A BLOG-STYLE PAGE OF WHAT'S HAPPENING NOW!

September 1st, 2010: One of my former students, Josh Solomon, has reviewed my method book for Examiner.com. His article can be found here.

I've gotten a student referral from Guitar Syndicate. They're a little guitar store downtown. Ralph (one of the owners) used to manage the gigantic Musician's Friend outlet in the east bottoms before corporate HQ closed it. He's a good guy and has agreed to refer prospective students to me as they have no in-store teaching. They also have a recording studio as well as wall space for artwork. When I first went in there they had Mark Mothersbaugh paintings on the walls! ("Are we not men? We are Devo!") That's pretty cool! A guitar store/recording studio/art gallery. What a combination!

Did a session last Wednesday at Chapman's Recording Studio. I first recorded at Chapman's back in '78 when the studios had brick walls in an old building down in the River Quay area. They've come a long way. The session was just me on acoustic guitar and a girl singer - live, no tracking. That means if one person makes a mistake, everybody has to do the do-over. Chuck told me 2 tunes, the engineer thought we were doing 3 tunes, the singer sent me 4 tunes, and we actually wound up doing 5 tunes. We were booked for 4 hours, we finished in 3 and a half, I got paid for 4 - in cash. Sweet.

I've been running some ads for my teaching on 103.7 the DAM. It's an FM rock station. More or less Nirvana-derived angst-y white boy rock music. So far, it seems to be a waste of money but I'll give it a little more time before making a final judgment. We're only in the middle of the campaign right now.

The solo gigs at Jazz Legends are over until December. That was a good run. The manager there indicated to me last night that he would book me back on the every other Sunday routine next year. I talked to him about leaving some of my spare PA gear there to help alleviate the brutal load-in and that I would be willing to let other groups use it. He was amenable to that and it should score me some brownie points with the other players who won't have to haul gear up and down the stairs every time they play there. Win-win!

Max Groove also has indicated to me that he would book me into Chaz on the Plaza in the 8-10 slot on Tuesdays starting in October. Waiting on those contracts. Max?

July 12th, 2010: Giggage: booked a bunch of Tuesdays - tomorrow and next week is at the Jazz Kitchen in Legends. The first 2 Tuesdays in August is at Chaz on the Plaza. Then Tuesday Aug 17th and 31st back at Jazz. All this helps to compensate for the drop in my teaching schedule that has occurred over the last couple of years.

This Friday will mark the return of Woodstock Flashback! (See entry below for March 13th) We will be playing the main stage in the Power & Light district opening for Liverpool. Looking forward to that!

July 9th, 2010: Stumbled across this tonight. They obviously lifted part of my entry for June 3rd. The following was at: http://ksmusichalloffame.org/news.html. I have no idea where they got the picture. I don't think it's even LaForte. As far as I know, he never played a keyboard. I'm sure that's not him.

Blues singer Jim LaForte dies

		Kansas City blues singer Jim LaForte passed away May 29. He was the original singer and bandleader along with Rich VanZant at the Saturday afternoon Harling's in 1984. The guitarist with that band, Jay EuDaly, has said, “In his prime, LaForte had a voice, an authentic voice, that was unmistakable and no one could touch him when he sang in that classic R&B style.” LaForte's most recent album, Catfish Pizza Breakfast , is available for purchase at several sites online. A memorial jam was held at BB's Lawnside Bar-B-Que on June 12.
Click here: LEONARD JAMES (JIMMY) LaFORTE Obituary: View LEONARD LaFORTE's Obituary by Kansas City Star .

July 5th, 2010: The Old School Knights will be the headliner at the 21st anniversary of The Sandbar in Lawrence on August 14th. Stan Sheldon will be playing with us on that one. We did the gig last year and it turned out to be quite a party. The cops rope off a block and there's a pretty big crowd. There's some footage taken last year by Valentine's phone up on YouTube.

June 25th, 2010: I've been a little disappointed at the lack of traction for Woodstock Flashback. I really enjoyed playing with those guys and both Stan Sheldon and Go-Go Ray have told me they would like to do more gigs. My disappointment has been mitigated at least a little bit by a recent development; The Old School Knights have booked several dates over the summer and Stan Sheldon has agreed to play on those gigs - so at least I will continue to play some gigs here and there with Stan. Performances open to the public for that band are: July 23rd at Sullivan's and August 13th at Intentions.

June 3rd, 2010: Jim LaForte passed away last Saturday. It has taken me 5 days to process the event and figure out what I want to say. Jim was a dear friend and a wonderful R&B singer. I started working with him on a steady basis back in '84. He was the original singer and bandleader along with Rich VanSant on the Saturday afternoon jam at Harling's. Working that gig with Jim and Rich, week after week, was a pressure cooker of a learning experience. Not only did backing Jim teach me a ton of tunes - we never rehearsed, we just flew by the seat of our pants -  I realized real quick that "cool" didn't cut it, it had to be "hot". They consistently played with tons of feeling, that is, they emotionally committed themselves to the music on a very intense level. A level that I wasn't used to operating on at gig after gig after gig. Watching Jim and Rich on that gig, week after week, taught me how to do that. I was thrown into the deep end, so to speak. I consider Jim and also Rich - and playing that gig - to be one of the formative influences on the way I play today.

