Pictures from the March 12 preview concert

Check out this album of pictures from the March 12 Joe Jackson's Night and Day preview concert at Richmond Triangle Players Theater.

Here are a couple previews:

"Steppin' Out" live in Brooklyn!

Here's a little teaser video, recorded this afternoon at my brother's apartment in Brooklyn.

Weekend in the City

It's been a big week! I met with a set designer for a meeting whose purpose I thought was to convince him to do the show, but it turned out he wanted to talk concept and layout; he was already on board. The percussionists came over to jam out on Monday and the singers congregated for the first big vocal rehearsal Tuesday nights. I didn't record any video because it was a lot of learning hard pieces, and a lot of stopping and starting. "Target," for example, doesn't translate so well when you're only repeating the same bridge and percussion solo over and over for 20 minutes. One great moment from Tuesday: the climax of "A Slow Song" is going to knock your freaking socks off. Damn, these singers are good.

I'm heading up to New York City this morning for a research and homework trip. I'll be up there through Monday morning. Goals:

1. Record some raw audio in interesting places for use in pre-show and intermission
2. Take some pictures to use in pre-show and intermission slideshows
3. Put a KickStarter video together with the help of my brother Patrick
4. Record some music with said brother (not JJND-related)
5. Do another thing
6. Meet some interesting people in some interesting places

So I ask you, dear readers familiar with New York: where should I go to meet some interesting people? I mean "Stranger than You" interesting.

Rehearsal footage 5/10/12: "Real Men"

We're into the weekly rehearsal schedule for the show now. Thursday nights the band meets, irregular nights I meet with the singers. Stay tuned for more updates. For now, here's our first run-through of "Real Men," featuring me (Andrew) on piano and vocals, Jake Allard on Percussion, and Adam Young on drums.

The joy of working with superlative musicians

I had a moment of joyful clarity last Tuesday evening. Sitting behind my keyboard in the music room at Rearden Hall (the home of Lucas Hall and Stacie Rearden Hall, my friends and landlords), I looked at the singers with whom I was working and said, "It's just amazing to work with superlative musicians."

Most of my band-leading experience has been with enthusiastic amateurs. I say this with nothing but affection; my work has called me into a lot of church praise bands, youth bands, and actor/musician groups, and I love the role of coaching up less-experienced musicians to create something bigger than what they thought themselves capable. The rare occasions when I have been gifted to collaborate with highly skilled, dedicated musicians have always filled me with wonder. It's just so much easier.

The rehearsals for the March 11 Joe Jackson's Night and Day Preview Concert are working like a concentrated microcosm of the eventual JJND rehearsal process. Good artists are busy artists, so it's a juggling act to make a rehearsal schedule work, but I'm willing to make my personal schedule somewhat chaotic in order to ensure the best musicians for a project. This week alone, I worked with singers Stacie and Liz Blake White on Tuesday evening and percussionist Jake Allard on Thursday. Tonight, Joe Hamm is driving up from Norfolk after work while bassist Philip Hamm meets us in Richmond, coming down from the DC area.

(I should digress here for a moment to talk about all these Hamms. I come from a very large, very artistic family. I have five brothers and two sisters, and all of us play at least one instrument. Most play several, like me. Phil is my older brother, and he's the one responsible for introducing me to Joe's music in the first place; in 1995 he gave me his old turntable and dozens of LPs, a collection that included Look Sharp!, Body and Soul, Big World, I'm the Man, Blaze of Glory, and most importantly Night and Day. Joe is my nephew; he and I took up the drums around the same time in the late '90s, and he outstripped me almost immediately. He plays for a fabulous rock band called Chasing Arrows. Phil and Joe are family, which makes working with them easy, but they're in the band primarily because they're excellent musicians.)

Adding Phil and Joe to a band already including Liz, Stacie, and Jake, musicians with whom I've worked dozens of times in collaboration for Richmond Shakespeare, Redeemer Lutheran Church, and other projects, brings me enormous satisfaction and peace of mind in the midst of what could otherwise be a problematic process. As it stands, the full band of six won't play all together in the same room until the afternoon of the March 11 show. It doesn't worry me a bit. Every time we start a new rehearsal session, the musicians just slide back into the easy communication we've shared so many times in the past.

I love working with musicians and theatre artists with less experience. The teaching element of direction and musical direction is a vital thread in my mission as an artist. But when the musicians don't need to be taught and barely even need to be told what to do, things blur from work to craft to art to sheer alchemy. It's simply amazing to work with artists who intuit naturally, and with musicians who listen with their hearts as much as their ears. You folks who can make the March 11th concert are in for a huge treat.

"Joe Jackson's Night and Day" preview concert and fundraiser March 11

Sadly, Mr. Jackson himself will not be
appearing at the event.

Step out for a one-time-only concert: a live music event featuring the music of Grammy winning, Oscar-nominated songwriter JOE JACKSON!

Featuring songs spanning Jackson's entire acclaimed career, including hits like "Is She Really Going Out With Him," "It's Different for Girls," "Happy Ending," and "Fools in Love" and the main event: exclusive preview performances of music from RTP's August world-premiere production of JOE JACKSON'S NIGHT AND DAY.

