Murphy’s Trousers is the faux Irish band that I put together upon occasion, and we were booked at the Red Stag Pub for Saturday night. Fred Gilmartin and Rick Weaver have a nice trio with Terry Hartzell on pipes, and, with Terry off to a pipers’ weekend, the lad asked me to fill in with some material we’ve developed over the last several years.
This is the first bar gig I’ve had in a while, but this is a particularly friendly and musically hip venue. We had practiced earlier in the week and had a good selection of tunes and songs ready. We mixed and matched material well, and the audience had a good time. I enjoyed performing in this familiar situation and the Celtic songs I do went over well. As a good friend in the audience commented, “Every song was about whiskey or hanky panky. These guys were misbehaving beautifully.” I was particularly glad that my daughter Rosalie and her beau Cory were there as well.
It’s not as tight a band as I would like, but, considering the barroom feel, it was a fine time had by all.
I packed up after these three gigs today and headed back to the SouthSide completely whipped, well-paid and glad that I can do this for a living.