Below is the original band that started the Saturday afternoon jam at Harling's in 1984.Left to Right: Chico Battaglia, Jay EuDaly, Jim LaForte, Mike Bramel, Rich VanSant

This from the late '80's. Another band with Jim; Terry and the Pirates.
Jim LaForte: vocals  Jay EuDaly: guitar  Chico Battaglia: percussion  Mo Paul: harmonica  Terry Hancock: drums  Gary Doombs: sax   Blake Hughes: bass

The other side to that coin, unfortunately, is that anyone who knew him well, as I did, is not surprised. I can't say I didn't see this coming. Honestly, I've wondered what took so long. He was 62, which is way too young...and the the older I get the younger that seems...but the mileage was very high, if you know what I mean. All of us who knew him could spend hours and hours telling stories that run the gamut from outrageously ridiculous to extremely ironic to the beautifully sublime. The short story is that he was just a horrible alcoholic and, even though I haven't heard an autopsy finding, the ultimate cause of death will involve the liver. I think Jim just drank himself to death.

Be all that as it may, in his prime, LaForte had a voice, an authentic voice, that was unmistakable and no one could touch him when he sang in that classic R&B style. My favorite song that he did was a ballad, "Who Can I Turn To". As far as I know, he never recorded that song. I, however, have it on a gig tape - a cheap, ghetto-blaster cassette deck stuck on a table in front of the stage - and the feeling, the emotional commitment, comes through loud and clear. That's the way he performed, and I learned a lot from working with him. Rest in peace, Jim. The rest of us will be along ---- sooner or later.

Jim is prominently featured on Mama Ray's 10-year Anniversary Jam CD.

Jim's latest CD is Catfish Pizza Breakfast.
 

May 21st, 2010: The Six on the Square gig is cancelled. It's questionable whether or not the place will even be open on the 29th so I'm not taking the chance of working and not getting paid or having to chase the money. I hate that kind of crap. I'd rather stay home. Maybe something else will come along for the 29th. The Avalon Ultralounge situation has some potential for being something steady thru the summer. Maybe that will take up some slack. I'll know more after tonight. Stay tuned.

May 20th 2010: Upsurge in giggage: new place north of the river: Avalon Ultralounge. Booking at places I've not played before: Six on the Square, Ugly Joe's Bar, Los Cabos @ Legends, Cheeseburger in Paradise. Most of this stuff is solo, except for Cheeseburger - that's a trio, once with Christian Franklin and Phil Brenner and the next time with Mark Valentine and Ray DiMarchi. The usual is also in play: BB's Lawnside BBQ with Mama Ray and band every Saturday afternoon as well as solo @ Jazz Louisiana Kitchen every other Sunday afternoon. Check the gig schedule and come on out!

May 10th, 2010: The event at the Gem Theater last Thursday was a bit of a let-down. Now I know - that a "sneak peek" is not a "premiere". There was some advertising calling the event a "premiere" but Sue Vicory called it a "sneak peek." I guess what that means is that it's a small piece of the movie, not the whole movie. So I went in expecting to see the whole movie and saw only a little piece of the movie. So I still don't know how much of me there is in the movie! The part that I saw had a few seconds of one of my tunes ("What the Blues are all About") from my latest CD. My wife said she saw me for a split second but I didn't see me! O well, now I have to wait for the whole thing to be released to find out if I'm actually in it. Pins and needles! What I saw looked real good. If the rest of it is as good as what I saw it should be a good one.

I thought our performance at the event was very weak. No need to go into the gruesome details, I'm trying to forget about it! Suffice to say it was a perfect storm of uncontrolled variables. Lesson learned: the jam format does not translate well to a big stage. Marilyn Maye, on the other hand, was incredible. She brought her own pianist and drummer with her and used a local upright bass player, Gerald Spaits. No matter what age she is, she is incredible - but she happens to be 82 and still going strong. Lesson learned #2: don't follow Marilyn Maye!

May 3rd, 2010: My method book has been reviewed in Fingerstyle Guitar Magazine.

April 28th, 2010: Apparently Marilyn Maye is bringing her own piano player from New York so I will not be accompanying her after all. O well, that's show biz! I'm a little vague on everything that's going on for the premiere of Sue Vicory's documentary film on Kansas City Jazz and Blues. I know that I will be in Mama Ray's band that's hosting the jam after the movie. I don't know if the host band gets paid (I doubt it), I don't know if I'll have to go in early to set up my gear, or if gear will be supplied, so consequently I don't know how many students I'll have to cancel. Yada yada yada. I bought my tickets for the movie today. My wife will go with me. After all, it's not everyday we get attend the premiere of a film that I'm in! My music has been in several films but I think this is the first real film I'm actually in.

