It is the Saturday night of my last gig with the wedding band for this year. Not because of some planned 3-month pre-maternity leave from singing but simply because there are no more gigs until January, when my nine months will be up. Tonight’s job is at Manzo’s banquet hall, in Des Plaines, not far from home. It is an easy 20-minute ride after peeling my children off of me as they attempt to squeeze in one more hug before I leave for the evening. The dance music is scheduled for 8:00-11:00pm, which is good, I won’t be out too late. A full day of mothering and setting up church music for Sunday morning has already worn me out.
The parking lot is packed. Since I only have to set up a music stand and plug in a vocal microphone, I’m always the last musician to arrive. Since the bride is the daughter of the owners of the hall, it looks like everyone who has ever purchased a wedding package here has returned for the festivities. My small car fits into a tiny space at the far end of the lot, and my stuff isn’t heavy, so it’s no big deal.
What is a big deal is the event going on inside. It’s 7:55pm, five minutes until the couple’s first dance. The guests haven’t even begun to eat dinner. Apparently, there are so many guests that the open bar and appetizers portion of the menu took much longer than expected. The first best man (there is more than one) is giving the first toast. He is followed by a second best man, a maid of honor, and a bridesmaid. I lose count. Father Carmen gives a blessing.
At this point, the bandleader dismisses me to find a comfy chair out in the hallway. Our 10-piece band is crowded and there is no place for me to sit down in the dining room, plus there is a DJ set up on the same stage area. The band plays dinner music and I retire to the hallway, where two tuxedoed men are setting up a real espresso bar, with the copper steamer, chocolate shavings, fancy sugars and chocolate-covered espresso beans. They use LaVazza beans, which they assure me are very expensive but also the best. As they have no guests to serve yet, they chat with me, pouring a double-shot latte, decaf, because I’m drinking for two. No small demitasse cup for me, I get the big to-go cup. It is hot and foamy and very nice. These guys are serious about their coffee duties, they have a gig tomorrow at the Palmer House.
The guest list with table assignments is printed on a large poster right next to my comfy chair. This is the biggest Italian wedding that I have ever witnessed. The guest list is populated by family names like Salerno, Passannate, Fannelli and Deluca, as well as O’Shea, Zagorski and Kranz.
As I sip my drink, I meet the star of the evening, the Dessert Lady. We are in a long, narrow hallway, right outside the ballroom doors. She has several six-foot tables set up against one wall, draped in sheer white and gold buntings. The tables have platforms covered in linens on them. Interspersed are enormous floral arrangements of hydrangeas, lilies and harvest-orange roses on pedestals. There is an ice sculpture of two hearts pierced by an arrow, glistening on the center table.
She begins the project of going to and from the hallway to a back room and returning with tray after tray of fabulous confections. She places baskets made from chocolate, including handles, filled with raspberries and cream on mirrored platters. She has cones of chocolate-covered strawberries amidst chocolate-mousse cakes. She has created cream puffs that have swan’s heads and wings crafted out of pastry. A chocolate Effiel Tower stands surrounded by petit fours. A chocolate grand piano opens to a view of pastel covered candies where a piano’s strings would be. Swans made out of white chocolate flank either side of the ice sculpture. Boats like the kind you would see in the canals of Venice are made out of chocolate and filled with fruits. Tiny plastic champagne glasses are filled with three different layers of liquor-flavored creams and topped with slivers of berries and twigs that are, of course, made out of chocolate. Real fruit, not covered by candy, is also on the stunning display. Blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, kiwi, melons and pineapple slices.
The violinist is strolling from table to table, I hear the strains of “O Sole Mio” coming from the dining room. A half-hour into my job, and I’m still drinking coffee. I have been to a lot of weddings and many post-concert receptions featuring sweet tables. I have already guessed that I am watching a Polish woman from Oak-Mil Bakery set up a 40-foot length of sweets. Sometimes, I make a pilgrimage there for paczki, they are that good.
She looks fifty-ish and she is wearing red alligator skin high-heeled boots with squared-off toes. Even in these heels she is only about 5’4” tall. She has black jeans on, with rhinestone-encrusted pockets, both front and back, a black leather belt with silver studs, and black sweater that doesn’t quite reach her fashionable low-rise waistline, giving everyone a view of her bronzed, un-toned midriff. Her hair color betrays her devotion to peroxide, and her face displays either an addiction to nicotine or too many trips to the tanning salon. She is poetry in motion.
