May
06
Tonight I played the last of three performances of Jason Robert Brown’s Parade in Anna, Texas. This is the fourth production of Parade I have played for and I always enjoy playing the show. The first time I did this show it was a professional production at WaterTower theatre. That production was a lot of …
Apr
20
The wake up call came at 4:30am. We loaded our bags in the bus and headed for the airport. We spent two hours cued up in a long line to check in and then came the news. Our flight was delayed by about 14 hours! We would be getting in to Chicago in the late …
Apr
18
After a short drive we began our assent of a portion of the great wall. This section took almost 300 years of excruciating manual labor to build. I’ll admit having heard about the wall and thinking, “So?” I mean it’s a wall. How hard is that? Well, it’s quite something else to see. The steps …
Apr
18
It was time to say goodbye to Guiyang today. Our hosts checked all our bags from the hotel to the plane for us so all we had to do was ride the bus to the airport and board the plane. Waiting at the airport we received several copies of a fully produced hardbound book of …
Apr
17
Tonight we attended the Grand Theatre of Guiyang‘s production of ‘Cool Guiyang’. This Broadway style stage show celebrates the many ethnic minority’s present within Guizou. From the very first number it was evident that no expense was spared in the production. The entire back wall of the stage and four different sets of legs (theatre …
Apr
17
On the way back from the Miao village I sat next to one of our volunteer guides from Guiyang named Yo Yo. We talked all the way to the village and all the way back which was probably about 6-7 hours total. She spoke English perhaps better than any of the other guides and we …
Apr
17
Our guide, Jackie’s mom is from the ethnic minority known as the Miao people. Today we visited his home town. Jackie tried to warn us for what was to come, but I don’t think any of us actually believed him. When we arrived at the Miao village we were greeted by singing women in silvery …
Apr
16
(I’m posting this one out of sequence because I’m too excited about what just happened) As we pulled into Guiyang’s Grand Theatre, “Jackie”, our guide, told us his mother would be watching tonight’s concert on television. This was of course the first we had heard of this and were pretty excited. We all entered the …
Apr
16
After the exhibit hall we traveled out to the Qingyan Ancient Town to eat lunch. Initially I sat a table with all Wesleyan students, but when then the guides didn’t have anywhere to assist us Americans with the meal so I got up to offer my seat to one of them. This however, displaced me …
Apr
16
Our guide Jackie rejoined our bus to provide us with non-stop facts about Guiyang and Guiziu. We were glad to have Jackie back, but I must admit I found Yo You and Livia’s entertainment very charming. Singing songs for guests from abroad isn’t something I would feel natural doing, but as a musician, I find …
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