Well, I finally got Geneva to come out and play and sing with me at the Borders gig. We worked up 4 "singing songs", and 4 or 5 fiddle tunes. She did really, really well. Better yet, she says she wasn't (and she didn't seem) nervous at all, and afterwards she said that "she hadn't realized how much *fun* it was gonna be!" My greatest fear was that she'd blow it big time, and/or be so stressed-wracked that she'd never want to do it again, but I guess we dodged both of those bullets.
It helped (a lot) that my mom and dad came down (with some friends) -- it's always nice to have some friendly faces in the crowd (and who's friendlier than a gramma?). Not that there was a "crowd" -- RSM was having one of their Summer Concerts that night, so the attendance at Borders was kinda light. I don't think there was any actual competition for audience, but I think that the local families that tend to go out on a Saturday night ended up at the concert, not the bookstore.
She sang "Soak Up the Sun", "Jenny Dreamed of Trains", "Lollipop Tree", and Tracy Ullman's 1979 pop hit "They Don't Know", which was probably the best of the lot. I sing harmony with her, a third up but an octave down, and it sounds pretty good, I think. It reinforces her sound -- and her courage, I'm pretty sure...
The fiddle tunes went OK, too, though we both need to work on the transitions and trying to remember how many A parts, and how many Bs. I'm not sure which one of us messed that up, but it was recover-able.
My dad took video of most of the night and my mom called yesterday to say that it turned out really well, so I'll be anxious to see (and hear) that. I'll try to snag some stills out of it, too -- I forgot to bring a camera.
I guess Geneva's other favorite part is that in order to incentive-ize her to get some songs together at all, I had promised her that she could have all the tips. We sold 6 CDs, and with some too-generous donations from my mom and her friend, Geneva made $47 towards her "iPod Fund"! That's a bit anomalous, of course, but it is a record "take", ever, for a coffeeshop gig. I reckon she'll want to do it again -- next chance at RSM (I don't think I want to take her to any of the not-so-friendly places for a while at least) is August 12. I hope to work up some more tunes by then, too ("Red Rubber Ball" to start). Now that she knows how much fun it is, maybe she'll be more willing to rehearse with me, and practice on her own.
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