After bringing out even more treats like tiny custard fruit tarts and squares of pecan pie dipped in chocolate, she turns to a cart full of greenery, berries on branches and cream-colored roses. Now she adds her floral touches in between the pastries, going up and down the length of the many tables until she is satisfied with the results. Next come trays of candles, candles on crystal stands, candles floating in vases filled with rose petals and a big lighter.
The diners are experiencing a break in courses and the only route to the restroom or to smoke outside is to walk past me and the Dessert Lady. The guests are clearly noticing the decadent display and make favorable comments in English and Italian. One portly gentleman exclaims that he just had his teeth cleaned and he can’t have any of this, as if that’s the only reason he might need to skip the calories. Others indicate the desire to bypass the main course and go right to dessert. Not so, for the Dessert Lady is installing velvet ropes meant to keep their hands off the goodies until the appointed hour.
The band is playing “Besame Mucho” as a parade of beautiful young women make the trip down the hallway to the Ladies Lounge. What is remarkable is that they are all wearing incredibly high heels. Four-inch patent-leather stilettos with peep toes and platform fronts, studded with faux-jewels are everywhere. For lack of a better term, I would call these some of these styles “dominatrix heels”, and I marvel at how girl after girl walks down this hallway on her tippy toes (Even if I had a pair of shoes like this, which my husband would love to come home and find me cooking dinner in, I think I would need a chiropractor immediately after removing them). Not just the younger girls, it seems that everyone under the age of 45 is wearing their fanciest shoes. Even the grandmas are wearing pumps, albeit with more sensible heel heights. My own pregnant ankles are the size of grapefruits right now and I am rather embarrassed by the fact that I am wearing black leather riding boots with ¼-inch heels (If you listen closely, you can hear my mother saying “put your feet up” as she reads this). There is no way I could have worn pumps.
Very short formal dresses are in with this crowd, all the better to see your shoes in. In just a few minutes, I see purple satin, red chiffon with even redder maribou feathers, gold, scarlet, teal, and electric blue. The young men with these colorful ladies are favoring black. They are tall, dark and handsome. I witness a few who must help their dates adjust their skin-tight dresses. “See, it’s bunching right there, see it? See it?”
The mother of the groom is wearing silver chiffon studded with rhinestones, She comes out to “ooh” and “aah” at the work of the Dessert Lady. She has had quite a few drinks and needs a little help from the bridesmaids, who are dressed in cerulean blue chiffon gowns that also include rhinestones, in navigating the narrow hallway so as not to crash into the sweets.
I am hoping that Dessert Lady will leave for just a few moments so I can tuck some small treat into my bag to bring home to the kids. She does not take a break for even one second. I hear the introduction to “What a Wonderful World” start up and it’s show time.
Or, maybe not. One song is sung, but the guests have just finished the pasta course. It’s 9:00pm and a small army of white-gloved waiters is now serving the main course, filet mignon. Suddenly, a mini-bagel with peanut butter and a few spoonfuls of Campbell’s Princess Noodle chicken soup doesn’t seem like enough dinner. Especially after watching the Dessert Lady for an hour. Another fifteen minutes of instrumentals and I have earned about $100 so far this job by doing nothing.
Time for the band to take a break, and we all adjourn to the hallway where the Dessert Lady is still not allowing anyone to take a bite. She says that she started working on all of the chocolate decorations, fans, twigs, leaves, boats, etc., on Friday morning. A sweet table of this dimension is a full two-day project. By now, the photographer is taking detailed pictures of it and guests are pulling out their camera phones to document this overabundance of sugar and heavy cream. Dessert Lady sits in my comfy chair and guards her masterpiece as if it were the Mona Lisa.
You know that you are at a good ethnic wedding when “to-go” boxes are handed out. Guests are packing up their leftover steaks. They are served a dessert, personal cakes shaped like hearts, and in addition, a giant white wedding cake is brought out. This cake is sliced and the wax-paper wrapped pieces are placed near the coatroom for the guests to take home, perhaps to freeze and eat on the one-year anniversary of the happy couple. Bride and Groom are visiting each table, the bride’s dress is covered in lace interspersed with crystals, her veil twinkles.
