Festa. June 19th, 2009

I just played an acoustic house concert in a killer house (see photos) for a bunch of wealthy drunk-on-wine Brazilians. What? You inquire politely... How did this come about?

Let me start at the very beginning, a very good place to start.

Rose is the president of the Rotary here, and along with being wealthy, intelligent do-gooders, these "rotary" folks (pronounced "ho-tah-ree")take in kids from all over the world as part of an exchange program to increase cultural awareness throughout the world. This particular "Festa" was to celebrate the end of one such year for one such 17 year-old Peter Baker (prounounce "pee-tah") from Ukiah, CA. yea. Ukiah. This kid has basically been drunk for a year straight. Don't get me wrong, he speaks decent Portuguese after all this time and is a pretty sweet guy - but you get the picture, right? . . . He's from Ukiah, where i'm pretty sure the most exciting thing to do is play Dungeons and Dragons for 18 hours straight.

Anyways... The wine is flowing, the languages are flowing, and I get corralled to the top of a short flight of stairs where my guitar is then thrust into my hand and I am announced as being the songwriter whose CD has been playing all night. Despite the fact that these people are hammered of of the some 30 bottles of various international wines, they listened attentively like good Brazilians and totally enjoyed the music. I sold all of the five CDs that I had brought for $20 Reis a peice ($10 bucks or so) and even autographed a couple of them. It was way cool. Futhermore, I had this major realization - my music is basically Brazilian music sung in English and Spanish and it is a definite hit here in Brazil. Why I didn't think to come here and tour when the album first came out is beyond me.

Now that I'm here, I really don't want to leave. It's pretty much fantastic. I'm already plotting how I can extend my stay a few extra weeks to play some shows.

Soooo... I tore myself away from the party around 11:30pm and Ana Carolina was sweet enough to give me a ride to this bar in Vila Magdalena called "Bleeckers" where my friend Daniel and his band Funkaría were playing (remember I met them at that antique mansion-cum-bar last Saturday???)

Anyhoo. I showed up totally alone and sat back against the wall to survey the scene. When Daniel (the singer of the band) saw that I has showed up he was like a happy little monkey on top of a banana cart. He came and sat next to me and we had this great chat about the music scene here in São Paulo - there in San Francisco. We talked about me collaborating with him and his band and maybe playing a show with them there in July before I leave for Buenos Aires . . . "Legal!" (Pronounced "lay-gal"it means cool in Brazilian speak) He was sweet enough to introduce me to his sister and her girly friends and we spent the next couple of hours dancing like groupies near the front of the stage.




After the show we all danced the night away to samba and bossa grooves (I was so in heaven to be at a funky bar/nightclub with such good music playing... I couldn't tear myself away) Until about 4:30am - when my Daniel and my new girly friends called me a cab.

So, if your cabby got lost in "Alphaville" which is a lot like "Stepford-ville suburbia" and it's 5:00AM - what would do YOU do? I tried to remain calm and awake and eventually (after stopping six times to ask for directions) we arrived - and I was charged $90 Reis for the trouble... didn't want to fight in my third language so I forked over almost all of the money I had made off of CD sales (thank God that panned out) and then went upstairs to shower and pass out.