Scouting Out Open Mic Night

Near the Old Town School there are two bars featuring open mic nights on the same night as my bodhran (pronounced bow ron, as in - ‘take a bow, Ron. They love ya’) class.

Last Monday, after the class, I scouted out the first venue at Silvia’s lounge on Irving Park road about a half of a mile away from the school. It’s a fairly large bar with two sections. One side is for the general bar population, with dart boards a long bar and an open floor for dancing. The adjoining room has a low stage, lighting and a sound system for the performers. When I walked in, I heard a fellow playing and singing and I made my way to open mic room to check it out.

This room was sparsely decorated with a few posters on the otherwise black walls, There were five or six round tables with bar stools, a sound booth in the back, and a low stage with a couple of microphones. The stage area was in front of picture windows that had been boarded up with unfinished, bare plywood. There was a man in the sound booth and one woman sitting at a table listening to the guy on stage. I figured she was his girl friend/wife since there were two drinks on the table and no one else in the room.

The guy on stage was doing great, playing far better than I could ever hope. But the fact that there were now only two people in the ‘audience’ gave is a rather pathetic feel. I sympathized with the guy. After a couple of songs, another man joined the woman at the table and I figured that they must be friends of the performer. Another couple of songs latter two people came in and sat at a side counter and engaged in a rude, loud, laughing conversation. I debated on how long I was going to stay when he finished up his set. The next performers turned out to be the couple that was seated at the table and they weren’t there for him at all.

The loud guy at the side counter turned out to be the host of the evening and introduced the next couple. I listened to a couple of songs out of respect, but I didn’t really like their material and left. I made my way back to school. The second lounge – Grafton’s – is about fifty feet north of the school. This also has two areas but both considerably smaller than the first bar. The bar area is the typical setup with bar, stools, and booths. The area in the back is set up like a den with a fire place, couch and love seat, a couple of round tables and a couple of square tables. There is seating for about fifteen at the very most.

The host, Adam Johnson, was setting up the microphones for the performers. There was a couple on the love seat, one fellow on the couch and another at a table. As it turned out everyone there, except for me, was planning on playing that night. Again, the only people in the audience were performers which giave it a kind of a loose club feel to it. Adam was fantastic. The others had varying degrees of ability. I spoke to Adam for a bit and he gave me one of his CD’s; really good professional quality stuff of the Hank Williams style.

I won’t be going back to Sylvia’s, but I think I’ll stop by the Grafton after my class this Monday and sign up to do some of my songs. There’s really no point of spending all this time writing these things if I never perform them. Given that everyone is basically in the same boat, just with differing levels of rowing abilities, I’m feeling less intimidated by the prospect of baring my soul in a strange place in front of strange people.

My Goals

Five years ago, I wrote a song for my wife and then performed it as a surprise during her birthday party. It took me over a year to complete and it was the first song I created in over twenty years. This opened a gate that had been holding back the music side of my creative energies. My work, responsibilities at home, financial worries, elder parent care, church and school support and charity related activities all helped to keep the ideas and melodies buried. In the past several years, I’ve slowly freed myself of those anchors and now the only things that are stopping me are my own limits and any obstacles I alone carry.

A couple of years ago I started taking guitar lessons at Chicago’s Old Town School of Folk music. I characterize myself as a fairly low level player and I’ve got a good distance to travel before I will be satisfied with my guitar skills. At this point in my career, my songs are bound to my level of guitar ability and I am still in the three/four chord realm. I know there are other levels I can attain and as I progress in my playing abilities I hope to progress to new song writing levels as well.

My goals are:

1. Complete any song that I begin.

2. Record the dirty copy of the completed song (a dirty copy is one where I play it through while signing all the lyrics just to get a recording of the song.)

3. Record a complete clean copy of the song where the vocals are correct, the guitar parts have no errors and any rhythm parts are precise and make sense for the song.

4. Upload my songs onto my Reverb Nation account and link them to my Facebook site. This will help me to overcome my fear of friends and family not understanding what I am doing, why I am doing it and what my music is all about.

5. Continue to progress in my knowledge and skills of home studio production.

6. Build my home studio to a point where I have sufficient tools to make my visions a reality.

7. Improve my guitar abilities by continuing to take lessons.

8. Seek out performance opportunities so that I am not just a basement musician.

9. Build a support community of like-minded individuals so that not only am I encouraged and energized by their enthusiasm and musicianship, but that I may share with them whatever I can to help them along on their own journey.

10. To do all of this with a spiritual realization that the act of creation is the essence of what it means to be “created in the image of God.” For the creation and appreciation of art are two of God’s gifts to us, and these along with love, laughter and a continuing sense of wonder are what makes a life worth living.
I believe that writing this blog will help me focus on these goals and allow me to share the success and failures of the many facets of song creation, performance and recording.