Back in 2011 i attended a workshop with master jazz guitarist Frank Vignola.
A couple of days after the workshop he was going to play a show not to far from where I live. At the workshop he invited the participants to come to the concert and offered the possibility to jam with him, Vinny Raniolo and Eric Bogart.
I talked to a friend and we decided to drive to the concert. I brought my original fretless Kala spruce ubass and a cord…
In the intermission I approached Frank and told him that I’d like to take him up on the offer to jam. We decided on Fly me to the moon and a blues…
Set two starten and I was called up on stage after the second song…
I brought my ubass plugged into the PA and of we went. We had not played a single note prior to this and there was somewhere around 150-200 in the audience probably wondering who that guy was taking the stage.
Fly me to the moon flew bye and Frank started to play the head for C-jam blues and after a somewhat shaky start (on my part) we found a nice groove.
I still love the part where I manage to steer us into half-time mode and the audience starts to clap along. Frank plays a smoking solo, I play a solo and we go into trade mode and finally manage to sync the ending pretty nicely!
This was a great experience and has also been great for my “ubass exposure” on YouTube with around 135.000 views to this day.
Last Saturday Frank played at a nearby jazz club and I went there with a friend. It was a fantastic concert. Frank played with top notch Swedish jazz musicians, Eric Söderlind, guitar, Hans Backenroth, upright bass and Joakim Ekberg, drums.
No jam for me this time but I managed to talk to Mr Vignola for a bit, telling him how fun it was when we jammed and that the video of that firat jam back in 2011 has been great for me. It’s nice to be able to give thanks for these things in person.
The sax and trumpet players from the support band was invited to jam. It’s so nice that Frank still pays-it-forward at his concerts!
Original blog posts:
PS: I have jammed with Frank Vignola and Vinny Raniolo once more. That time we played the Police song Walking on the moon. I played my Rob Allen Guitars MB-2 that time. Check it out here!
Play UBass! 