The lights dim, wheels of colored lights turn and make the entire room glow blue, now pink, now gold. The senior folks ask for tangos, fox-trots, waltzes. I sing Rosemary Clooney’s version of “Mambo Italiano”, which has many words in it. It’s a little hard to concentrate on lyrics like “Hey, goombah, I love-a how you dance the rhumba” when an internal child is doing the cha-cha in your belly.
A second wave of guests is arriving, mainly young people who have been invited for dessert, coffee, drinks and dancing. The Sweet Table is open for business and I watch plates piled high with mini-cannoli and cream puffs make their way with patrons from the hallway, across the dance floor and back to tables. Like Tracy in the Partridge Family, I play the lame tambourine on a few numbers, although I look more like a middle-aged Laurie. We play the usual rock, country, big band stuff, and “Mamma Mia”. How are they dancing in such high heels? By taking tiny steps and swaying from side to side, clinging to their dates or even to their girlfriends because girls always dance with girls at these parties.
The well-fed and sugared-up crowd is discoing and hugging, laughing and kissing. The bandleader is frustrated and upset momentarily because the pianist is a sub and he doesn’t get the transition between two of the songs right. I tell him to “let it go” because these people do not care, they are having a great time, just look at them.
It’s 11:00pm and the DJ takes over. This group is going to dance for a long time. The espresso guys are working until 12:30am. I have not worked very hard at all, and it takes about five minutes for me to pack up my music and bid the wedding business farewell until next year. One male guest in a shiny suit says to me, in a voice like Father Guido Sarducci, “that was-uh real nice-uh”, the mother of the groom gushes over the beauty of the music (she’s still feeling good) and I’m glad that my singing made into the schedule.
Back in the hallway, I see that Mr. Clean Teeth is forsaking his purity pledge. Although the large crowd has descended up it, Dessert Lady now has a young man helping her to constantly re-arrange the treats so as to appear less ransacked. She makes my day by placing, you guessed it, “to-go” containers on the Sweet Table! She is an artist, but her chosen medium is perishable, and it must be consumed in order to fulfill its tasty destiny. A selection of teeny fruit tarts, chocolates and melon will surely draw squeals of delight from my girls tomorrow. Except for the square of chocolate-covered pecan pie, which does not make it out of the parking lot. Yum, that’s-a nice-uh.
Monday, October 12, 2009
Monday, September 28, 2009
A Day's Worth of Kisses
Monday, September 28, 2009
The first gig is in a church in a south suburb of the city. I need about 40 minutes to get there. Lena is still asleep as I prepare for the job, I leave some grapes and a choice of outfits for her in the living room. She will wake up before daddy does and know to get dressed. I kiss the top of her sleepy head and tiptoe out of the bedroom.
The gig is an Irish funeral for an elderly gentleman, Mr. Mahoney. This in itself is not unusual or remarkable except for the fact that the family asked for an Irish instrumentalist, too. That means that I get to sing with one of my favorite Irish musicians, Jimmy, who plays guitar and whistles. He will be groggy and late because he was out at a bar gig until the wee hours of the morning and should probably still be asleep. (He has four kids, so, how late would they let him sleep, anyway?)
He is Irish-from-Ireland, and that means, even though he is cutting it close in getting to the church, he must pause for a moment to kiss me “hello”. A buss on the lips followed by “good morning”. Together, we have as much fun as is possible while playing music at a funeral. The 85-year-old priest begins the Homily by saying, “Everybody wants to go to Heaven but nobody wants to die”. We are giggling. Jimmy plays his instruments so beautifully, you’d swear he was wide awake. I know I haven’t done a bad job myself, because both Jimmy and the music director at the parish praise the singing in ways that they just don’t have to. After we walk to the parking lot, we exchange the “good-bye, see you later” smooch that is required in order for us to part ways. He’s a great musician, a sweet person, and I just love him.
I race home in order to see Lena before she goes to preschool. I make it there in time to sit with her for a few minutes while she waits for our neighbor to walk across the yard with her own preschooler and collect Lena for their carpool. She is wearing purple Crocs on her feet and I notice that the Tinkerbell charm in her shoe is missing its head. As I remove the headless fairy, Lena is asking me to rethink my plans for the day and to come home while it is still morning. (Morning for Lena is anytime when you can still see daylight.) I tell her that I will be home before she wakes up on Saturday and I help her put her backpack on. We walk towards our neighbor’s car, and Lena kisses me goodbye, going off happily with her friend. I already miss her and I love her.
