Hippo, birdie, two ewes...

...to dr_nebula and jeffreycornish!!! Have a great one!!

Tres Gique 2.0

(Takes deep breath. Jumps off cliff.)

"My" Toastmaster concert at ConChord this year was actually a Tres Gique concert, and it went off remarkably well considering that we really only had two rehearsals together as a group since last May, and that the set included three songs we'd never done as a group before.

It wasn't awesome. Parts of it came close, though. Quiet Victories, even with a couple of flubs and my flagging voice, was very close to awesome. I don't usually tear up listening to recordings.

Callie's partner, Naomi, pointed out that we could be awesome, consistently, if we got together every 4-6 weeks for a weekend of intensive practice. So that's what we're going to do. Or at least try to do -- we'll get together sometime in mid-November and see how it goes.

This is going to mean some big changes.

The biggest change for me is that we're not going to be "Steve Savitzky and his occasional backup group" anymore. We'll be doing a mix of my songs and other people's songs -- we won't even stick to filk; Joyce has been singing folk since forever. We'll try writing stuff jointly -- I have some ideas about that. I won't always be lead singer (I can hear the cheers from the audience already). I won't get nearly as many concerts as just me -- that's part of the price. But I'll learn to be a better performer, and my concerts, with or without TG, will sound a lot better -- that's the payoff.

For Callie and Joyce, the big change will be that they'll have equal billing as performers in the group, not just as part of some singer-songwriter's backup group. That's what happened to Callie with Echo's Children: she was many people thought of her as just Cat's backup and never became known as the fantastic performer she is.

Jordan, our drummer, will stay in that role at least for a couple of years; eventually he may move out, go into impoverished college student mode, and we'll have to worry about what to do next. Kat, who's performed with us a couple of times, won't be able to make it down from Canada for rehearsals; she can sit in via streaming audio if she wants, but mostly will become our Webmistress. Things will sort themselves out.

Joyce's husband Dave, who has been doing live sound for her and others for years at folk dance camps, will be the official Sound Guy. Colleen is, of course, Catering and Hospitality, and possibly logistics.

Now, about that version number. Back around the end of last year Kat and I came up with a version-numbering scheme: I was 1.0, Callie and Joyce were 0.1 and 0.2 respectively; Jordan and Kat were 0.0.1 and 0.0.2 respectively. Add 'em up. Wwll, we're not playing mix-and-match anymore, and I'm not the main performer anymore. So, Tres Gique 2.0.

If this comes off, we'll have our first concert at Consonance or Baycon.