[Harp-L] Harmonica on PBS and other stuff

["Rob Paparozzi" <chromboy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Just wanted to say thanx to all that responded to me about those recent TV appearances and apologize for not getting back to some of you as yet as I've been away from the computer and traveling. There may be some more stuff coming up with Dolly Parton in November so I'll try and post it when I know. I'll be in Istanbul with Bernard Purdie and the Rats in Nov. as well and Louisiana w/ my BS&T debut.

     Last week I did a gig at Dino BBQ in NYC and John Sebastian stopped in and sat in with our trio, he ended up playing the whole night...singing, pickin' and harpin'...we even did  a few harp duets....he's a super GREAT talent!!!!!!!!!

    Monday night I did the House of Blues in Cleveland with The Original Blues Brothers band and this past weekend played at the Kennedy Center, for the Mark Twain Prize Awards show, honoring Actor-Comedian Steve Martin. The show I believe will air with plenty of repeats etc...starting NOV 9th on PBS. The show is pretty good with some real funny moments and appearances by Larry David, Carl Reiner, Tom Hanks, Lily Tomlin, Paul Simon, Eric Idle, Martin Short and many clips from the large collection of Steve Martin's film career...he even sat in with us on 5 string banjo to play "Foggy Mountain Breakdown"!

    I'm not sure how it all came out on camera etc...but it was 2 full days of rehearsal and shooting. I was hired a Harmonica Player to play in the "House band" (The Jimmy Vivino band),  we played the guests "on and off stage" like most award type shows. It was pretty tuff as we recieved most of the charts when we got there and had to sight read them and make corrections as we rehearsed...

   This was a NICE spot for the Harmonica since the theme was "Americana"  in line with Mark Twain, there was some great trad. Country and old time Music which was fun to "Blow on". Then on Chromatic, we brought out Queen Latifah to "Isn't she Lovely" and Claire Danes to "Bluesette" so there was a pretty wide variety of styles covered.

     I didn't get to work with Diane Keaton as she brought her own pianist and did a duet..........

    The most fun for me was be featuring on a song on center stage with Randy Newman, he did "I Love to see you Smile", he had sent ahead his large band orchestrations for this song in advance. Jimmy Vivino the bandleader re-did Randy's arrangement for our 'smaller' 8 pc house band. On this song I played both Chromatic & Diatonic. Mr. Newman was a pleasure to work with and gave us the 'thumbs up' on the arrangement....I'm a HUGE fan of his and it was an honor to work beside him. The Band consisted of Tuba/Trumpet, Sax/Clar/Piccolo, Gtr/Fiddle, Guitar, Bass, Piano, Drms, Harmonica.

I played about 50-50 between Chromatic and Diatonic. When you do a UNION gig like this ALWAYS put in for a DOUBLE if  or are playing both and add another double for Bass Harmonica or Jaw Harp.

  PS..  I didn't get a chance to get this gig into Danny so I thought I'd plug it here...

this Friday Night 10/28, I'm going to do a gig with the legendary session guitarist David Spinozza at 

Trumpets in Montclair, NJ.....two of my favorite songs he (Spinozza) played on were:

"Something So Right" (Paul Simon) and "Right Place, Wrong Time" (Dr. John)...and David also produced and played on James Taylor's classic "Walking Man" record so I'm really excited to share the stage with him.

      Looking forward to Bonfiglio's Grand Canyon event in Sept 06....looks like it'll be VERY interesting!,-) We'll post more on that event soon.

Best to All,
Love Peace & Harps 
rob paparozzi