Last year, after our semi pickup group, Baroque and Beyond, finished our last concert, we thought it would be a good idea to see if we could find something we might do in the summer, when those of our group with jobs thought would be a little less hectic.
So we got together and made a CD with the idea of shopping it around to some wineries, many of which have tasting rooms around here, and thinking maybe we could get a gig during the summer.
Now it's November, and Rominger Winery finally agreed to give us a try. We were to play on a Friday from 5:30 to 7:30. We managed to put together three rehearsals in preparation for this, although only one of those rehearsals included all the people in the group.
We did get a nice program put together, and Phil, our violinist, was actually able to borrow and deliver a real harpsichord from UC Davis for the event. That was pretty nice for me.
As you can see from the picture, there was a huge crowd there. If you look more closely, you can see John and Kathy's husband, Dave sitting at a table together. One is reading a magazine, the other is texting. The people at the next table seemed to be having an okay time though. I think they didn't really make any money on our being there, since they, in fact paid us a little bit, but combined with the fact that they gave us wine, it just couldn't have worked out very well for them. We had a good time, though.
Saturday John and I went over to Mike and Heather's new house to watch Rina while they went to birthing class. We had a good time with Rina, which included putting all her animals in a tree. It was fun, even though trying to lift her up to get the stuff into the tree kind of ended up with bashing her head into limbs and stuff. They are obviously desperate for baby sitters or they would never have us around.
After we left the baby sitting gig, we went over to the convention center for the holiday craft show (one of two really good ones that are put on every year before Christmas in Sacramento, the other one being the Creative Arts League/Crocker Museum show on Thanksgiving weekend.) We got a couple of interesting things, and I met this cool artist named Elizabeth Hall, who designs very colorful, fun jewelry. She immediately attracted my attention because her hair was red, yellow, green and blue. And then I loved her jewelry. Here's a picture of her wearing the necklace I bought.
I wanted to go back the next day, but I had agreed to play with Charlotte in a talent show at her church. Charlotte is a hammered dulcimer player, and I love the sound of hammered dulcimer with harp, so while I wasn't too much looking forward to being in a talent show, I was happy to be getting to play with Charlotte.
We played two sets, one with the Cherry Tree Carol/Air the High Mountains/and riddle song; the other included Give me that Old Time Religion/Do Lord/Golden Slippers. Golden Slippers is a great piece that Charlotte really has nailed and makes a great show ender.
It's also obvious from this picture that I really need to lose some weight. I suppose better posture might help, but every time I see a picture of me playing the harp, I realize how fat I've gotten. Ugh.
