02.12.09 Anne Heaton House Show Review
I'm getting further and further behind on keeping this block up to date. Last week was a whirlwind of activity and I am just now getting a few minutes to give a proper review to an amazing couple of days.
Anne Heaton played a house concert at my place on February 12th. I also had two friends, one from Seattle, the other from Sweden, come down and spend a couple of days with me.
Many of my friends wonder how I have gotten into the whole "house concert" thing. Well, I have wanted to do it for sometime, but just didn't have the space or house to do it. Then, last fall, an opportunity fell into my lap and I ran with it. Since then, my friend Sarah has hooked me up with some great talent to play at my house. Sarah is a fantastic graphic designer and you should check out her website. I've also found this website called Concerts In Your Home and have found some amazing artists on there to have play at my place. I'm actually having to turn people away!
So, back to the house concert.....Anne Heaton played at my house, in my living room. She hired a bass player, Will and brought out one of her smaller keyboards with her to play. Musicians who travel have to incur quite a few expenses and the new restrictions by the airlines is not helping them! Anne plays piano and her music style can best be described as a singer-songwriter with a twist of folk, blues and jazz all thrown together. She draws influence from Peter Gabriel and Tori Amos and was classically trained on the piano. I had heard a few of her songs from her myspace page and website, but was not entirely familiar with her music before the show. I think it's safe to say, I really like her music now!
We had about 20 people at my house for the show. Some of them were friends, others were complete strangers. That's half the fun of house shows. It's always a great mix of people who show up and it's all about the music. Anne started her set and it was great. She started to share a story about her and Rose Polenzani doing a video for the song, "Where Your Scar Is". The video involved a pink ukulele and paper hearts. When she mentioned the ukulele, my friend, Jennie (aka Jennie 5-0) squealed with delight! The conversation went something like this:
Anne: "Oh, do you play the ukulele?"
Jennie: "Yeah, I do."
Anne: "You wouldn't happen to have one with you, would you?"
Jennie: "I do, I carry one in my car!"
Anne: "Will you go get it and play with me?!"
(the crowd...."Yeah!" "Go get it!")
Jennie: "Oh, okay, I'll go get it!"
(the crowd....."Yay!!!")
So, Jennie came back and played this song with Anne. It was awesome!!! Probably the best part of the night.
After everyone left, Jennie, Linda, Lisa G., Anne and I all sat around and Jennie sang a few more songs on the ukulele. It was a long day, but an amazing day filled with good energy, good friends and good music.
The next night, Anne played at the Albert Street Pub, a venue I haven't been to in years. I have to say, I really liked the layout, it was friendly to the artist and you get to keep all of the door. I ended up being Anne's door person and collected the cover for her. It was a lot of fun. She played solo but this time with a mic and PA system, along with some stage lighting, so it was a little less intimate than the night before. Jennie made another appearance with her ukulele and blew the crowd away, accompanying Anne during the song, "Where Your Scar Is". I have video of it, just need to upload it to YouTube. I'll post it here when I do get it on YouTube.
Please go check out Anne Heaton's music!!! She is amazing and a very sweet person who is welcome in my home anytime. Thanks Sarah, for hooking me up with the opportunity to do house shows.