Little Charle

["Richard Kraus" <richard.kraus3@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Went to see Little Charlie and the Nightcats at
the Turning Point in Piermont, NY last night.
If you can't have a good time watching these
guys, you can't have a good time.

The place was packed to the rafters (on a 
Tuesday at 8:00 PM) and they put on a
great, funny, musically super show.  Rick 
Estrin, the harp player/vocalist had the crowd
rolling in the aisles with his routine and the music
was both amusing and technically superb.

Rick played both diatonic and chromatic and sounded
fine on both.  He used about a wide variety of styles
holding the mikes, using the PA, Chicago sound, acoustic
sound, you name it.  At one point, after a great and tasty
guitar solo, Charlie handed his guitar to Rick and walked
off stage.  Rick hoisted the ax and played a nice little (and
humorous) solo of his own.  Then Charlie wandered back
on stage, picked up a harp and mike and played a harp solo !!!!
Fun, funny and great upbeat music.  No one in the place was
not smiling.

After the show, I saw that Denis Gruenling and Gina Fox (the
vocalist in his band) were in the audience.  Denis told me, "you
gotta come out to hear the "big ones"."   I also saw several other
local harp players in attendence (guys I've heard at clubs in NJ).
They say when you see Orientals coming out of a Chinese rest-
aurant, that's the place to go.  I guess it applies to harp players
too.

One last thing, I saw that Rick uses a technique specifically taught
by Dave Barrett at his seminars: he establishes a simple theme
for many of his solos, then builds on it in a very structured way.
I'm not saying Rick learned it from Dave or vice versa,  rather that
Rick demostrates how effective the technique is at building tension
and a meaningful, moving solo.

That's it from NJ.

Best regards        Rich K