Following a quick trip to the Jewel for some provisions so that the family will not starve while I’m away for the rest of the day, my husband anxiously desires a cup of coffee from the Caribou. I don’t know why he doesn’t want to brew a pot at home but, hey, he’s buying so I’ll go with him on my way out of town. First I have to swap my funeral-singing clothes for the outfit that I will need in the evening. He patiently finds my microphone and helps put the groceries away. We get coffees at Caribou and sit for a moment in their comfy chairs, chatting about neighborhood happenings. He looks a little tired, possibly from lack of coffee until 1:00pm, or from the tremendous effort he is putting into creating class materials for a music camp that he will be teaching at next weekend. I could sit all day (or go home and nap), but I have to get moving. I kiss his cheek because I love him.
The next stop is all the way northeast, into the city, where I will spend time being an Arts Administrator. Half-way there, I get a phone call saying, “Where are you? We miss you!” I am coming as fast as I can, although Chicago’s finest cops have inexplicably come screeching into the intersection near the Superdawg and closed it right in front of me. A small detour is required.
Polish-from-Poland people share the same kissing culture as the Irish-from-Ireland do, and both the boss and the secretary of the organization that I am on my way to fall into that category of Polish-ness. However, I see them both so often, that we have developed an un-spoken understanding of when to kiss “hello” and “goodbye”. We do it when we are out on social occasions or at post-concert receptions. We save the biggest Polish kisses, three times – one cheek, the other cheek, the first cheek again, for Christmas and Easter activities. We are released from kissing obligations at our office. On this particular day, I solve a major problem for the boss who is preparing for both a concert on the weekend and a yearly board meeting. “I love you!” she cries out to me. This is such a frequent sentiment expressed at our office that I offer her my standard response “What’s not to love and I love you, too.” (Just don’t kiss me, I’m trying to get some work done!)
The Presbyterians that I know are not an overly kissing bunch. Genuinely caring, yes, and they like to shake hands and hug each other on Sundays. Today, one of them has an artistic concern that is bothering her to the point of sleeplessness. In between prepping music and writing paychecks for tomorrow’s concert, I read email messages from her and attempt to compose a cohesive message to her that might assuage her fear of being treated unfairly by the Music Director, who happens to be me. I think I have crafted a loving and thoughtful reply to her, perhaps we will exchange a hug soon.
It’s 8:00pm now and that’s really bad because I am still in the office near Lake Michigan and I am supposed to be standing in front of a band at a country club near Elgin by 9:00pm. It’s too far, it can’t be driven in sixty minutes. The boss, who is the one who has begged me to stay and help finish things for the board meeting, finally makes me leave by saying, “I love you, but, get out of here!”
It’s 9:00pm now, and I have somehow made it, in a light drizzle, to the highway exit, only 8 miles from the country club. The phone is ringing, it is the drummer who, of course, would like to know where I am. I am coming as fast as I can, I’m almost there, I ask him to have the male vocalist, who is also the guitar player in the band, to start singing the set. There is a small problem with my suggestion because it seems that the guitarist thinks the gig is on Saturday, and today is Friday. The guitarist’s wife knows not his whereabouts. The band would be really grateful if I get there soon. It doesn’t matter that I am late because the event includes a charity auction, which is still going on.
Seven men in tuxedos are very glad to see me at 9:10pm because they are huddled together trying to re-do the set lists for the evening. Fear not, I say to them, because we live in the era of internet on our cell phones, I can pull up the lyrics to any tune that the male singer does. (Just don’t make me sing “Mony, Mony”, I’m not getting paid enough for that!) The only one who has to suffer anxiety now is me, the person who will have to sing the songs she doesn’t really know. A list is written, the auction is over, the guitarist calls, he is shocked at his own forgetfulness but he is on the way! I am so happy when he arrives that I could kiss him! (We’re busy, so I won’t.)
The view from the bandstand is one of sparkling wealth and privilege, people are dressed to impress. Ladies of a certain age show proof that doctors who perform botox injections and personal trainers earn a good living in this neck of the woods. Also striking is the decades of age difference between some of the more beautiful women and the men they appear to be escorting or married to. I have clearly let my career opportunities to become a trophy wife pass me by, since I am on stage both in my 40’s and pregnant. C’est la vie.
