FOURTH NIGHT

Playing in Bloomsbury Theatre, London, 2008

ONE FRIDAY NIGHT in London some months ago I struck up a conversation on the 29 bus with a man who was heading to play a gig at a blues burlesque bar in Soho. As I had a few harmonicas on hand, he invited me to join the band for a song or two. An hour later I was on stage alongside two dancers in lingerie and nipple tassels who were gyrating to the harmonica solo in front of a crowd of cheering twentysomethings. My only other off-the-cuff performance as memorable as that one took place a few years ago while I was planting trees along a river on a Vermont dairy farm. I had just taken lunch and decided to practice a few blues licks before returning to the digging. Within moments of playing I was surrounded by a herd of Holstein heifers, each of them cocking an ear towards me and staring at me out of an unblinking eye. I am sure few musicians have ever had as attentive and wide-eyed an audience as I did that day. Keep reading→