Tales From the Newsroom: Going backstage
The time I got to hang out with The Chieftains
One of the absolute best parts about being a newspaper reporter is the opportunity to spend time with some of the most creative people on the planet.
Getting to chat with them about the creative process is both an honor and a thrill, but after awhile you realize that no matter how talented, famous or rich, they’re still people. And what brings that home is when you get those coveted, almost mythical backstage passes.
The first time I was ushered back stage to meet the band after a show was at Miles Davis’ 1984 San Diego show; we didn’t get to meet Miles, but the photographer who’d set up our tickets, Andrew, got us into guitarist John Scofield’s room and we hung out there for awhile. It was wild just seeing how a top-rank venue like Humphrey’s treated its stars (low-key but swank in this case).
A few years later while stringing for the San Diego Evening Tribune, I’d interviewed husband and wife guitar and vocals team Tuck & Patti — and Ms. Andress invited my wife and I backstage after the show. They were the opening band (and I don’t even remember who they opened for!), so we had to close the door to their room to hear over the headlining act.
Over the years, if an interview went well, I’d get word from the venue publicist or the band’s manager saying so and so hoped I’d stop by and say hi after the show — or sometimes before the show. I got to meet blues guitarist Kenny Neal one time, and when my oldest was about 14, I took her backstage to have her picture taken with Queen Latifah.
The two backstage offers that stick out the most, though, are one I didn’t act on and then about 30 minutes being entertained by one of the great Irish folk singers and raconteurs.
At some point in our telephone conversation, it occurred to me that I’d erred grievously in not preparing to record the interview with Al Jarreau. Because he was no longer talking to me, but singing to make a point about how jazz composers have always borrowed ideas from previous popular songs.
And so I was the privileged audience of one for one of the greatest pop and late in life standards singers of his generation.
I was pretty pleased with how the interview had gone — more of a conversation between two music lovers, really — and I guess Mr. Jarreau thought so too, because at the end of our phone call, he said he’d really like to meet me at his show in San Diego.
Sure enough, the night of the concert when I picked up my media passes for the show there was an “all access” badge as well.
Jarreau was superb that night — a great mix of his R&B hits as well as jazz standards off his more recent albums. And that man could scat sing like nobody since Ella Fitzgerald.
But at the end of the show, I was, to be honest, a bit paralyzed with fear. What was I going to say to him outside of the formal structure of an interview? In an interview, I’m in charge - I choose the questions, I steer the conversation, I end the interview when I’m done.
But in a social setting? With who knows who would be in his dressing room?
I asked my friend who was with me if she wanted to go backstage. She, like me, is on the shy side of things. She asked if I’d be disappointed if she said no. I laughed and said I’d be relieved!
Looking back, I think I regret it — but I also remember how uncomfortable I was at the thought of trying ot make small talk with a group of music biz stars.
When the great Irish revivalists The Chieftains came to town for a show at the Center for the Arts in Escondido, I got to chat by phone with the band’s leader, Paddy Moloney. He was a character when being a character meant something. Funny, erudite, quick-witted, observant — I probably learned more about Celtic music in 45 minutes of listening to him over the phone than I have in the rest of my life combined. I mean, he knew not only the history of Irish music, but Scottish and Welsh as well, and knew all about Breton revivalist Alan Stivell.
As with Mr. Jarreau, at the end of our conversation Mr. Moloney said he hoped we’d get to meet — but before the show, if I didn’t mind.
I got there early and made my way to the stage door where I showed the pass that had been left for me at Will Call, and was let into the cavernous back stage area. It was pure industrial minimalist in style: Plain concrete walls, unfinished ceilings with duct work and conduits fully exposed. Quite uninspiring for a performer, I remember thinking.
Volunteer ushers kept directing us further and further back, until we got to a security checkpoint beyond which we could see the band milling about. I showed my pass, and the guard told me to wait — he’d let the band know I was there. A few minutes later, Mr. Moloney came out of their private area and guided my guest and I into a large room that wasn’t being used. And by large, I mean that it was about half the size of a gymnasium, and just as charming. There were some folding chairs in there, and he indicated them, the three of us sitting down.
For the next half hour or so, my friend and I were the sole audience of a one-main variety show. He regaled us with stories from the U.S. tour they were in the midst of, sang a few songs, told a few jokes, made a few more observations that were even funnier than the jokes.
The part I remember most clearly — and he came at you like an old vaudeville star, bit after bit, one after another with barely a break for a breath — was when he told us that he’d been at a wedding in Ireland the previous summer where Van Morrison and Paul McCartney were also guests.
He stood up, and showed us his interpretation of Sir Paul (as he referred to McCartney) attempting an Irish jig, which he said Sir Paul insisted on showing Moloney at the reception, telling him, “I’m Irish, too, you know!”
Moloney laughed uproariously at his recollection of Sir Paul’s dancing, turned to us, and said, “Ah, he’s a wonderful musician. But as a dancer?”
He laughed again as he shepherded us out so he could get ready for the show.
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