March 27th, 2010: RIP Lucky Wesley. Longtime bass player/singer for the Scamps passed away this morning. For details go to the Scamps on MySpace.

I was privileged to be on stage with Lucky (and the Scamps) a couple of times.

The Scamps: A Short History (as of June, 2005)

March 13th, 2010: Woodstock Flashback was happening! Killer rhythm section. We pulled a bunch of stuff out of the hat with no preparation - Purple Haze, Fortunate Son, and a couple of others. Go-Go is a monstrous drummer and Stan's bass playing was solid as a rock. None of the 3 of us had ever played together before the sound check Sunday morning and it just kicked ass immediately! Go-Go told me later he really enjoyed it and wants to do more. Stan said he had a great time and the whole thing was "nostalgically awesome!" Well, for the record, I had a great time myself - it's one of the things I live for - and I want to do more as well. I think there's a good chance more will happen. Valentine's working on it. We had a 24-track recorder hooked into the board and my brother Kevin (White River Productions) was there shooting pictures and we got some video as well. Valentine is working on a promotional package using all that to help sell it. We'll refine the costuming, work out more of a show, choreographed entrances, bows at the end and so on. The immediate goal would be to do a few local gigs and then travel regionally - festivals, special events, corporate parties etc. I'll keep you posted.

If you go to the "pictures" link in the above paragraph and scroll down through the pictures from 2010, you'll see that I don't know what kind of guitarist I want to be when I grow up. I go from playing Woodstock music, complete with silk scarf headband and tie-dye to Jazz with Everett DeVan to Blues at Knuckleheads. And I love it all! Decisions, decisions! I just can't make up my mind. It's great as far as getting lots of local work, but nobody becomes rich and famous for being versatile - think about it. (I'm not so sure I want to be famous...but rich would be cool!)

March 2nd, 2010: Go-Go Ray will play drums for Woodstock Flashback. This is a freakin' awesome band! I hope we wind up doing more than the 3 shows at Bartle Hall. As I understand it, the personnel will be:

Mark Valentine: vocals, guitar
Debi Cordero: vocals
Jay EuDaly: guitar, vocals
Mark Lowrey: keyboards
Stan Sheldon: bass
Go-Go Ray: drums
Ray Demarchi: percussion
Phil Brenner: sax

No rehearsal - Mark distributed a CD with 10 songs on it. Everyone does homework as needed, then we throw it together on the stage - just like Woodstock! We are to play 3 half-hour shows between noon and six. That's all I know. Maybe I should do some mescaline before the show, like Santana did, just to be authentic.

March 1st, 2010: Woodstock Flashback update: I learned today that Mark Lowrey will be playing keyboards. Mark was the keyboard player in the video of my song, Feel the Flame. This is stacking up to be an awesome band! The drummer is still up in the air, although the incomparable Ray Demarchi is on percussion. If we score a good drummer this is going to be a kick-ass band!

Mama Ray, Alan Monroe, Don Glaza, and myself will be the host band for the jam that will happen at the premiere of Sue Vicory's documentary film on Kansas City Jazz and Blues. This means that we will not only play with all the musicians who are in the movie (we're in the movie too) but we will be backing Marilyn Maye's performance. She will be receiving a Lifetime Achievement Award as part of the activities surrounding the release of the film. So....I will get to be onstage with Marilyn Maye!

February 20th, 2010: I found this picture on John Armato's website. John is a drummer formerly from Kansas City who now resides in northern California. The thing is, I have absolutely no memory of this...none whatsoever. But that's me, playing with John. The bass player is Bob Blount. From the look of things, I'm guessing late '80's to early '90's. Apparently I've played so many thousands of gigs that most of them don't even register on the radar anymore. John is a wonderful drummer and Bob is one of the best bass players I've ever worked with. This had to be kicking ass! I wonder what else I've forgotten? Scary.

February 18th, 2010: Here's the concept: We dress like hippies and play only songs from Woodstock...the first Woodstock - 1969 - not the other pale imitations. The name of the band is Woodstock Flashback. I'm on board! Up until now, the band has been in Mark Valentine's mind. But now...we're booked at the Kansas City International Auto Show at Bartle Hall on March the 7th. So we've got to put a band together. Today I got an affirmative for the bass spot from Stan Sheldon. I've known Stan for a little over a year now and have been waiting for a situation to offer him. He's got a couple of my CDs (Channeling Harold and My Ship) and has said several times that he'd like to play with me. I'm looking forward to this! For those who don't know, Stan was Peter Frampton's bass player for years and years. Stan was the bass player on the Frampton Comes Alive album which is only the biggest-selling live album of all time! Before he moved here a couple of years ago, Stan toured for a year with Delbert McClinton. He's worked with Tommy Bolin, Phil Collins, Warren Zevon and Lou Gramm. I've never played with him but he's got a big-time pedigree and a reputation that precedes him. More TBA.