One female guest stands out. She looks Latina, the only one in the room who is not part of the wait staff at this gala affair. She is wearing the loudest dress, a pastel that stands out in a sea of dark colored frocks. It is floor length and fringed like a flapper girl outfit, and it has a very daring, long slit in the back. She dances with abandon all evening. She laughs and smiles, she does not appear to have a frozen face. She is not the youngest or the most classically beautiful of the women in the room, but she is alive and captivating. It is impossible not to notice her throughout the course of the dance sets.
The benefit of my having warmed up vocally early in the day, and having already sung quite a bit before arriving at this gig, is that I sound good. Better than I should sound because I am now getting sleepy. One of the sax players notices both, “God, you sound great today. You look kind of tired.” The guests at this party are nice, a cultured group. They care enough to hire live musicians, and they come up to the stage to talk to us and compliment us throughout the night. It is a pleasant job. They are trickling out now, towards the coatroom, many of the ladies taking the extravagant floral centerpieces with them.
We will play until as long as the contract requires us to for the hearty few dancers who still want to party. This includes the Latina lady in fringe. She dances, now with her girlfriends, until the last note is played. At which point, she scoops up her own centerpiece and runs up to me. Thrusting the large bowl of flowers, tall gladiolas, freesia, gloxinia and greenery into my hands, she says in accented English “Take this, this is for you, you deserve it!” With exuberance, her arms encircle me and the bowl of flowers, she hugs me, and kisses my cheek. I don’t know her name, but in this moment, I just love this adorable woman.
After the long drive home, there is no one awake to give me a good night kiss. At 3:00am, with giant flowers on the table, I head for bed, confident that my husband and children will shower me with good morning kisses when the sun comes up.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Thoughts from the Funeral Service Trenches
September 23, 2009
2. Snappy comeback needed in response to the relative who, before hearing my voice, declared me incompetent to sing the O'Malley funeral Mass because I do not have an Irish surname. Has he considered that it might be a married name, or that I could be Irish on my mother's side, or that a spelling mistake was made at Ellis Island, or that Susan is really Siobhan? That's not the case, of course, but, this is the U.S.A. and those are valid possibilities. (Perhaps my friends who include, for example, Fergus, Berndt, Moore, Cowan & Keane can show me the secret "approved by the Irish" handshake! )
I don't usually sing for the deceased with anger in my breast, but this comment did get on my nerves. I had nothing to say in response to him at the time except that I was the singer who was hired and present and I would do my best. So, I threw myself into it with the goal of making the music so beautiful that Uncle Jack would cry. Which he did, during the sacred version of "Danny Boy".
3. Apology accepted, Uncle Jack. Hey, is that your phone ringing?
Friday, September 11, 2009
Thankful Moments and Great Eulogy Closing Line
September 11, 2009
A singing friend with a sore throat needed a sub for a 10:00am Irish-Polish-Italian funeral at St. Thecla's on Chicago's northwest side. Repertoire requirements included "Serdeczna Matko", "Ave Maria", "Santa Lucia", "Celtic Alleluia" and "The Rose". Luckily, I had sheet music for "The Rose" in a file of music dating from my high school years on my back porch, right next to "You Light Up My Life" (hey, you never know what someone might want to hear). Thank you, Kathy, for helping me earn the cash to pay for the party (get well soon)!
St. Thecla's had a huge rummage sale going on. Thank you, St. Thecla's, for Laurel's new $1.50 pair of ice skates, and for two Build-a-Bear outfits at $.50 each!
My dear friend and fellow singer Ewa lives right down the street from the church. She doesn't know "The Rose" so, she could not go sing the funeral at her own parish. But, she called and invited me over for homemade butternut squash soup, fresh croutons and cookies. She gave me a nice maternity top. Thank you, Ewa, for free lunch, clothes, and conversation!
My parents were driving to town today from Iowa, on an afternoon when I desperately needed a babysitter before York H.S. students are available. Thank you, Mom and Dad, for free babysitting!
The funeral this morning was for an elderly woman who had fought back from bouts of cancer several times over decades. I did not know her but she was clearly beloved by her family and friends. Normally, I try not to listen to the eulogies because it's very hard to sing afterwards (humming "Copacabana" or "The Chicken Dance" to myself usually helps). Today, with no song in my head, I paid attention to the eulogy, given by her widower. He talked about the day they met (It was raining and he had an umbrella) and a little about the 50 some years since then. He ended with this line: "It was fun. Thank you, Alice."
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