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Tuesday, January 17, 2017

A Night For The Band Mom

Most of the posts on this blog are about yoga. I am a yoga teacher, optometrist, and a band mom. My son Jackson plays snare in our Edwardsville award-winning high school marching band and indoor drumline. He is a senior and is also section leader. My son Jonah is in our middle school concert band also on percussion. He is also a guitar prodigy, and an accomplished pianist.

They have a band called "The Hallquist Brothers". Jackson plays drums and Jonah, guitar. They have been in the studio once already and that effort can be heard on soundcloud. (Click here). Two or three years ago, they played open mic at Stagger Inn and wowed the crowd as two separate solo acts. I've asked them every year since to play it again, and Jonah vowed to never play another open mic without a full band. Well, that happened last night.

I warned them, "Boys, please only play two songs as there will be other acts that want to play as well. Don't bogart the mic." (School of Rock reference) Well, that was a moot point as the crowd LOVED them! I think they had two encores and played a total of 5 songs. Halfway through the set, a man from the crowd with a bass in hand asked if he could sit in. They had never met this man. They had been dealt a wild card. As he sat down, he smiled and said "You just play and I'll watch." Well, a few measures into the next song, he chimed right in and it was as if they had been playing together for a year. It was so beautiful to see the pitching and catching they were doing on stage. Especially during the final blues number in which players "trade", meaning the band plays the main blues chord progression, then each player takes turns soloing for 8 bars. They were incredible!!! Members of the crowd were filming them on their phones. Mom was proud.

After we broke down the drum set, I poked my head in the back office to check on them, and Jackson looked at me with a smile and said, "Mom, they booked us to play happy hour Feb 11." (WHAT??!?!?) I said, "Will you be paid?" Their Dad said "Yes, they will." Jackson's next statement, "Now we have to play for 3 hours!"

This moment could not have happened without every single day of their lives leading up to it. All those loud basement rehearsals, hours & hours of drumming, hot humid nights at Miner Park listening to them play with all the other teen bands, taking them to drum/guitar lessons, taking them to school band practices/concerts. Dreams do happen, but not without tenacity and hard work. My boys will do great things in this world. They were born for this. And as Butch said last night, "We are here to change the world for the better, one note at a time."