February 16th, 2010: Sue Vicory's documentary film on Kansas City Jazz and Blues is starting to get some press. And I just happen to be in the picture on the promotional poster that's being spread around...and I was named in the press release in the Kansas City Star!

February 14th, 2010: I had another interesting encounter yesterday. I was playing the gig at BB's  BBQ as usual. Mama Ray announced that there was a guitar player from Cincinnati that was going to sit in. I didn't think anything of it. He was a late-50's maybe 60-ish looking black guy. He was there from the beginning of the gig. Listened all afternoon. I wasn't having all that good of a day, I wasn't feeling particularly inspired and my face hurt all day (2-year-old injury). Anyway, Mama calls this guy up, and it happens to be Wilbert Longmire. He was on Tappan Zee, a record label started by Bob James back in the late '70s. He's played with Bob James, Grover Washington, George Benson, and many others. He's a jazz guitar player/singer very much in the George Benson mold. He's really good. Much better than he comes across in the Bob James produced recordings, in my opinion. He was very complimentary, said he wanted to shake my hand and was hoping some of my spirit would rub off. He said several times that he really liked the way I played. He said he was planning to spend some time in Kansas City and we would play together. I wanted to hang out with him after the gig, but I had a gig an hour out of town later that night and had to leave. It's always affirming when someone who's been/is in the big leagues has nice things to say about you. I gave him a CD and here's hoping I hear from him again. If he's going to be hanging out in KC I probably will. (He wanted me to be his friend on Facebook) It would be major fun to gig with him. I'd like some of his spirit to rub off on me!

January 26th, 2010: Phil Keaggy was eating at the Jazz Kitchen when I arrived there for my gig on Sunday. For those who don't know, Phil is one heck of an awesome guitarist. True story: Jimi Hendrix was on the Tonight Show and Johnny Carson asked him if there was a guitar player in the world who was better than him. Jimi said yeah, there was. Phil Keaggy. Phil was on his way to the airport to catch a flight. He's lived in Nashville for the last 20 years but travels internationally playing his music. He had gigged over the weekend in St Jo and Topeka. He and his wife were with Paul Clark, who is a friend of mine from way back. I've met Phil a couple of times over the years but never got to really sit and talk with him. We have several mutual friends. I was familiar to him - so he said - but he couldn't place me. I think he was being nice - there's no reason he would remember me. Be that as it may, he was very friendly and engaged. It probably didn't hurt that Paul talked me up to him! He asked me if I could teach him to read music! (What's he thinkin' - fly me to Nashville once a week for his lesson?) Anyway, when I found out that they had to leave before I started playing, I set up my gear, looped some changes and soloed for a minute. My wife said, "Big deal, he didn't even hear you play a song!" Don't matter...I can tell if someone can really play in 30 seconds - trust me - he could tell. He asked me for my website address and I gave him two CDs. He said he looked forward to listening to them. Fun. I want established artists - like him - on major labels to record my songs. Yeah...that's the ticket. Less money, but it comes in the mail and I don't have to tour all the time. The money comes in the mail and I stay home and play with my grandkids - yeah, that's what I want. (Don't get too excited, people. This kind of thing has happened to me quite a few times over the years and nothing's ever come of it. My wife is downright caustic about it after years - decades - of disappointments. I'm not caustic - just realistic. I never forget it only takes once. You must be prepared and seize the moment. And in the meantime, I still get to play my guitar all day - every day.)

January 3rd, 2010: New Year's Eve was brutal. The gig was great. I played at a nice hotel called The Lodge in Baldwin City Ks. The money was ok and the management and the audience were very nice and the deal included free rooms. The rooms were very nice. The problem was I spent that morning sitting on the pot puking in the bathtub for about 5 hours. Then I had to drive to Baldwin City and front a trio. I was the only singer on a four and a half hour gig. Finding a sub that can do what I do on short notice on New Year's Eve - that's an exercise in futility. As I was leaving my wife said, "Is there anything I can say that will make you not do this?" I said, "Nope." Then I went and played the gig sick as a dog. I'm from the Old School. Thank God for the room.

December 15th, 2009: Did a quick jaunt to Vancouver over the weekend. Played one song at a private party. Rough gig! The thing that surprised me about Vancouver is that there are TONS of Asians there. I mean dozens of Asians for every Caucasian that I saw. It's like Seattle or San Francisco in that regard. Also like San Francisco it's a gay Mecca. My hotel was right around the corner from "The hottest gay bar in town!" Yes, that was what was up on the marquee. And I must say the idealized male torso on the sign out front was hot! It was also the first time I've flown since I broke my face two years ago. It hurt. And I had vertigo practically the whole flight(s). Being dizzy for 4 hours is no fun.