Pianist Andrew Hamm leads an all-star band including Joe Hamm of Chasing Arrows on drums, Philip Hamm on bass, Jake Allard on percussion, and featuring special guest singers Liz Blake White and Stacie Rearden Hall. This is a unique fundraising event for the August show, so bring friends and support local theatre and new works!

Tickets are $15, $10 for RAPT members, students, and seniors. Additional donations will be enthusiastically accepted. A link to the Facebook invitation can be found here.

The Richmond Triangle Players Theatre is at 1300 Altamont Avenue, Richmond, VA 23230.

New York City comes to Richmond, Virginia in a world-premiere concert musical

Night and Day

This summer, Richmond Virginia will see the world premiere production of the concert musical Joe Jackson's Night and Day, with music and lyrics drawn from Jackson's two New York City-themed albums, the classic Night and Day (1982) and its acclaimed follow-up, Night and Day II (2000).

Richmond Triangle Players' beautiful new theater will serve as host for the show, a mix of theatrical and concert elements developed by director/musician Andrew Hamm (your humble author for this blog). A live onstage band will back five of Richmond's best singers for some of the greatest songs of Joe Jackson's storied career, including "Another World," "Real Men," "Stranger than You," "Glamour and Pain," the hit single "Breaking Us in Two," and the classic "Steppin' Out." The show is scheduled for eight performance from August 8-18, 2012.

The seed for JJND  came when I saw Joe live on the Night and Day II tour in 2000. I had the opportunity to see the band twice, early on in Boston and then for the final performance of the tour in, appropriately, New York City. Aside from the fact that these were the best-performed concerts I had ever seen, something about the way they were staged catalyzed a lot of my ideas about the role of theatricality in live music. Joe has always used a few theatrical elements in his shows, and the 2000 tour was the most dramatic of his career: musicians made dramatic entrances and exits to emphasize musical elements, empty road cases served as scenic elements, one musician made a costume change during the intermission to play a drag king, and the show was even structured into a rough two-act format.

I spent the entire drive home brainstorming about the various characters and situations in the music from the two albums. More than the first album, Night and Day II is loaded with very specific characters and situations. Could multiple songs be sung by the same "character," creating a story arc? Could some of the songs be structured into duets, trios, and ensemble pieces? What would the younger sister from "Dear Mom" be like singing part of "Real Men," and what's the connection between the latter song and the transvestite prostitute from "Glamour and Pain"? How is the paranoia of "Target" like that of "Just Because," and could "Cancer" and "Chinatown" come from the same mouth?

There was another, more personal element to the story. While Joe was living downtown in 1998-99 writing songs about his turn-of-the-millenium Manhattan experience, I was living way uptown at 204th Street writing the music that would later become Strange Education, my own New York experience album. As a result, when I looked at Joe's music, I saw a reflection of my own triumphs and troubles in trying to create an iconic musical representation of the city. Joe, of course, actually hit gold with his; "Steppin' Out" is about as perfect a Manhattan song as you will ever hear, and over his career he has performed it as a ballad, a piano solo, lounge music, and in its original uptempo form. Like New York City itself, the iconic song has a multitude of faces, every one equally true and equally incomplete.

So Joe Jackson's Night and Day was structured as a songwriter's struggle to create the perfect New York City song, and of the people, places, stories, and questions that inspire him on his search. From the abrasiveness of "Hell of a Town" to the touristy excitement of "Another World," from the lost love of "Breaking Us in To" to the abandonment of "Love Got Lost," from the despair of "A Slow Song" to the bittersweet triumph of "Happyland," JJND is about both music and music's very creation, as seen through the lens of an artist striving to express his world with an honest voice. It's about the impossibly broad spectrum of peoples who call themselves New Yorkers, residents of a town "where there's always someone stranger than you." But mostly it's about the best damn bunch of songs I've ever heard played by the best band I've ever shared a stage with.

I'm incredibly grateful to Richmond Triangle Players, especially artistic director John Knapp and managing director Phil Crosby, for having faith in the vision of the show and making their space available. Stacie Rearden Hall, a dear friend and longtime collaborator, will be serving as associate director, providing a much-needed outside eye and fresh ideas. I produced a well-received workshop of the show in 2004, and drummer Adam Young and bassist Philip Hamm are returning to the show this year, joined by percussionist Jake Allard. Auditions are being held on Monday and Tuesday, February 27 and 28. See below for details if you're interested.

I want to acknowledge the enormous boost the show has received from Mr. Jackson's camp, as well. Mike Maska, Joe's manager at Big Hassle Management, has been an enthusiastic supporter of the project since 2003, and has helped move permissions and rights along with, well, very little hassle. Sean Melia and Tresa Hardin at Sony/ATV Publishing have also made things very easy. I'm enormously grateful.

One final note: This production is being funded from private donations and living room concerts. Please contact me if you're interested in helping to make Joe Jackson's Night and Day possible through a donation or by bringing live music into your home. All donations are tax-deductible.

This blog will be updated periodically with news updates, bios, links, live rehearsal footage, and other goodies. If you have any questions or comments, please email us at jjnightandday@gmail.com and we'll answer them for you.