Hey BLOG peeps,
Been in Nashville all week and just got home tonight. I played with my dear friend Charles Billingsley and a band of guys I really enjoy playing with and hanging with too! The conference was the AACC which stands for
American Association of Christian Counselors. It was held at the
Gaylord Hotel in Nashville and was an awesome week spent with some truly amazing people. My friends from New Life, both Henry Cloud and John Townsend spoke along with a cast of inspirational hero's from the Christian world.
I love Chuck Colson! He is always amazing. Joni E Tada was deep! John Piper, Gary Smalley... It was an amazing week! Music came from Charles but included Amy Grant, Michael Omartian, Star Field and lots of others! It was a really cool hang and I was blessed to be around so many great leaders.
Hanging in Nashville is always a treat. About half the band I was with lives in Nashville now so we had the inside scoop on good eats and it was great. I did a night on the town too - heading off by myself to the city and had quite the adventure.
It all started with Face Book posts and a new friend on FB writing me to say she was in Nashville too. I found out she was working at the TPAC theater doing Wicked and checked on tickets for the night. It had been sold out forever, BUT, they had information on a limited number of tickets to be released the day of at a really great price and I headed to the performing arts center to try this raffle process and try and see the show.
I had no idea what I was doing or where I was going, but, what the heck? I had the night off and now had a plan. The only problem was, this EVENT was advertised and, by the time they actually did he drawing for the tickets, 100's of excited people crowded the performing arts center with cameras rolling and 20 seats going up to the draw.
Well, I did get close.... Kinda! One of the names drawn started with Greg and the last name was close; something like Valaso. I was a little disappointed after 18 bucks to get there, 10 bucks for an umbrella because no one from So Cal would have thought it would be raining the whole time, and I knew someone so I would have got a tour of the pit and back stage area.
Well, I ended up downtown on a Friday night in Music City! Not a problem. I found a great place to eat and hung listening to great music, all country of course! It ended up being an awesome night and I had a ball.
That was Friday. Tonight is Sunday and I am home. I left Tuesday and just got back. It was a long week.
In Yamaha news, I did day 1 of video taping for a Cryogenic sax test last Monday; before the cryo process, and then I am scheduled to play the same saxes post cryo tomorrow on video for everyone to hear. I was totally excited to be apart of this experiment and I am probably most excited about getting a chance to hear the video before and after.
So, off to Yamaha to play these saxophones tomorrow and it will all be recorded so sax players can hear the before and after. I am loving September so far. Very exciting stuff!
The only other piece of news would be the Gospel Jazz Radio Show is still on hold. I was gone and not able to be very involved in the process, but this next week will be spent working on that area of the business. Then off to South Dakota for the weekend to do a church Gospel gig.
I'll post the outcome of the sax test tomorrow. Hope fall begins to feel like fall soon. Blessings until next post.
Greg Vail ~ SAXBOY