I just came from a photo shoot for Sue Vicory's documentary film on Kansas City Jazz and Blues. Apparently I'm in it since she emailed me and wanted me at the shoot. I was in a group that included Danielle Hudspeth, Mama Ray, Washboard Jo, Leon Brady, and Stan Kessler. We were jamming but nobody was plugged in, it was just mugging for the cameras. We were playing a Blues in C, Stan was playing a trumpet solo. He stopped right in the middle of it and complained, "I can't hear the guitar!". It did my heart good to hear that. That is the one-and-only time in my whole life I'll EVER hear Stan say that to me! I will treasure the memory of it for the rest of my life.

December 8th, 2009: I've blogged several times about my friend John Bukaty. For those who don't know, John is an artist who makes performances out of the act of painting. He paints to live music and interacts with the musicians in front of an audience. Many times he paints the musicians. I've done several gigs with him and am in several Bukaty paintings. For more detail go here.

I just found out that John is traveling across India, doing 100 paintings in 100 days. The trip, as well as John himself, will be the subject of a documentary being filmed in India as I write this. This is very cool, I'm thinkin'! The website for the documentary of John's adventures in India is here. I can't wait to see it!

November 28th, 2009: Booked every other Sunday from January through August solo at the Jazz Kitchen in Legends. A steady solo thing will be good. Consequently I'm on the lookout for singer/songwriter stuff. I discovered Dan Bern last week. One of my students brought him in - thanks Sarah - and I'm already doing "Kurt". Getting a good response so I'm gonna keep doing it.

I will be playing with Danielle and Brandon Hudspeth at the jam at BB's this coming Saturday. Looking forward to that, I like both of them.

October 25th, 2009: According to the calendar on the Blue Room's website the Pat Martino show for Nov 5th is cancelled. I'm disappointed.

October 23rd, 2009: I've been running my reverse scam on quite a few scammers lately. I've gotten several emails from other teachers who've found this website by Google-ing whatever name their scammer is using. I've had a couple scammers engage me even after I told them I knew it was a scam. One of them called me a "son of a whore"! (Mathew Medley) That's entertainment. Another one demanded I take his check to the bank and verify whether it was good or not. (Frank Stacey) Actually, I called the business the check was supposedly from (a motorcycle dealership in Phoenix). They said the check was forged, the lady even knew the account number printed on the check, and said this had been going on for over a year. Whoopie.

Pat Martino is playing the Blue Room on November 5th. I'm planning on being there. If you don't know who he is here's his bio: http://patmartino.com/biography.php Check it out, he's got quite a story!

August 26th, 2009: The student load is pretty severely down right now so a couple of days ago I put an ad up on Craigslist for guitar lessons. Wow - scam city! I did get a legitimate inquiry so I consider the ad worth it. But at the moment, a mere two days after posting the ad, I am stringing 3 different scammers along, holding out for that worthless $3000.00 check to add to my collection before telling them what I really think about their sorry asses. And I'll have more content for the Scam Section of my website. Sweet!

August 4th, 2009: Played the 20th anniversary party of the Sandbar in Lawrence last Saturday. Turned out it was a big block party - festival atmosphere, outdoor stage, the street was roped off for a block in downtown Lawrence - and we were the headliners. There's footage taken with Valentine's camera/phone at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jFZhceGR9pM

There was a pirate theme going. Captain Jack Sparrow was there along with Barbossa

Elvis also showed up - he really fit in!

Thus were all the pieces in place for another one of Jay's detached, surreal moments (See the 2nd paragraph for June 28th below). There are more pictures on the MasterGuitar photo page. All these pictures were taken by Nancy DeWitt. She's the wife of Andy DeWitt who is one of my musical compadres and she's an avid photographer of, among other things, Kansas City musicians. I have dozens of her photographs on this site. If you have a Facebook account all the pictures from this event can be seen by going to Nancy's Facebook page.

June 28th, 2009: Ok, so I played the Kansas City Kansas Street Blues festival this evening. I crossed paths with an old friend, Thomas Walker. Thomas is a wonderful drummer and is now touring with Glenn Patrick. Glenn is originally from here but is based out of Vegas now. I hear he's got a CD out that's climbing the Blues charts. His road manager told me they're playing all over the world. I met Thomas in one of my stints with Kevin Mahogany. Thomas and I later worked together at the Saturday jam at Harling's with Mama Ray and Rich VanSant. Thomas now lives in Phoenix but is traveling a lot with Glenn. He said it felt like it took them 3 days to get here - the tour bus broke down. Been there - done that. Touched base with Glenn as well - it's a small world. I've been known to tell drummers, "I want you to hit the freakin' snare drum as hard as you can!" I never had to say that to Thomas. Listening to him today reminded me what a solid, in-the-pocket drummer he is. 2 and 4 never went away. Ever.

