Alexander's Real Time Band: Journal

The show last night at Star E Rose was a blast ! The highlight of the evening was the guest appearance of guitar virtuoso Hershel Yatovitz (http://www.myspace.com/hershelyatovitz) for the second set. I first became aware of Hershel about a year ago while watching Austin City Limits on PBS. He was performing as the lead guitar player for pop singer Chris Isaak (a gig he has had for over a decade). I was blown away by his performance and as fate would have it, two weeks later we met each other for the first time at a party. As it turns out, even though he tours and performs all over the planet with Chris and other rock luminaries, he lives right here in Portland. We have since become fast friends. It was an honor and a gas playing with him last night. The audience loved it too. This guy can play the guitar! Check out the photo on my gallery page at http://alexandersrealtimeband.com/photos.html .

Portland musician/producer, Jeffrey Dawkins is currently hospitalized and facing major uninsured medical expenses.

Jeff''s condition has stabilized after a close call a couple of days ago. He is still in critical condition. He is now entering his 3rd week of hospitalization.

Fund raising efforts are starting up. Visit http://jeffreydawkins.net for details on how you can help.

As I write this I am on the Empire Builder train heading toward Chicago. The final destination is St. Louis. It's Mom's birthday and I am going to help her celebrate. We are traveling somewhere through eastern Washington right now and it's pitch black out my window. But the accommodations are awesome. I have a deluxe sleeper cabin on this train. It's very cush. It's a 3 day trip by train but I have provisions and entertainment and all of you to keep me company (via this blog).

St. Louis is my hometown and I have some catching up to do with family and friends. I hope to document some more oral history from senior family members while I am there. I also have a couple of house concerts set up that I am looking forward to.

But I am really disappointed that I am missing the Portland Jazz Festival. It's going to be great this year. If you are in Portland be sure to get out and support it. That's the only way to make sure it's there next year. If you are wondering which shows to catch, let me give a big plug for my sister Mary Sue Tobin. She is all over the PDX Jazz Fest this year. For more info visit www.myspace.com/marysuetobin . Her dates are also posted in the guest book of this site, www.alexandersrealtimeband.com/guestbook.html .

I will been posting here a few more times on this trip. If you have any comments you can post them in the guest book. In the meantime, get out and support live music!

later-a

Tune in to KMHD 89.1 FM in Portland and you just might hear my tune, 'The River'. It's been added to their new release playlist. You can listen to KMHD on the web anywhere on planet Earth at http://www.kmhd.fm
Of course you can also hear the tune right here at http://www.alexandersrealtimeband.com/music.html

I got a chance to catch a set of Felina's Arrow last night at the Langano Lounge in SE Portland. It was a great show as usual. They had Sailor Banks sitting in on stand up bass, guitar and keys. She did a great job of adding texture to Felina's song book.

Felina's Arrow continues impress with the quality of their music. I am looking forward to our summer solstice show together. -a

I want to give a shout out to Artichoke Community Music in Portland Oregon (SE 31st and Hawthorne). My show there at the Backgate Stage last week was SO MUCH FUN !!!! What a great audience they have there. The place was packed and there were at least a dozen folk trying to get in for most of the evening; not to see me so much as just to get into the room. It's a great 'listening room' as one performer put it. They don't sell alcohol, there is no smoking, all ages are welcome. In short, there is no reason to come there EXCEPT to listen to music. That's why audiences and performers love the room so much.

I just posted an audio clip (MP3) from my last show there on the music page of this site. I have a couple of more shows booked there in the not too distant future. Check the calendar page on this site for more details.

Later, -a

Say Hey!

Welcome to the new site. I put this site together to focus on my activities as a performing artist. You can look here for calendar info, links to other performing artists, blogs about the shows, live recordings or to join the mailing list. My other web site, http://dubsquadmusic.net is focused on the activities of the publishing company (Dub Squad Music, BMI), like what's happening in the studio and what new releases are forthcoming from the DSM crew.

I wanted to separate the two so that my personal escapades on stage don't detract from the 'serious' work that goes on at DSM ;-)

I want to give a shout out to Host Baby (where this site is hosted) for providing musicians an inexpensive easy resource for creating a web presence. I have been developing web sites since the CERN spec that created the web was released in the mid 90's. Still, I find this hosting service and the tools provided to be perfect for any musician no matter what skill level or experience you have with the web. Why?

1. Host Baby is NOT (to the best of my knowledge) owned by a giant global media corporation and there is no need to associate your music with unrelated advertising (did someone say My Space?)
2. All the tools you need for calendaring, blogging, networking and audio posting have been created for you.
3. It's part of a community of, by and for musicians. There is a lot of support here.

Just for the record, no one at CD Baby or Host Baby paid me to say that. I am just another satisfied customer.

That's enough outta me for now.

Happy New Year! -alan