23 July 2001
Performing (Red Rock Coffee Company, Eric Cheng's)

That was quite a weekend. *grin*

Friday's show was one of several I've booked at the Red Rock Coffee Company. It was a strange venue to me at first: the room is oblong with refrigerators and such interrupting most lines of sight, so there's no particularly good spot for a performer to set up camp; it's also got the whole particle-board-ceiling and fluorescent lighting thing going on. But it's amazing to behold the kind of warmth that can well up from this place during the course of a show...ironically, it's partly due to the sight of people jam-packed into such an unlikely music venue, applauding with craned necks behind pitchers of half-and-half. It's also on a busy corner in downtown Mountain View, so much the audience on any given night are random passers-by who heard the music wafting out onto the street. It all creates the lovely illusion of a small-town gathering, something almost unheard of here in Silicon Valley.

And Saturday...I still have a Steinway high from Saturday. *happy sigh* I'm more or less content with my P-80 for coffeehouse gigs, but there's still nothing in the world like playing a good grand piano in a good-sized room. Tori Amos speaks about her piano as a lover -- I don't think I've found a lover yet, but I have made several close friends. Most grand pianos I've met seem to share a wavelength with me, an immediate understanding that I never quite reach with uprights or keyboards. With a grand I can talk about why I'm not afraid of death; with an upright I can swap stories about comfort foods; with a keyboard, we compare our respective cell phone plans. Well, my relationship with the P-80 has matured a little -- we're good working partners now, and we talk about our families once in a while. But we can't really relate on a fundamental level.

So I was happy indeed to get to play at Eric Cheng's house -- and honored, given the caliber of classical performers he's invited for house concerts in the past. I had quite an inferiority complex about it for a while, and sort of hemmed and hawwed whenever he invited me ("What makes him think that I'm good enough to be in the same concert series as Livia Sohn?"). He kindly assured me that I was plenty good enough, but it was the other Eric, dear Mr. Miller, who finally pointed out that I was comparing apples and oranges. "Sure, you're not a stellar classical pianist, but you're not giving a classical recital, are you? It's a different thing." Fair enough.

The invitations went out, people filled Eric's living room and loft, and I stood in the kitchen with a plate of Chinese take-out in my hand (dinner supplied by the host -- he thought of everything!) and tried very hard not to get nervous. I'm not very good with recital atmosphere. Eventually I went to the piano while the crowd was still murmuring with small talk and started to play, without announcement or shushing; only when I started to sing did the audience notice and gradually quiet down. I told stories between songs, mingled and signed CDs during the intermission, and asked occasional survey questions of the crowd, who obligingly raised their hands and laughed at my jokes and applauded at the end of every song (I don't think they were so sure of that, at first. Residual recital protocol: "Was that just the first movement?"). The coffeehouse is my home, and so I bring home wherever I go...the standing ovation at the end, however, was most un-coffeehouse-like. I really wasn't expecting that. Wow.

I can see how performers can get addicted to this kind of adoration. I hope I never come to rely on it, or demand it and act all snooty when I don't get it at every performance. But playing a good show, having people's full attention, and hearing their appreciation at the end of the night -- man, it's a nice feeling.

- VT

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