It's Been Awhile - part 2

This pic was taken outside of Black Hawk College's gym (Bldg 3) back on April 4, 2009. Last gig played with Lewis on bass before he left for the Bay Area. A tremendously talented musician and lifelong friend of mine. Lew's in the front row on the far left (without a hat on) sittin' next to John Kinser (bodhran and percussionist), that's me next to John. The back row has Heather (my oldest daughter) on the left, she plays spoons, sings, and is workin' up the concertina, and Pat Oliver who plays pennywhistle, fiddle, mandolin, and sings, also. It's a fun combination for Fire In The Belly. It was a crazy gig that day. I wouldn't want to be soundman for such an event. We played for 15 minutes and he had to setup mics and get us mixed in the first tune. There was no room in the schedule for setup. And yet, he did a remarkable job!

Yeah, It's Been Awhile...

The image to the left is a table card for when we played at Huckleberry's Pizza in the District of Rock Island this past (2009) St. Patrick's Day weekend. Even now
Fire In The Belly's undergone changes. The bass player, Lewis Demitri, has gone to the Bay Area in search of employment in the renewable energy sector and probably will move out there as that's where his and Kathy Demitri's hearts are at, as well as their daughter Avalon, who's dancing in the San Francisco Ballet Company.

Seems like that's all bands do, play and undergo changes. Had a bit of trouble dealin' with the changes myself until a friend, Mike Blomme, made a lot of sense to me when he said, "Why change the band name, man? Band's change personnel all the time. Journey's got only one original member in it right now but they kept the name of Journey." It's funny what revelations can occur during a late night chance meeting in a grocery store aisle.

Another thing that happened was a customer, Gloria Fisher, wanted me to use Fire In The Belly because she liked that name better than Red Sky. She said it sounded like there was going to be upbeat, fun, toe-tappin' put-a-smile-on-your-face fiddle tunes played! Hope we pleased her last Thursday. The crowd seemed to enjoy it!

So, it's Fire In The Belly from now on and who knows who'll be playin' with me from gig to gig. Though there's the core group of John Kinser and myself, it could be any of a dozen or more friends we know of who can fill in when someone has to work or has other obligations that can get on stage and play the tunes or have a fine enough ear that they can follow well! After all, as John Harford asked, "What should it be if it shouldn't be fun?"