Twenty-Six Tiny Little Bands

Today was the Portland Marathon. I didn't know about the Portland Marathon, but it turns out that Portland in early October has the absolute perfect weather for a marathon (a cool drizzle, in case you didn't know). But what I REALLY didn't know about the Portland Marathon is that the organizers have apparently decided that what marathoners really need to keep going, more than anything else, is a regular sequence of tiny little bands sprinkled every mile along the marathon route. They must have hired about, well, about 26 little bands. Each band parked under a tiny white awning, every couple of miles along the marathon route. It's a pretty cool idea. Picture it - there are you are jogging along, jogging, jogging, jogging, through the rain, past the deep green Oregon trees, and hey! A marimba ensemble! Jog past them, jog, jog, jog, hey! A bluegrass band! Jog past, jog, jog, jog, look! A flute player with a friend holding an umbrella over her head! etc. Until finally, hey! A tiny samba band!

The tiny samba band was Jake, Jesse, Angela and me, apparently the only 4 samba musicians in town foolish enough to agree to a Sunday morning gig. It had really seemed like a good idea until the alarm went off at 7am. At 7am it seemed like a truly horrible idea. I actually thought "Maybe they won't notice if I don't show up" - ok, that might work in a 25-person ensemble, but NOT in a 4-person band. (This was the morning after Saturday's electrifying maracatu gig, you see, plus I'd had to miss a great opportunity to jam on some more late-night maracatu at a Jujuba show).

My hard-working cat, who has the job of waking me up in the morning after the alarm has gone off, had to bat my on the nose at least 100 times over the next 15 minutes before I finally dragged myself out of bed. She tried every variation she could think of: claws out (bad reaction to that one), claws in (better reaction), on the nose, on the eyelid, on the cheek, on the chin, left paw, right paw, quiet, different tones of meow; tireless worker that she is. Till finally I hauled out of bed and staggered to the gig. Past all the hordes of jogging people and all the 25 other tiny little bands.

So the cool thing about this gig was - no one audience member hears you for more than 30 seconds. So it basically means you can just jam on whatever you want! And the Jake/Jesse/Angela combo turned out to be a perfect jam group. We're not all actually in the same band - it's one of those situations where Jake and Jesse are in a band together, and Jesse and I are in a band together, and Angela and I are in yet another band together. (I guess the last link is that Jake and Angela need to start up another band.) That sort of thing is really excellent for a jam group, 'cause any pair of people can toss ideas at each other from their shared group, remind each other of little things, and then the other people can pick up on it.

It became so free-wheeling. Now it's a samba! Now it's a six-eight! Now it's a New Orleans second line groove! Now just try and guess what it is! So much fun.

The images that stick with me:
- There'd been a poor dog whose owner had stupidly left it tied to one of the tent stakes of the little tent that we were parked under. Poor thing! For most of our set he looked completely miserable. He pulled away from us as far as he could, well out into the rain, even dragging the tent stake a little ways out with him. What was that owner THINKING, leaving his dog alone with a samba band? Doesn't that legally qualify as cruelty to animals?

And then Jake started playing the cuica: Up came the dog's head. Up came the ears. Every note Jake played on the cuica and the dog would do another facial expression. SQUEAK, tilt head to the right; BWOOP, prick left ear; SQUEAK, prick right ear; WOOP, tilt head to the left; SQUEAK, prick both ears. Jake turned to face him and just played to the dog for a long time. I wish I'd had a video! Best cuica reaction I've ever seen.

- And then at least we were waiting for the very, very, very last marathoner. We could see her way in the distance, plodding along, all by herself, with two police cars slowly inching along behind her (the police cars were marking the official end of the marathon). So we played a whole special samba just for her, playing faster and faster and faster as she got closer and closer. When she finally reached us she put her arms over her head in a victory salute. We kept on playing till she disappeared round the corner.

And we staggered home. (or to Lions rehearsal, in my case.) What a fun gig. Hope to do it again next year. And what a fun bunch of people to play with. Hope to play with them again, soon.