Gigging with Cousin David

Murphy and I just played a gig—a music job—with our Cousin David. Now, gigs with David always involve some degree of unpredictability, or, if you like, Adventure. The folks involved were Murphy and myself, our friend Scott, and good old Cousin David.

In this case, the Adventure didn’t take long to start. It was raining, and it was time to go. We were all loaded up to drive to the gig in Cousin David’s minivan when I asked him (loudly, because his hearing’s pretty spacey), “All ready to go?” and he said, “That just reminded me. I left my hearing aid in the house!” So he went back through the rain and got his hearing aid and put it in. Then, sitting next to him in the front of the car, I asked him “Got your hearing aid?” — but I said it very softly, so he couldn’t hear me. Cousin David looked at me. I said, “Got that hearing aid in your ear?” even softer. David smiled at me. (He’s really good at covering up.)

Cousin David is not spacey. So we drove two hours away (in the rain) and had gotten in the general vicinity of the gig, and David said, “I meant to find out directions or print out a map of where to go, but I just never got around to it.” So after driving in circles (and triangles, and rectangles) for a while, he called the place for directions. Then we got there. But he is not spacey. It was an Adventure.

It turned out that in order to set up David’s sound system for the gig, we had to carry all the equipment into a big building, move it down an elevator, and set it up in a big lobby nearby. It was a long way. So we all got to work, and just did it. We hustled setting up all the microphones and cords and speakers and cables and all that stuff, and had the sound system ready a whole 11 minutes before it was time to start. Not bad; I almost had time to get my mandolin in tune! More adventure.

So far, the gig had consisted of rain, being lost, moving sound equipment, and stringing together various wires. But now came the good part. Murphy kicked things off with “Lonesome Road Blues” and Scott followed that with “Moonlight on My Cabin,” and we were off. Murphy, Scott, and I alternated in playing and singing various bluegrass favorites for the folks. It was an older audience, so we played plenty of songs and tunes they’d recognize. They liked us. I saw people singing along with Murphy’s “I Saw the Light” and my “Mountain Dew” and Scott’s “When the Saints Go Marching In.” Cousin David played bass and contributed a harmony vocal here and there. We played three sets of good music, and it was fun.

Then, it was back to messing with the sound system: coiling up the cords, packing the equipment up, and moving it back upstairs and out of the building and into David’s car. We drove back to his house just in time for Scott to get in his truck and leave to play another show that night with his own band.

So, it was all an Adventure. There was lots of rain. There was some getting lost. There was plenty of hauling sound equipment around. But you know what? We all had a good time, and the people liked us. And Cousin David’s not a bit spacey.