Appalachian Theater of the High Country/Boone, NC/Football Weekend

Just about to jump in Gertrude and take off to Boone, NC. Gertrude is a 2006 Toyota Camry that my Aunt Gertrude Hodges gave me a few years ago when she decided to quit driving. The car had 17K miles on it then. About 87K now. Aunt Gertrude is my aunt that lives in town and therefore she seemed really far away to me when I was a kid. Fact is though that I probably could’ve walked to her house in half a day from where we lived in the country. I felt like I’d never really gotten to know her much, only saw her occasionally on the weekends when we lived across the way from Mamaw and Papaw. When I took delivery of the car it had about 4 pair of black dress gloves with faux leopard fur cuffs in the middle pocket and in the trunk there were two oversize umbrellas, some pruning shears, one garden trowel, a towel, a thermal blanket and several plastic garbage bags full of silk flowers. Oh yeah, and one dent on the right front fender where she had let one of her girlfriends drive the car around the church parking lot and apparently into a post. All I can figure out about the rest of the contents of the trunk is that it was used to tend gravesites. I took all but one big yellow silk rose to Goodwill and returned the gloves. The rose rides over my driver side visor. Amongst my Compton relatives, Aunt Gertrude seems to be the only one in the generations that I’ve known or met that has much of any curiosity about the rest of the world outside of where she lives. She has style which is evidenced by the gloves and she has an interest in art and antiquities, fine furnishings, etc. I know my statement about style and curiosity will probably make the rest of the Comptons made at me if they every stumble upon this blog, but all I have to say is, “If the shoe fits…”.

Anyway, I’m fixing to load Gertrude and go to Boone early and check in to the Holiday Inn Express. It should be only a two hour drive, but it’s some kind of big football weekend in Boone, so there will be Boone’s version of a traffic jam awaiting our arrival. Sound check comes at 4p and I’m figuring on an hour delay, so that makes me leaving here shortly. It’s gray outside today and gray inside as well. I’m not sure how to change this currently but will study on it on the way. Nobody wants to pay good money expecting a cheerful Christmas show only to see some sourpuss moping around stage right.

I’ve got to go. I’ll fill in more details later…

The road to Boone started out to be a winding maze of turns and switchbacks but evened out into the usual interstate daze. I was annoyed for a while by a Budget rental truck going 80 miles an hour but finally got shed of him. I recalled a Facebook post I read yesterday about a person’s pet peeve regarding other drivers. This guy was covering at least two of mine, those being cruising in the left (used in considerate driving circles for passing) lane and my personal favorite, speeding up to keep people from passing when the opportunity arose. It took about two hours of dodge and dart to get to Boone. I got a message from Newberry just as I got into Wilkesboro that the hotel information was incorrect so that was sorted before I made the same error he did. By the time I got to the hotel in Boone, I had one hour left to go across the street and get a couple beers for the next couple days, grab my clothes and instruments and go to sound check in the Appalachian Theater.

Traffic had been flowing fine until I got ready to leave the hotel and it was backed up all the way over. Fortunately that was only a few miles, but it took over 30 minutes to drive it. In the parking lot, up the back steps, I threw down everything that wasn’t needed and up the elevator to the stage. There was really only the levels to test pretty much because the stage layout was done. The sound was really lively and loud which is a switch from what it can be oftentimes. Too loud, really. We ended up with everything backed off. The request was made to the sound person to ‘set it and forget it’ and let us work the mics as we are accustomed. The request is always made for the same thing. There are several ways this plays out usually. 1) your request isn’t acknowledged, 2) your request is acknowledged but ignored because the sound person is actually an artist and knows more about what you should sound like than you do, 3) your request is acknowledged and you are allowed to control your own sound. Now, this might sound like me just being petty, but let’s look at it this way…if a person is at the mic and making countless small adjustments on the fly to blend and mix into the whole only to have the levels audibly going up and down what do you do? Or say the group is singing in four-part harmony and everyone is making attempts to sing and phrase in tune only to realize suddenly that your sound person has gotten creative and now you sound like you’re standing at the bottom of a well. You know, the old Starday sound. With all the variables going on there isn’t much chance of putting out a good product. Thankfully there was a minimum of sound board hanky panky this time.

The show was a mix of the Gathering sequence and an assortment of songs the rest of us in the serious and otherwise categories. After having gotten used to the sound and arrangements with the Winston-Salem orchestra I realized that I didn’t have a complete memory nor command of the string band arrangements but I think I got away with it. As David Grier is fond of saying, “nobody threw anything”. All in all it was a pleasant evening and I got to talk to a few middle-aged men who are mandolin players. We are a different breed, we Boomers. It was nice to talk to some guys that I have common interests and vocabulary with. I felt like I could relax and be myself.

Once I got back to the room I opened one of those beers and watch a Jason Bourne rerun on HBO and went to bed. A bit of fitful sleep due to a sore rib from sliding down the hill the other night, but nothing serious. I fired up the Keurig this morning because I have run the course on the coffee kit I brought with me. The coffee says “Royal Cup”. More like Royal Loser. I don’t remember the last cup of coffee I had in a hotel or motel that was worth the effort of brewing it. The people that make this stuff must not have ever tried it. So I got out my iPhone and opened the Yelp app and found a place about a mile away called Bald Guy’ Brew. When I went out to the car there was ice all over everything so I had to thaw out before I could go anywhere. Fortunately Gertrude isn’t cold natured and I was off to get caffeinated in about 15 minutes. About halfway over I ran into all the football fans setting up for tailgate parties and saw what was fast becoming a parking nightmare. The coffee shop looked more like a bar setup that was getting ready for a mob to show up but at the time I got there there were only about 5-6 people. The young ladies behind the counter were good though and got my order right away. Only a couple minutes time and I was looking at a steaming latte. I think the young lady that made it must have been in training because she struggled a little with the final flourish on the top. When she brought it over I asked if that was her masterpiece and she said that it was. I looked at it and asked her what it was. She said, “I think it’s the head of a dragon”, to which I replied, “Okay. Looks like he’s eating a marshmallow”. She laughed and said she was working on it. But the brew was made of very good coffee with the right proportions and it was very welcome. Saved.

It will be time to leave here in a couple hours and go west again. At least I’ll be two hours closer to home. I’m looking forward to another go of it tonight in Greensboro, NC. It’s overalls night on the program.

Life is good. MC