35th Year as a Group

IT’S MY PARTY! will be celebrating thirty-five years of bringing music and live performance to our followers and fans. We will spend the next few issues of our newsletter reflecting on past members and sharing stories and artifacts. We have an exciting 2020 planned, which will include a new release, and possible touring outside of our local area.

What started out as nothing more than an idea in 1984, became a four-piece band, fronted by three amazing singers, each with their own unique spin on music and vocal delivery. Now, 35 years later, it felt right to look back and reflect on this amazing journey.

Noticing an SD card, on my desktop, and needing to try out my new computer — I was still running windows 7 on the old rig — I popped it in and saw that it contained two video files. One was from 2014, it was a short clip of my cat, Shane, who died recently from kidney failure. It was nice watching this and remembering what a great cat he was. The second video was an incomplete performance of “Moon River Cha Cha,”  by the group from the summer of 2015. Although the clip starts about halfway through the tune, I really liked so many aspects of this performance, and it will be the first in a look back during this special anniversary year.

“Moon River Cha Cha”

We have many influences as a group, and one is the movie and soundtrack from Breakfast at Tiffany’s. This movie, a band favorite, brings early 1960s New York City clearly into focus.  Hepburn and Peppard bring their characters to life, as Mancini’s soundtrack perfectly sets the tone for each scene and segue. At least once a year, we try to assembly as many band members and singers as possible for a viewing. 

We have performed two tracks live from the Breakfast at Tiffany’s movie soundtrack, “Moon River Cha Cha,” and “Something For Cat,” both instrumentals. These songs are recorded by a full orchestra or band, and it is a challenge to arrange them for our smaller ensemble. 

During our 2015 tour, “Moon river Cha Cha” was our opening number. The song begins with a guiro striking out a familiar rhythm before the band kicks in. The song speaks to the heavy influence Latin-American and Brazilian music had on the USA pop music scene at the beginning of the decade of the sixties. At about the halfway point of the tune, Mancini adds female vocals, and this provided us with a perfect opportunity for the singers to walk on and then participate during the second half of the song.

I hope you enjoy watching this as much as I. Notice Sarah’s unbridled enthusiasm; Dylon, our keyboardist, swinging to the groove, and our violin section, who instinctively sway to the music, even though they do not play in this number. I also love the little misques here and there. At our performance at the Gig in Hollywood, back in 1999, Darian Sahanaja, who was working with Brian Wilson at that time, met with me back stage and complimented the group. I knew that we had made a couple of mistakes, and said to him that we needed a little more polish, his response was, “Please don’t.” I didn’t quite fully understand his remark then, but I do now, especially in light of all the computer generated perfection, and overly-slick live performances we hear and see in music today.

Please leave a comment on our YouTube page for this video.