So...this Queen of the Festival thing (see entry for March 25th). Sometimes...I don't know what it is. Maybe it's lingering effects from hallucinogenic drugs I did back when I was young and stupid, but sometimes it's like a switch goes off in my head and all of a sudden everything becomes very surreal. I feel very detached, and in an emotionless observation mode. It happens most often on gigs when unexpected and weird things happen. Many times it's triggered by something visual. Some kind of unexpected scene or disjunctive images mooshed together. Like today. Culturally, this festival was very mixed, lots of blacks, lots of whites, that's all very cool. That's one of the neat things about music. It can bring all these disparate people and cultures together. Because of the location, the whole thing had a gritty, urban feel to it. Dig it. So we start into "Low Rider". This is the song we decided to do while "Queen Mama" does a little parade around the grounds with her Queenly retinue in train. Well, we quit playing in the middle of it because Mama was being followed by a Drum-and-Dance corps doing their thing. Marching, dancing, and beating drums real loud. That's ok, no problem. We just quit playing and I grabbed my camera. So they walk around the grounds, then march up to the space right in front of the stage. They do this routine for a few minutes. All these black cheerleader-looking dancers and a bunch of drummers, performing for Queen Mama, who is dressed up in an Elizabethan-type gown, along with her husband, Will, and Will's brother who both are wearing, I don't know, something that looks like what an English Admiral would wear. They had a bunch of attendants who were also dressed up in Medieval English court-style clothes. That did it. It was the sight of dozens of black cheerleader-dressed dancers, doing bump-and-grind moves, dancing for characters out of a Shakespeare play, on a hot afternoon in the middle of Kansas City, Kansas. Click. I feel very surreal right now.

June 16, 2009: This is my 20-year-old son Evan on a wedding gig.- he's a drummer - and my granddaughter, McKenna Joy Eames. I love them both!

June 10th, 2009: Added a couple of links to my Tribute to John Elliott page. Gary Sivils and Bob Brookmeyer had some things to say about John in various interviews. Added some photos and redesigned the photo pages to make it more manageable.

May 12th, 2009: So today (while teaching!) I did a Google ego-search. That's where you type your own name into Google and see what comes up. I do this mainly to make sure MasterGuitar gets good rankings in the search engines. Also for ego-curiosity! Well, there are at least six solid pages of listings for my name before anything else gets listed. That's good. That reflects well on my web guy and also on CD Baby. I gave CD Baby permission to distribute my music across multiple platforms (iTtunes, Amazon, etc). A great deal of the hits have to do with CD Baby doing their job. Other hits have to do with promotional activities that various venues do where I perform. However, there are bizarre things that I can't explain. This one takes the top prize. I have no idea what this site is about: http://www.geocities.com/musicon27/jay-eudaly.html but there's this poem on the page:

Dude! I just lay my music out there. It's amazing to me how it happens to affect people. I wonder if whoever wrote this actually has heard my music. It doesn't say anything about a guitar - which just happens to be the centerpiece of everything I do as well as the sexiest instrument on the face of the earth!

I also just discovered that I was the 4th top-selling New Age artist on Guitar Nine Records! .......for December 2000! Check it out: http://www.guitarnine.com/topsellersmonth200012newage.html

May 7th, 2009: More gig news. This Saturday evening (7-11) I'll be at the 810 Zone on 119th between Roe and Nall. In addition to that, the Phoenix has booked back Phil Brenner and me . I also booked a new club in Lawrence called The Barrel House. That's me and Phil also. I signed a contract yesterday to play Chaz on the Plaza in the Raphael Hotel. That's a solo deal. That was booked through my friend Max Groove who is booking the room. The interesting thing about that gig is that Max wants as much original material as possible. Max gets away with performing his own material more than anybody I know as far as the local scene goes. But then again, Max has a history that goes far beyond the local scene. However, it's been my general experience that nobody around here wants to hear original music. Do I ever hear, "Hey, man, let's hear some of your stuff!" Nope, I don't. All I ever hear is, "Can you guys play Brown Eyed Girl?" I actually took a loss money-wise - I'm canceling more money from students than I'm making on the gig - for the chance to play my own songs. I don't have enough appropriate material to take up the whole 4 hours so I'll do what I normally do, which consists of covers that I put my own stamp on, except on this gig the covers will be liberally interspersed with originals. Max liked that concept. Max offered me the gig every Tuesday but I just can't justify that money-wise. I wanted to play it once to see what it was like and to expose myself to the management there. I would consider a steady gig there if they liked me so much that I could get more money! What's the key to that? Drink sales! So come on out people! It never hurts to "cast your bread upon the waters."

Notice anything about all these new gigs falling in my lap? They're all acoustic solos and duos. No bands, no electric guitars, no drums. Mark Valentine, who I've worked with for almost 20 years and who shoots me a lot of work besides the gigs I do with him,  wants me to get my name branded. So whenever I book as a solo, or duo, or whatever, and I'm the front-man/singer, that will be called, "EuDaly".

Check the gig schedule for dates, times, and locations.

