A Day in the Life - Donna Summer Gig

About two years ago I had the privilege of playing with the "Queen of Disco" Donna Summer. Here is the quick rundown of that event. I was booked for the event by my good friend, Dino Pastin a month or two before the event. I recieved the charts to the Donna Summer songs but we only received 2 mp3's from her people. The one and only rehearsal was called for Friday at 7:00pm. Friday at 4:00pm, I finally got a call from Tommy Sims assistant who was going to email a link to the mp3's. I tried, the previous night to download them off of iTunes but a lot of the ones on iTunes are the radio versions of the songs and not the live versions. But I did find a couple of the live versions on YouTube and those versions matched up pretty well with the charts we were given. So, I finally had the mp3's in a listenable format at 5:00pm (2 hours before rehearsal). I got about 45 minutes of rehearsal on the six songs before I had to get ready to go. With 6 songs to learn and only 45 minutes you really only have time to just go through the songs and make notes on the music.

So, I went to rehearsal and met the guys in the band. The band consisted of...

Marcus Finney - Drums (Played with Larry Carlton, Billy Preston, Kirk Whalum)

John Billings - Bass

Nathan DiGasare - Lead Keys/Music Director (Nathan was nominated for a Grammy in 2005 for Best Contemporary Christian Pop Album of the Year)

Tommy Sims - Rhythm Guitar

Yours Truly - Lead Guitar

Scott Whelan - 2nd Keys

Dino Pastin - Sax (Keyboard/Sax player for country super group Alabama and he also played on the Jam Along CD's for L&MG)

and several other musicians in the brass section.

The rehearsal went well right from the first song. (It turns out, for a follically-challenged white guy, I can play disco pretty convincingly.) I felt that we were in some sort of parallel universe where I am playing the lead guitar parts and the great Tommy Sims is playing rhythm guitar next to me. I had to focus on my parts but I was keeping an ear on him and his little fills sounded great. (It sounded almost as good as if Tommy Sims were actually there playing them, Oh wait a minute...) ( and by the way, all of the charts were in music notation, no TAB. )

Tommy actually ended up being the nicest guy in the world and he was very complimentary to me. And yes, he does wear sunglasses at night.

Everyone came away from rehearsal pleased that it was sounding so well and looking forward to the gig. I was relieved that it went so well. Being a fill in musician during these sorts of rehearsals can be very stressful if things go south. "Uh, Mister Guitar player, what so you think you are playing? It's supposed to be the solo just off of the record. Now, let me hear you play the solo off of the record.... right now... with no one else playing.... perfect."

So, yesterday we had load in to the venue at Noon. We were playing at the new Symphony Center in Nashville. It is an incredible venue. Downbeat for the band was at 1:00pm. Donna was going to arrive at 2:00 for a brief soundcheck. We eat at 5:00pm and play at 9:00pm.

We had our soundcheck and then Donna Summer came out to check her mic. Man, can she sing. It was pretty much down to business but I must admit, when I was playing She Works Hard for the Money and she was singing and I glanced up looking at all of the lights and seeing her sillouhette, I did have a flashback to seventh grade school dances and get a little star-struck for a moment.

I remember during the actual performance looking out in the venue with a packed floor of people all staring up at the stage with their candlelights on their tables. It looked just like a movie.

The performance went well. Everybody loved it and loved her. We played well. It was a fabulous event and in 25 minutes & six songs it came and went all too quickly.

I had a great time.

I hope you are all well and thanks for coming along on with me on the Donna Summer Gig.

Keep Learning and Growing!

- Steve Krenz