Mattias fighting the police…
Yesterday Mattias gave me a phone call around 22.00… and had quite some story. He had just been at Bob McChesney’s house having his first lesson with him. On his way back home he was walking between bus stops, trying to heat up (it is quite chilly during night time here). A woman is running behind him, most probably doing her workout routine. Mattias reaches the bus stop and sees her stop on the opposite side standing at the corresponding bus stop. He sees her calling someone on her phone and within minutes two police cars shows up from out of nowhere. She starts yelling and pointing towards his direction and the police officers runs up to him, grabbing him hard and pushes him up towards the wall. ‘Spread your legs’ and all that. They cuff him and starts asking for weapons and everything. They are really aggressive and Mattias of course wonders what is going on. He sees the girl leave after a while and the police officers starts calming down after multiple questions. Apparently she had been worried that Mattias was a rapist and was insinuating that he had made sexual gestures towards her. Totally insane.
Apparently, LA females can come up with any story and call the cops on your ass without reason. It happened around 20.00 so it wasn’t really late… crazy, Mattias was pretty shaken up when he arrived home.
Gordon Goodwin’s Big Phat Band
Last Saturday was the evening with big “E”! We have wanted to see the Big Phat Band play since we arrived. One of those things you gotta do if you are here. If you haven’t heard of them yet, go to there website and listen! They are in our opinion one of the most well playing big bands referring to quality of musicianship. Tuning, section playing, technique and phrasing is super tight and always sounds impressive. This concert was held in Los Alamitos, a smaller community southeast of Long beach. This time the commuting took us with food break FIVE hours! It included the Orange, Red, Blue metro lines and bus 60 and 42. Unbelievable, we almost missed the concert. At least we got some of the last tickets left for 28 dollar each, ouch! Concert was alright but far from as impressive as we hoped it to be. The sound was bad in the high school main concert hall as well.
A bit disappointed we chose to get down to Hermosa Beach again where we knew Paulie was playing with some great musicians. That turned out to be the best choice we’ve made this far. Saturday night down at the beach seems to be the place to be. Full of people already and the band was already smoking inside Boogaloo Cafe when we arrived. The band grooved like crazy and I gotta find some info on this guy Ellis who was singing. A total Stevie Wonder class geniuos, singing and playing piano/organ. He even got to play some funky solos on both bass and drums. He is just ridiculous at whatever he does. And what a singer. If you think of the soul and vibe of Stevie Wonder, you are close! the best concert this far! Funny… the best concerts we’ve seen have both been in Boogaloo Cafe with Paulie on sax. It is the man!
Carol Welsman singing in Fullerton
This last Friday Mattias had looked up a concert with one of his favorite singers, Carol Welsman. Maybe you have heard about her, she is considered one of Canada’s greatest jazz/slick/smooth singers. She rearranges standard tunes with cool new sounds and writes her own material. She has a tendency of always showing up with great musicians in the band so we took the greater ordeal of going there… We still have no car, that is a problem in this city. It took nearly three hours to get there. It is not particularly far to Fullerton but just a tough connection. We rode with the Orange and Red metro line to Union station and from there an Amtrak train to Fullerton. From there we could walk to the Steamers Jazz club. sadly they started late, so we listened to only one set and then left to catch the three hour ride back home again. It was a promising concert but the sound and commitment in the band disappointed. We did have some good beer and food. Good evening, total damage: 55 dollars each…
Bob McChesney Quintet at Charlie O’s
We haven’t been writing for a while now…. time for the weekly updates. Last Tuesday we went to see Bob McChesney Quintet play. Interesting evening, we had been waiting a month to really get to see Bob play. Last time he only got some minor exposure with the Menza band but this time featured with his own quintet. They started playing without the piano player who apparently had some delays. After the band had played one tune without piano, I had already been pushing Mattias to go offer his piano playing skills to the band. So… he went up there and asked. Of course the band got excited and welcomed him up! So, Mattias sat down and started reading the music, playing with Bob himself! It was so much fun sitting there watching the whole thing. Mattias still grunts about not being in shape with his technique, but GOD did he play well! He rocked the house and the band was really glad to have him up there. After that song, the original piano player showed up, which I must say was too bad. Mattias looked great up there! 