April 22nd, 2009: A couple of things have shaken out gig-wise: The Phoenix has booked back myself and Phil Brenner. That's billed as "EuDaly". I sing and play acoustic guitar, Phil plays sax and flute and we do a broad variety of tunes - jazz standards to James Taylor, Eagles, Beatles etc, to more current things like Jack Johnson, Dave Mathews, John Mayer, Foo Fighters, Nine Days, and so on. We'll occasionally do some of my tunes from the latest CD. Phil played on quite a few of the tracks, so with the two of us playing I feel like I can promote that CD on the gig. I've also been booked back into the Jazz Louisiana Kitchen in the Legends Shopping District as a solo act. I basically do the same thing there only without Phil. Check the gig schedule if you want to see either of those two shows.

April 5th, 2009: Played another gig with John Bukaty yesterday. For those who don't know, John is an artist who makes performances out of his painting. He paints to live music and interacts with the musicians in front of an audience. This time he painted me. I didn't have my camera with me so I took a couple of pictures with my cheap cell phone. For more on my gigs with John go here.

March 26, 2009: Normally I don't get into personal stuff here (with the exception of my accident and surgery last year) unless it affects or impacts my music or teaching. This is somewhat related as you will see. Six weeks ago one of my daughters (Rachael) had a very premature baby boy (at 24 weeks, 6 days gestation). They call him a "micro-preemie". Of course there has been a lot of drama and stress. Rachael and her older sister Amber are both dancers and run a teaching program for the Heart of America Dance Center in Lee's Summit, Missouri, a suburb of Kansas City. Before the birth, Rachael had been in the hospital on complete bed rest for a month. Because we were getting overwhelmed with phone calls and inquiries on how Rachael was doing, Amber started an update blog so that Rachael's students, friends and family could keep up with what was going on with "Miss Rachael". Since the birth of Rachael and Justin's son Jimmie, the blog has kind of exploded, people from all over the world, hundreds at least, probably thousands judging from the mail we're getting, are following Jimmie's fight for life in the NICU (Neonatal Intensive Care Unit) at Overland Park Regional Hospital in Overland Park, Kansas. Amber is maintaining the blog on a daily basis. In honor of Jimmie's six-week birthday Amber put together a picture/video montage of images of Jimmie, Rachael, and Justin, and used the song "Faithfulness" from my latest CD. (Faithfulness Montage)

Little did I know when I first wrote that song back in the late seventies how it would be applied, even in my own life. At that time I had probably not had a single thought about having grandkids, and yet here I am with several...and counting! Life is full of unforeseen surprises, both good and bad. I think Jimmie will turn out to be one of the good ones!

At this point I have great hope and expectation that Jimmie will survive and live a full and productive life, in spite of his rough beginning. He's already beat some pretty long odds, and it's obvious that he is a fighter!

March 25, 2009: Mama Ray has been chosen to be the recipient of the Lifetime Tribute Award and will reign as this year's Queen of the 9^th annual Kansas City Kansas Street Blues Festival. Mama and the band will perform at the Living Heritage Tribute Show at about 6pm, Saturday, June 27^th. Other recipients of this award in past years have been;

Myra Taylor - 2008
(No festival in 2007)
Cotton Candy - 2006
Ida McBeth - 2005
Millage Gilbert - 2004
King Alex - 2003
Little Hatch - 2002
Lawrence Wright - 2001

The web site for the festival is: http://www.kckstreetbluesfest.com/

More details will be announced as they are forthcoming.

February 22, 2009: Put up 10 pictures taken at the Phoenix gig last night. Andy DeWitt's wife Nancy took them. I've used quite a few of Nancy's photographs over the years. She is at many of Andy's gigs snapping away. She must have an awesome collection of photos of Kansas City musicians.

January 28th, 2009: Starting a new News page - the other one is long enough! It covers 4 years.

A couple of years ago I joined Facebook. The main reason I did it was to stay current with my kids. They were "facebooking" - posting pictures and whatnot so I joined to keep up with all the kids and their friends, my grandkids, etc. It was a window into my kids and their friends lives. A week or so ago I got a friend request from my good friend and a wonderful bass player, Andy DeWitt. In just a few days I have been deluged with friend requests from dozens of musicians, guys I haven't seen or spoken to in years. John Cushon, Bruce Sidener, Joe Miquelon, Tony Rustici, Rick Huyett, Jimmy Dykes, Wayne Hawkins, Chip Lewis and many more - wow! It's a whole network of Kansas City based musicians! I don't have to keep a "panic list" anymore! Whenever I need a player I can just put the word out on Facebook! Thanks Andy! You are THE Plugged-In Man!

