Back Stage at the Iowa City Jazz Festival - George

When working back stage on our live broadcast of the Iowa City Jazz Festival, one misses out a bit on the atmosphere "out front" and you don't really get to listen to much of the music. But it is interesting to see what goes on behind the scenes as the stage crew works to get everything off stage after one act and get things ready for next.  We also get to see the performers arrive and see how they interact with other musicians, the crew and staff.  And we get to meet many of them "up close and personal" when they come to the KCCK tent to do pre-performance interviews.

Tidbits from those interviews include: 

-Joshua Redman almost became a lawyer rather than a musician.

-Jenny Scheinman's first home when she was a kid didn't have electricity.

-Bonerama listed influences going back as far as Jack Teagarden.

-Billy Martin of Medeski, Martin and Wood has converted one of his diesel vehicles to use grease from a Chinese restaurant.

-Music Director Steve Grismore would like to bring in Bela Fleck for a future festival.

The crowds were great in the aftermath of the flooding...especially Friday and Saturday. There was a huge crowd for the fireworks following Friday's final act.  Attendance was down a bit Sunday as hotter and more humid weather moved in.  It was perhaps appropriate (if unfortunate) that Joshua Redman's finale concert Sunday night had to be cut a bit short because of threatening weather.

The Jazz Festival gave me an opportunity to work with son Daniel (Soundhole Recording Studio), who set up and ran our remote broadcast control board.  Son Brady came down for two days.  He's an architecture student at Iowa State with an interest in urban planning and mass transit.  He enjoyed exploring Iowa City on his bike.  His thoughts can be found here www.dorm.org/~brady/?p=43

Disappointments:

I wasn't able to find my favorite vendor food this year.

Jenny Scheinman didn't play "The Orange Blossom Special" on her fiddle!

Overall, a great festival.