To read about Make Music Madison from 2013 – 2017, please see Make Music – Part 1.
2018
A song that I often sing at Make Music Madison is Jim Croce‘s “Working at the Car Wash Blues,” so my first photo idea for 2018 was a picture of me sitting in an abandoned car wash, wearing something blue of course. Then, the fact that I would soon be turning seventy gave me another idea. I first started playing guitar in the 1960s. This year at Make Music Madison would be the final year of my sixties. So, I decided to call my act “From the Sixties to the Sixties World Tour.” The left half of the photo I used was taken in about 1972; the right half was taken in about 2016. I put them together with a little Photoshop cutting and pasting to create the final image.
The weather on June 21, 2018, was not exactly conducive to playing music outside; it was raining. The performances are all scheduled to take place outdoors, but if a venue also has an indoor location, musicians could move inside when the weather does not cooperate. This was the first time it rained. Fortunately, I was scheduled to play on the sidewalk in front of Michelangelo’s Coffee House, which had room to squeeze performers inside. Also fortunately, there was room for more than me because again I was happy to have several of my neighbors join me for a couple numbers on the “stage.” My nephew, Jimmy Sustachek, was also willing to add a song or two. With the commotion of moving and playing inside, I forgot to put out my busker bucket so I just made my own personal donation to the American Cancer Society.
While I was playing, I kept seeing a tripod-mounted video camera pointed at me. That seemed a bit strange. The woman running the camera was not a friend or relative. When I finished my set she came over to talk to me. She was a reporter from WMTV, the local NBC news channel. She interviewed me for a while about my performing in Make Music Madison and told me it would be broadcast that night. Since I was curious, I asked why, out of all the hundreds of scheduled shows, she had decided to come to mine. I naturally assumed it had to do something with my fame or maybe a surprise recording contract. It turns out that she was assigned to get a story at one of two places. Since the performer at the other venue had a name that she couldn’t pronounce, she decided she would rather interview someone named Anderson. So, I guess it was my name, not my fame! When I watched the evening news, it was nice to see that in addition to my interview, my nephew also showed up in some of the video.
2019
In 2019, I was back on the sidewalk in front of Michelangelo’s. I didn’t bother to make a new sign. I still had one from 2018, which was different enough to use but I decided to skip it. All the performances were listed online and in a special addition of Isthmus so I figured I didn’t need anything else.
Fortunately, the weather cooperated this year and a lot of people turned out. Eric was there, of course, which I always appreciate and Matthew and Lisa surprised me by driving up from Indianapolis. A lot of familiar friends and family members showed up again. Most of them have shown up in past years. That made me wonder, is the reason they come back because (1) they feel obligated, (2) they hope that maybe I’ll finally do better this year or (3) they actually enjoy the music? I hope it’s the latter but I’m afraid to ask.
As usual, I enjoyed having neighbors join me for some songs and I also did my musical trivia questions with fabulous collectible $5 gift certificate prizes for Michelangelo’s. To add something new, I brought along a dozen kazoos and handed them out to some audience members. After teaching them the difficult task of playing this wind instrument, I asked them to play along while I sang “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.” (Remember Bobby McFerrin?) I thought this was fun and the participants were allowed to keep the kazoos. The audience must also have been happy because this year I contributed $169 to the American Cancer Society.
2020
As we all know, everything changed in 2020. COVID-19 was spreading around the world and deaths from that disease were starting to skyrocket. I had seen stories on the news about people sharing their music by singing on balconies or out of their windows. That interested me so, since I didn’t have a balcony, and neighbors were not close enough to hear me from my window, I decided to make videos of me playing some of my favorite old songs and post them on YouTube and Facebook. I started to do this in March and ended up recording a song every Sunday for ten weeks.
Here’s my version of “A Little Help from My Friends.” (Remember The Beatles?) Note that I talk for the first two minutes about the difficulty of keeping in touch during the COVID quarantine. If you’re patient, or click ahead, the song will eventually start.
When I made these recordings, I thought that Make Music Madison 2020 would be cancelled, but it was not. Instead of live performances, however, people were encouraged to make videos on June 21 and post them that day on Facebook.
