5/24 (The first day of internet access!!)

5/24/07
The jazz set went allright last night – I survived despite being way, way out of my comfort zone. Marie is a great soloist, and so is the pianist – unfortunately I was hitting all kinds of wrong notes, even when just playing melody. I didn’t feel I did well, but it did hold together enough to fool the guests. ☺ A couple of elderly gentlemen talked to me afterwards. The funniest thing was one British guy came over and said quietly so they others couldn’t hear, “You were wonderful. I can’t say much for your friends – they weren’t very good at all – but YOU were brilliant. I listen to a lot of music and I know.” Ha ha! I laughed all night. Its funny how God can lift you up when you’re not feeling that good about yourself. I wasn’t feeling good at all about my playing, and to me it was painfully obvious that I was the weakest link in the performance, so to have that man say that just cracked me up. I’m still laughing about it.

Tonight we have two shows with a well known violinist named Doug Cameron. The music is really challenging, but fun. Doug is quite the perfectionist, and he kept picking on our drummer and pianist. He was really nice to me, though. The first show went ok, I’m sure I’ll do even better in the second one (I’m in between shows right now, sitting on my bed). Tomorrow we’ll be in San Torini, and I might be able to get off the ship and take some pictures to send you guys, since my training for tomorrow was cancelled. Yay! Hopefully I’ll be able to get this frusterating wireless internet system to work, too. I know you guys are probably wondering why I haven’t written yet. Sorry!!