Stephonne’s Tommy Boy Showcase at Piano’s NYC
A wild and intense ride well spent with great musicians in an amazing city. We stayed at a super stylish 5 story walk-up Air BNB in China Town and with only 3 days to get our heads right and one full band rehearsal booked the same day of the gig – the pressure was high but well managed due to the wonderful disposition of the crew. Fast forward past the couch rehearsals into our booth reserved at Rivington Rehearsal Studios, that energy begins to really bubble up. We had 3 hours where we would be first meeting our saxophonist and keyboard player, Mark Kraszewski & Brendan Polk. They both came highly recommended and within a half hour of set up time, we began hitting all the transitions and going over any score markings and questions. After that 45 min. had passed, we got the entire crew hitting all the tunes. It was a very fun time that also required hyper focus because we are cultivating our emotional expectations that serve that psychic language necessary for us to lock in. After we finished, 2 hours remained before showtime. I raced home to knock out some notes within the parts for clarity. Stephonne, Angel & Melissa left early so they could walk and Johnny, Adam, & I unfortunately waited for our Uber. Unfortunate because being Halloween weekend on the lower east side of NYC, traffic was locked. We bailed our Uber and walked nearly a mile with all of our gear in the misty rain of the city. By the time we got there, we had 10 minutes before we had to start getting on stage. Suddenly we were up there with barely a soundcheck and a few technical difficulties and we were off. We played really well, had the largest crowd of the night, and Rosie, the President of Tommy Boy, was really impressed and said that I would hear from her the next day. We celebrated and all felt an extreme sense of levity afterwards. Tommy Boy conferred and told us they would help out but wanted to keep their label more on the hip-hop side of things which we half-way expected, but Rosie told J. Searle he was a brilliant producer and that we should all keep pushing and they would be in our corner. We are very grateful for the experience and has made such an indelible mark in the long road from idea to execution. Faith was backed up by recognition on this one!