On June 21 I decided to record “Country Roads.” (Remember John Denver?) Since I wanted it to be just like a “live” performance, I set up a bench in my backyard, turned on the video camera and planned to do the song in one take. As it turned out, about half way through the song my neighbor started to use his power saw! The roaring, squealing saw drowned out part of the video so, after he finished his job I want back out and captured this unedited second take.
All ten of my initial recordings, this “Country Roads” video, and an interesting recording that Matthew and Lisa submitted are now posted in this blog on a page named The Corona Concert. If you haven’t heard enough, you can find all of them there.
Obviously, setting out a busker bucket in my backyard would not have been very useful so I decided to post a fundraiser on Facebook. People were generous, maybe because they didn’t have to sit around for an hour-and-a-half, and I ended up raising $240 for the American Cancer Society.
2021
Things were a little better than in 2020, not because COVID had disappeared, but because vaccinations were available and people who listened to their doctors instead of their politicians now had some protection from infection. Make Music Madison was more open but participants were still told to follow Health Department guidelines. Social distancing and masks made me hesitant to return to my usual State Street location this year. After discussing the situation with some of my usual participating neighbors, I proposed that we just perform in my driveway and try to get neighbors to attend. So, I first created a photo for Make Music Madison to use on their website, and then I created a poster using a graphic from Make Music Madison that we could use for publicity in our neighborhood.
The week before the concert, I walked around the neighborhood with one of my neighbors and we handed out our hand-made fliers. I also tacked a few up onto telephone poles in the area. We set up a small table in our yard and Kathy and one of our neighbors covered it with plates of home-made cookies. I added some cookies I purchased at Costco and filled a cooler full of juices, sodas and water packed in ice. I moved the cars out of the garage to make our “green room” and, with chairs from our house and a neighbor’s house set up in the driveway, we were ready to go.
I was very surprised at the great turnout. At least 30-40 people eventually turned up for part or all of the show, some relaxing in the chairs and many others standing in the driveway and on the street. We had five acts, including me. They’re all included in the photos below. You probably know which one I am, but if you hover over the other photos below you’ll see the names of the other performers. Eric took all of the photos below.
The show went very well. All of the performers sounded great and, despite only very rough planning, it filled the scheduled time of two hours almost exactly. As always, I introduced the acts, did my usual trivia questions with fabulous prizes between the acts, and handed out kazoos so the audience could join us in a grand finale of “Don’t Worry, Be Happy.” No busker bucket, just a personal donation again.
2022
This is the tenth year of Make Music Madison. Except for the summer of 2017, when I was in Europe, I’ve participated in every one. So, I certainly couldn’t stop now! Since 2021 went so well, I suggested to a couple of my neighbors that we schedule another event for “The Anderson Family Driveway.” I created a flyer advertising our event and my neighbors and partners in musical crime, Ken and Ann, distributed them around the neighborhood. I set up a venue on makemusicmadison.org and advertised the performances that would be taking place at “The Anderson Family Driveway.”
I was surprised that we had another good turnout this year. About as many people showed up as did last year. Many of them came last year so I guess having heard us before did not discourage them. Quite a few people sat in the chairs we set out in the driveway. Others stood in the road or in the yard. We again had a table full of cookies and other snacks as well as a cooler full of cold beverages. It was quite warm so they were appreciated.
I started the show with a few of my favorite songs and then announced that I had a special guest who would join me for my last song. It was Winnie the Pooh! We’re both retired now and had met at a recent AARP convention. He joined me for “House at Pooh Corner” by Kenny Loggins. Between each of the acts I did my usual music trivia quiz. Instead of just asking questions this year, I decided to sing a line from a song and see if someone could sing the next line. Winners would, of course, win amazing prizes. This year, to keep things local, I awarded $5 gift certificates to Moka, a coffee shop on University Avenue. Each act was given about twenty minutes and, like last year, even though we didn’t rehearse or know what the others were going to sing, the show lasted almost exactly two hours. Many people stayed around a while to talk afterwards, which I thought was great. And, we were able to donate $100 to Mercy Corps to use for their work in Ukraine.
The only worry for me that night was the weather forecast, which included a chance of rain and a threat of lightning. If it did rain, my plan was to move into the garage. I assumed some people would go back home so that we wouldn’t need too much room to seek refuge from the rain. The clouds really put on a show while we played but, fortunately, not a drop of rain appeared on the scene.
So, what about Make Music Madison 2023? Ask me in a year.