We set volumes down a bit, put the musak on and retired to the bar – first round courtesy of Gerri! Dave always knows someone at a gig and tonight he knew the young man behind the bar. He had been a drummer (and guitarist) but he was now a whiz in juggling glasses and bottles as he ran the bar brilliantly. We suspect he was also rather gifted in doing cocktails, ‘cos after the lagers, he sorted us out some interesting and very rare fruit juice based energy drinks. I had a word with reception and secured the use of room 1 to get changed. It was very plush – even had a 4 poster bed! We put on white’n’black – me and Nige smart and Dave still suffering from strictly ‘ting tong’ as he struggled into the dragon shirt! We crept on stage just after 9pm as the puddings were being served and started very quietly with a jazzy 12 bar. This went well and we all got loosened up playing solos for about 5 minutes or so. From then we played about 30 minutes of instrumentals; some good, some not so good, some even got a round of applause. I enjoyed a bluesy improvisation that turned into something like “Albatross” – think I might learn that one day. We also did an interesting “Chatanooga Choo Choo” and “Diamonds” amongst several Shadows numbers. I thought the band had done really well to play so quietly and with such versatility. Ian came up as the coffee was served to ask us to liven things up, so we started up with the full version of “Just One Look” The sound where I stood was not good – I couldn’t hear Dave and Nige singing too well at all; I think Nige pushed up their volume a bit as it progressed but my Bose was very prominent in the mix I was hearing (possibly because of its location in the corner which funnelled the sound into my ear). But most of the audience were up and dancing as we carried on through the normal flow to the Everly’s. Dave and I sensibly read that the situation demanded minimum banter and that’s what they got! After the Everlys we did “Moon River” as the first spot waltz. Not a bad performance considering it hadn’t been rehearsed. After the first solo we stopped for the first spot prize. Rather than leave a short gap while we selected the best couple dancing. Dave rushed my plan by also doing the intended 3rd prize announcement about bringing up a hankie (or a shoe).which just confused things - so we just got on and resumed the song. Next up was my party piece bossa nova “Girl From Ipanema”. I had rehearsed this at home but we had never played it together before. Dave set a fine, strong Latin beat and Nige gave it his best Brazillian bass passion as I tried to croon it through in a soft smooth jazz voice. We played it nicely to the spot where we awarded the prize for the most glamorous bossa nova couple. Then we resumed to finish off with another verse and bridge. The crowd danced really well to this and I was pleased with the overall performance of the song. I thought we came across as a bit of a ‘lounge lizard Locarno dance band’ and it shows that if we work on this kind of thing we can easily have the function set sorted. Next up was a Jim Reeves waltz: “He’ll Have to Go”. In the middle I got Dave to stop for the final spot which we awarded to a lady in green for the most striking dress. Having completed the spot prizes, we resumed the dancey ‘Foot Tappers” music, picking and mixing a bit up to The Shadows walk. Dave wasn’t sure about doing this, but I pushed it and in the event it went down real well. We had a line of 5 up and doing the walk playing rubber guitars, tambourine and just dancing. On the whole I must say they didn’t do a disciplined walk but they did enjoy themselves and there was a lot of photo’s taken – always a good sign! Because we were operating ‘off piste’ a lot, and Dave was not too well, I had to spend quite a bit of time finding the songs in his book. Thankfully, Nigel was very good at spotting delays and filling in with some impromptu banter to keep things going. We eventually finished off the set with “3 Times a Lady” which I though we played and sang very well and it filled the floor! Resuming after the raffle, I called for the party dance sequence and we played that through from “Amarillo” to “Hi Ho” filling the dance floor all the way. After “Unchained” we reverted to set 2 material, starting with ”Sweet Caroline” and sort of playing roughly backwards through the set with “Halfway”, The Eagles and the Searchers before it was time to wrap up with “Pretty Woman” - which brought out shouts for ‘more’. So we encored with “Wonderful Tonight”. Although there were still some cries for ‘more’ we announced we had to stop as it was after midnight and we didn’t want to disturb the residents. Ian came over and congratulated the band on helping to make their night a success and then it was the long pack up. Dave was a bit lost without Jen and it took us quite a while to get all the gear in the cars. We left about 12:50am and I was home about 2 am.