Those of you on various email lists that I maintain will notice that you're getting emails from jay.eudaly@gmail.com instead of from jay@masterguitar.com. This is because a !@#$%^&*! spammer stole my masterguitar email address! You can still email me at jay@masterguitar.com. All messages sent to that address will automatically forward to my gmail account. I began to notice that my emails were being blocked by sbc as well as yahoo. They were treating masterguitar as spam. Then I started getting spam - from myself! #%@&*$^#%!!!!! My web guy says not much can be done - think of all the spam (supposedly) from citibank, or ebay - and suggested I do the gmail workaround. I can even configure my gmail account so that it looks like the message is from masterguitar even though it's really from gmail, I just haven't gotten around to figuring that out yet. Don't worry, my lists weren't stolen, only my address - it could happen to you too. So if you happen to get spam that appears to be from jay@masterguitar.com, it's not, it just has my address in the "from" field. So it's not from me or because of me, it's a @#$%$#@ spammer!

Somehow the Feel the Flame video on You Tube got put up on metacafe.com. O well - the more the better I guess - seems like I should be getting paid somehow. That is the cliche statement when it comes to the internet: "Seems like I should be getting paid somehow!"

Speaking of getting paid, I'm really re-thinking the whole CD thing right now. Since 1999 - ten years ago - I have released 3 CDs. The first one, Sound Tracks: as of today, I am $109.00 away from breaking even! Yup - 10 years later and I'm not quite even. The second one, Channeling Harold: released in 2001, without getting into the gory details (I went almost double over-budget on this one), as of today, I'm $1079.12 in the hole - 8 years later. If I hadn't gone over budget, I'd be in positive numbers by now. This one is actually my best seller. It's straight ahead, traditional jazz and there's a market for that - in Japan and Europe. Thanks to CD Baby, I'm selling this one overseas more than in America. Ironic, isn't it? Brings to mind Jesus' saying, "A prophet is not without honor except in his own country." My most recent release, My Ship, has been out for a little over 2 years, and I'm $1520.00 in the hole. Before these CDs I was releasing cassette tapes. Industrial Moon and Waiting. Both those projects got into positive numbers, I actually made a profit on them. All these numbers don't count what I've spent on my home recording studio over the years (tens of thousands) or the hundreds of hours it takes to write and record these things. If I counted that, well, there's no way I could ever break even, let alone profit, without some major label help and distribution. Also thanks to CD Baby, the checks I'm getting are leaning big-time towards digital downloads as opposed to CD sales. The last couple of checks have been about half-and-half. One check several months ago was 100% downloads - not a single CD sale! Why am I forking out thousands of dollars up front to put out CDs (and scrambling - unsuccessfully so far - to make a profit) when more and more people are buying and downloading single songs? Good question. There are several reasons I can think of:

1) It's good to have product on hand at a gig. When someone comes up and asks if I have a CD out it's a sure sale if I can pull one out and sell it to them right then and there. Otherwise, I'm telling them to go to MasterGuitar and buy it off the website. Chances are they won't.

2) I still need promotional product to give to people in the industry - record labels, agents, A&R guys, publishers etc. A CD not only has the tunes, but lyrics, pictures, liner notes, contact info etc - or in my case the web address where all those things, and more, can be found. In this capacity a CD is like a real expensive business card. It's not a product you necessarily make a profit on, it's a business expense that will hopefully lead to more income in one way or another.

3) This is difficult to quantify but I call it, "Street Cred" - as in "credibility". Even though I'm not signed to a major label, my CD's are professionally manufactured, complete with bar code (Soundscan - those in the industry know what I mean), with copyright registration,  BMI or ASCAP affiliation, and licensing fees paid for cover tunes - not some burnt CD made on a home pc with an inkjet cover and a sticky label - and for that I've seen guys charging $15.00! Please - $10.00 max for a burnt CD! I'd say $6.00 or $8.00 is fairer. Don't misunderstand me, I don't begrudge the guy selling home-made burnt CD's - more power to him - especially if there's a demand. He would be stupid not to endeavor to meet the demand. I'm in favor of capitalism. I know what it's like to do the best you can with what little you've got - I respect that. But there are issues that should be addressed. Do you think that guy who's selling burnt CD's has paid the licensing fees for the cover tunes he's got on there? Anyway, having a real CD out, or several, lends credibility to all activities. I have more credibility in the eyes of my students because I can honestly say I'm selling CDs world-wide. Wouldn't you want to take lessons from a guy like me? :-) Wouldn't you want to go to a club and see a guy like me play? Of course you would, in part because of the CDs. Everything affects everything - I sell CDs and get students from gigs, students come to my gigs and also buy CDs, and my CD's help me get students and gigs.

So I feel like I'm caught in a dilemma here, and I'm not very motivated right now to throw myself into another recording project. It takes a major commitment of time and energy - and a little money. If I do one in the near future, I think it might be another straight ahead jazz thing. Something real simple and easy to record, like an upright bass/guitar duet album or maybe just a guitar/vocal thing with me playing and singing standards, I don't know. Besides that, I don't have the up-front money right now, which is another reason I'm dragging my feet at the moment. But...I'm sure something will shake out of my psyche in the near future, and then I'll figure out what to do with it!

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