Look at the picture, he is down to the left! And Bob on trombone. by the way, Bob played fantastic. Such an agile trombone player, a true pleasure to listen to. 
The Disney Concert Hall
I took the subway down to Civic Center today to go see the the coolest concert hall I’ve heard of. Weather was beautiful, it is becoming really warm here now finally. I met a group of students from the photography department of the Art Institute who were there on assignment so I was not alone shooting. Since I needed to get away from the trombone for a bit it was good with a creative session. The garden behind the concert hall had some orchids and stuff, so I spent some hour there too. Check these ones out!
Oh, forgot to mention that I have an 16Gb iPhone coming. It should be coming any day now. Such a cool thing! Here is a picture for those of you who don’t know it…
Monday…
So some compulsory practicing as usual done the whole afternoon, we have gotten our practicing mutes now to the trombones… Good, our ears need some rest from trombone sounds! At 6pm we went to Bob’s big band rehearsal again and played through some nice Tom Kubis and Gordon Goodwin arrangements. Paul Litteral (former trumpeter with the Rollings Stones and multiple hit songs from radio) joined in, playing lead. Great player, great guy, was so much fun playing with. After rehearsal we followed Paulie and Paul to Peach’s place again to listen to their recording session for some new possible hit tune. The song writer/engineer came over to the studio and showed them the song. Mattias got to join the session and together they head arranged the entire tune in some hours time. Mattias might be playing on the next coming radio hit!
Friday night down town
Last friday we went down town to check what was on. We started out going by subway to 7th street and were immedeately overwhelmed byt the tall scrapers. Cool sight an night time! We found an Ihop diner and got ourselves some spare ribs american style. We followed some huge sky lights down to what turned out to be Staples Center hosting the LA Clippers vs. Utah Jazz basket ball game. The game had already started so we got some cheap tickets off the street and went in to see it! That arena is HUGE and what an atmosphere! Great vibe; basket ball is true american culture!
After the game we took the subway to Hollywood/Highland to see some club life. Hollywood Blvd is totally boiling, full of clubs, bars, music and motion. We walked around for some hours, went in to a improvised comedy theater show, drank a few beers and watched the preparations for the Academy Awards with the big Oscar statue outside the Kodak Theatre. Cool stuff! LA is really a cool place!
Scott Whitfield at Charlie O’s
Both Mattias and me have become fans of Scott Whitfield after seeing him play last week. This time he had more time to show his colors whilst playing in his group at Charlie O’s. while we certainly enjoyed hearing him play live, we actually enjoyed as much the intermissions when they played some of his CDs. They sounded fantastic! He is a great player, a very natural approach to the horn using a very mature jazz language.
Bob McChesney at Charlie O’s
Finally we got to meet our hero, the one and only… We went down to Charlie O’s to see the Don Menza big band play. This monday the big band we usually play with was canceled due to President’s day which meant we got to see the entire two set concert at the jazz club. The cool thing was that while we were expecting to meet Bob McChesney there we also got to see Chuck Findley playing lead trumpet with the band. Cool stuff. The concert itself was not too exciting but seeing Bob play for the first time here was impressive. This coming week he will play with his own quintet which will be totally awesome!
Barbeque in Santa Monica
We were invited to a party a friend of Paulie’s was hosting in her house down in Santa Monica. Peach had the most amazing house you could imagine, totally big and furnished. We arrived at 4pm (they always start parties early in LA we’ve noticed) and people were already there cooking and preparing the food. Of course a big cooking island in the middle, full of italian food. Lots of people stumbled in during the evening, we got lots of new friends.
After food and beers the party continued inside Peach’s recording studio where we all unpacked our instruments and started jamming away. Lots of blues and good times. Everybody crammed inside the studio on the floor listening to the “concert”. Man when did we attend such a party at home? Check out some of the photos…
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This is the place where you can read about where I am and what I currently am doing. My calendar is on the left.
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