05/04/2026
Jodi comes up with some of the most creative show ideas. When she reached out to me with the concept for The Songs Of Cortez, I was immediately intrigued.
Three artists, three performance areas.. the sound from each performer eminating only from their vicinity. No stage, no central PA. Each singing a couple songs then passing to the next musician in the round. Free to speak, tell stories, and perform their music. Each wrote a special opening song for our home, Cortez. No agreed genre, theme, or tone.. but you'd swear they'd rehearsed the show together based on the outcome. They didn't.. but the entire evening felt curated and stayed glued. Meaningful back stories, performers altering their set list because the performer before them inspired such. The term magic gets thrown around too easily, but the rapt audience demonstrated that magic was indeed the outcome of the evening.
From a technical point of view, the artist' needs were quite simple, one vocal mic, one guitar, one monitor. On the face it's a show I've mixed dozens of times.. until you seperate the musicians and disperse them around the room. Add to that a very unique test.. each performer had their own PA and their music only eminated from their location. As they conversed amongst themselves the conversation danced around the room. The heads and bodies in the audience moving, literally, toward each performer. A surprise request from Leigh asking Chris to accompany him on a song made an interesting challenge..how do you mix the instruments? I made a couple adjustments and hoped for the best. The applause said it must've worked, though I have notes should it happen again.. 🤷🏼♂️
I've now mixed over 150 performances.. but nothing quite like this. Seven unique mixes, three monitors and four main mixes (I sent the fourth mix to the bar room for guests unable to find a seat in the performance space). It was about 7.5 hours of work plus the 2 hour performance. Noon to 9:30 or so.. 😴
Deepest thanks to Jodi and The ZU Gallery Crew for a very special evening. Let's do it again next year?