a strange experience

On Monday night, i was at Great Scott in Allston.
Were you?

It was the third and final installment of HUMANWINE's residency.

On Sunday night, i was at one of my favorite bars in Cambridge where i ran in to several of my favorite people, including Nate, the drummer for HUMANWINE*. He asked me if i wanted to come to the show, offered to put me on the list, invited me to sit in on a couple of songs.

So Monday evening, after a quick video chat lesson with one of my autistic piano students (i promise, that will be relevant later on), i headed to the bar. When i got there, Holly (the singer) jotted down a tentative set list and between her and Paul (the bass player) came up with a few chords.

After 4 opening acts, we were on. I wasn't nervous like i usually am. It was a fucking awesome set. HUMANWINE kicks so much ass, and were a ton fun to play with. Somewhere in the middle of the set, Holly needed to re-tune, and we fell into doing "Doh! a Beer" (this is ironic because not even three hours earlier, i was trying to coach an autistic 14 year old playing the same song, well..."Do, a dear") At one point, i looked back and Nate was giving me some sort of a nod of approval. That meant a lot. 

 here's the strange part...
At the end of the show, Holly sort of introduced the band. She thanked me for playing, though i'm not sure she knew my name, having only met me in passing once or twice.
...but the people in the crowd did know my name.
and they kind of cheered for me.
and i know that some of the people were friends
but many of them weren't.
they knew my name.


After the show, a lot of people said a lot of really nice, thoughtful, things to me. Many of them had seen me play with Army of Broken Toys or Jaggery, sit in on some Balkan jams with Goli, or perform at other random events at Cloud Club. A couple of them had even been at that first Garden party where i did a 1/2 hour of solo viola music during an approaching thunder storm.
Still...i didn't know them
and they knew my name.

*if you're not familiar, that's how the name of the band looks. always all caps. though i'm genuinely excited for having played with them, i'd hate for you to think of me screaming the band name at you every time it comes up.