer. I can't do this all summer. I can't do this all summer."  It turns out that my wireless receiver needed new batteries. And now it sounds great. my fiddle sounds a little like a toy fiddle but all the levels are correct and everything is clear. And in the house the fiddle sounds good. Sandy also pointed out something which I need to keep in mind whenever I sound check. I play an instrument that involves a lot of feeling as well as hearing. I feel the notes through my my hand and they echo through my jaw. There is no way to recreate that sound in reality outside of my own scull. As Sandy said, fiddle players are chasing a tone that doesn't exist. So while I should pursue a great tone, I need to practice some moderation. Either way, while there is still a tun of work to do on the sound my in ears are now clean and clear, which is what they are for.

 

 That right there is a wireless output box (surely that is the wrong word but it sends sound FROM my fiddle) wrapped in a towel and attached to my fiddle with two rubber bands. It is surprisingly stable. Presumably they will make me something more attractive. But for now this totally works. The wireless receiver clips to my belt and goes into my ears so that I am completely free of cords. Having spent so much time tossing a cord over my shoulder when I pick my fiddle up it is amazingly freeing. It's like driving automatic and slamming your foot on the "clutch." I keep tossing an air-cord over my shoulder.

We have of course continued to have some band drama. It did get pretty epic today. I think I said this last post but I will say it again. The band is having serious issues with one of it's members and I think it is a credit to the rest of us that no one even mentioned they disliked him until he crossed way past the line. We just kept our cool and tried to make the best of it. Now that we had a "band meeting" (drinking after rehearsal because we were all about to go crazy with stress) we are all on the same page. I think we have all been very good about blowing off steam on breaks so that we can behave like the professionals we are when we are in rehearsal. I feel confident that things may change, but we will make it work because we are all motivated to roll with the punches so as to make us a good band, however things come out.

8pm at the Burning Hills Amphitheater

Day 9

Despite what this picture seems to say we are not in fact a demon band. This is the Coal Diggers, sadly without our bass player Ed.

Here's the musical page: http://www.medora.com/do/entertainment/medora-musical/ Hit "meet the cast" to see the bios and head shots. When they took my picture they had me stand with my feet 1.5 feet apart and they took one and said "that's good!" I stupidly believed them even though I was sure that I had done the Man Pose with my chin raised so as to give the most unflattering angle possible. As it turns out I did. Patti told me to let the rehearsals end and then request they change my picture to something flattering. I wouldn't always care but it's on the website and program ALL SUMMER. The program is stuck that way though. It does annoy me, didn't anyone think that I might not like the picture where I was looking sort of aggressively friendly?

As you can tell it was not the greatest day. We had rehearsal in the gym again from 1pm to 10pm with only an hour for dinner. Everyone was feeling tired and FREEZING (they won't turn on the heat in the school and it was 50 degrees all day. It was about 55 in the gym. So no one was having a good time, luckily most of the cast seems to understand that if you don't have a smile and something nice to say just go sit in a corner. No need to bring everyone else down.Unfortunately one of the band members didn't get that memo and I got in a fight at dinner. A fight that very clearly I tried to shut down twice before I finally couldn't hold it in anymore and snapped a few phrases before I walked off. There have only been a few stressful moments with the band and it is becoming clear that this guy is the only crack in our little band unit. On the one hand I was furious and had to screech some really choice comments about him in general to a friend but on the other hand I am aware that if only one person in the band bothers me then that's actually doing pretty well. The rest of us are besties.

On that note I have an 8am call tomorrow morning and we want to get breakfast first so I have to get up at 6am. So I will retire to my bed piled with blankets because my room also does not have heat and it is currently 47 degrees outside. Also my shoulder is killing me and my teeth are a little lose again. Not that I'm really grumpy, BUT I AM.

Day 8

This morning after the Coal Diggers had already gone in to town to have breakfast before a 10:30 call at the theater we were informed that due to weather everything had changed. After a variety of changes and unnecessary trips to Medora we ended up in Fryburg, which is a small town near Belfield that has an unused high-school gym. Patty (who may or may not be spelled Patti) said that the rain storm that we were experiencing was so low that the radar that she watches like a hawk (being the stage manager) couldn't see it.

I dressed for a windy cold day on the hill at the theater in my warmest running shirt, my flannel and my Halloween bandana. I think it is my best outfit of the summer.

the acoustics in the gym were atrocious  and the band didn't have the tight feel that I have gotten accustomed to. We are also facing some issues of who is cuing what, how to cue it and so on. We will pull it together, but right now there are a few problems. But as far as I can tell, not nearly as many as their usually are in the band at this point in rehearsals. 

Day 7

That's what my boots look like from three days of North Dakota mud!

 Today was another beautiful North Dakota day. After a 2.4 mile run (picture above) it was our first day with the cast. So we showed up at 12:30 (early for call) and waited till 3 (when we all thought downbeat was at 2pm) and in the second song my bow exploded. All the hair fell out and I have to use a back up bow for now and send mine off for repair. Basically I had a very well contained meltdown complete with behind-sunglasses-crying. It was not even a little funny. I was stomping my foot and pouting. Luckily over dinner I worked out a game plan for fixing my bow with the stage manager Patty. After that I felt better and stopped pouting. The lame part is that there is nowhere in North Dakota to send it to get fixed so I have to fed ex it back to Kansas or Nashville. So tomorrow morning I call music stores and then Patty the AWESOME stage manager will take it, pack it right, insure it and send it off. After all the hair fell out of my bow I was crazy paranoid and I wouldn't let sun hit my violin for fear that it would crack. So for all of the blinding sunlight today and half of tomorrow I am the girl with the UV protectant (is that a word?) umbrella held carefully over my violin but not my face.

In previous years the band has been over in the corner of the stage with the rhythm section inside a house and only the fiddle, steel and guitar in the open. This year they are building us a gazebo in the middle of the stage. They must have heard I was playing the show this year. Who wouldn't want me center stage?

The theater is fantastic. As cheesy as I assumed it would be I have to say it is shaping up to be pretty good. It is a Country Review which means it is a bit goofy, but you know what? Ain't nothin' wrong with goofy! I think it will be pretty well done. It will sure help when we are not in some random corner they put us in so that we could play until they get our gazebo done.

On that note let me say a giant THANK YOU to all the tech boys and girls who have been working their asses off in the rain to try to get the stage ready. Also I appreciate that when I realized I needed a sweatshirt (since it drops 30 degrees when the sun goes down here) I knew exactly what to do: go find the big tech guy and smile real cute and ask for a sweatshirt. I totally got one. I always love the Tech crew!

Here's to hoping I have no more violin disasters while I'm here!!

                                                                                                                                                                           

Day 6

 I went out last night with the band and some of the cast and crew to a bar called Boots and one called Little Missouri. But this morning I woke up at 8:30, an hour and a half before my alarm was set to go off. Something about this place makes me really energetic. Or maybe it's just being in a new place with all of these new experiences. Either way I tried to sleep more but eventually just got up and went for a jog. As you can see it's a nice place to go running.

 

The view from the Chuck Wagon. The food may be disgusting but at least it's scenic. Finally a pretty day, still cool but clear blue skies all day.