Terry Lee Hale's official website

Spring 2001

June 7th Concarneau,

I’ve just returned from my travels in the south.
Right now I’m pretty worn out from all the miles and gigs (5 weeks on the road!) but it’s nothing that a little sleep and rest won’t cure. I’m glad to be "home" for sure! This whole past month was kind of a strange affair for me or at least more strange then normal I guess. On the positive side I think I was playing some of the best music of my life (see set list below). I had only the Froggy Bottom with me this time but I promised everyone that the next time I come back I would bring the Dobro and 12 string along. As always I met a lot of great people, old friends and new.
New cities for me and gigs that I really enjoyed were Thessaloniki, Rome and Plauen and the venues, the people and the shows there were outstanding. The best gig perhaps was on May 12th which was my birthday in Zagreb. I saw a huge amount of beautiful countryside and everywhere spring was happening full blast. More on all of this in detail below. For the negatives I think conflicts with a couple of booking agents dampened the overall spirit of things. Confusion, lack of effort and, in general, just plain sloppiness caused a lot of tension where there didn’t need to be any. Never the less it’s the business of music and must be dealt with.

I have to be realistic and accept the fact that the Terry Lee Hale show is not always a priority for busy booking agents. And it’s not because they don’t like the music either because they do or they wouldn’t do the work at all. It’s just that lack of record sales usually means lower turnouts at the clubs and less money in agents pockets as a result and so of course they must delegate their time accordingly. You see? It’s all tied together and it doesn’t even have anything to do with talent. I understand this. Usually it’s not a problem though and I have been very fortunate to be represented in most all of the different countries by quite good and conscientious individuals and agencies. Pascal at La Variety in France, Trygve at Talent Farm in Skandinavia, Pierre at NADA in Belgium are great examples of agents that work hard for me even with full rosters and busy schedules. Spain, Croatia and Greece tours are co-ordinated by our distributors there and, although they are not officially booking agents as such, they do an admirable job for me considering all the other work they must also complete. This business of music though is always in a constant state of flux and nothing ever stays the same. I try to roll with the punches when I can and not to take it all too seriously. Admitedly that’s a hard one for me as I’m pretty much a one man operation and it’s a little hard not to take everything personal in such circumstances.

To be fair and honest I am certainly not an angel myself. At times I can be very demanding, shortsighted, selfish, impatient or even just plain ignorant. Even with that said I still ALWAYS try and do the right thing. Always (even when I’m mad)! But as the French so nicely say, "cest la vie" and that’s the truth. I hate the business part of it sometimes though but it is part of my world and complaining about it will not make it go away. Are all successful musicians good business people?
That’s the short story friends. Mostly I had a wonderful adventure, met a lot of great people, ate and drank my fill, covered a thousand miles and lived to tell about it. There were a couple of times that left the taste of sour lemons in my mouth but, all in all, that’s not really THAT bad I guess. It is not my purpose here to drag anybodys name in the mud but I will not hide the fact that everything is NOT sunny all the time. One day soon I’ll attempt to write out in greater detail my thoughts and advice concerning booking agents and such. Nuff said………. As always, I am very fortunate to do what I do and even get paid for it!! Below are some hightlights:

Here’s the basic set list I played on a one set night. A few of the bars I played wanted 2 sets as they can sell more drinks that way. Personally I think I prefer a one 90 minute set concert but I can certainly do it both ways.

Some Girlfriend
Digging Up Crud
Edenless
First Get Over Falling
Who’s Fooling Who
Useless
I Still Want You
King Of The World
Ragged Caravan
Forget About Love
Michigan Weather
Ride Hard
Ah Love
Unmet
Little Toes
Withered Bouquet
Toss
Texas Rose
Little Wood Guitar

May 4th Rome@Big Mama - This club is pretty legendary in Italy. I even think I'd heard about this room before I came to Europe and that was in 1993. Steve Wynn told me that he had played Big Mama's more than any other club in the world and that says a lot about both Steve's longevity and the good taste that owners Pasquale and Marco have in music. In a city of I don't know how many millions it is the only place that plays exclusively blues, roots, rock and country music.

Everybody has played here at one time or another. So it is no surprise that I had wanted to play there for years but for one reason or another it had never happened until now. It's not a big club but intimate seating (chairs and tables right up to the stage edge), a great sound system and soundman and a well trained audience make this a world class entertainment venue. I guess about 130 came out for me tonight and I was quite happy especially considering that this was my first time. And of course there is the little detail that all of this happens in one hell of a city. I only spent a little less than 3 days there but I was quite fascinated and did indeed fall in love with this place. I can truly understand why so many people choose this as a home.

I spent my "off" days just doing the tourist thing (including visiting a lovely little church with two Caravaggio paintings!!) (S. Maria del Popolo - W.n.). My good friends Stefano (webmaster) and Paola drove down for the gig and a visit and, as always, both guide me through the intricacies of Italian life and cuisine (i.e. thou shalt not chew on a toothpick while walking down the street or thou shalt only drink capucinos in the morning NOT in the afternoon ect). Yes Rome is also too big and noisy and hot and expensive and full of too many tourists but it's also beautiful, exotic, exciting and full of life and history.

I could go on and on but I will just say that I am honestly looking forward to my return both to Big Mama's and Roma.

Oh yeah, the gig was great for me. I played two long sets, sold lots of Cds (always a good sign), talked to lots of new faces and better yet - I played very well thank you very much. I even had a few Americans come up after the show and said they liked it! Make sure you check this club out on your next stop in Roma! PS: On the way back up north with Stefano and Paola we stopped for lunch in the lovely little hilltop town of Orvieto where, not only did we have an excellent meal, we visited the beautiful church that rests at the very top of mountain. One of the loveliest churchs in Europe for sure. Covered on the outside with millions of different colored tiny tiles. Stunning!! Don't forget to also sample the gelato in the little store just to the side of the church. I think the best I ever had. A must stop place!!
PPS: Stefano bought a bottle of sherry that is 100 years old. You will not believe how good that stuff is!!!

May 12, Zagreb, Croatia @ KSET - The big 48th birthday for me on this day and it was celebrated in fine fashion at this university located club. It had been a long day of travel for me to get here as the night before I had been gigging on the Slovenian coast in Piran, another favorite place of mine. We celebrated the very start of my birthday there at exactly 00H01, taking a break from the music and opening a bottle of champagne on stage. (We actually continued the celebration into the wee hours but that's another story...)

In any case it was a car and a train that got me to Croatia, tired but intact and ready to play. Nice club with a good PA system but I was a little nervous because at 21H30 only about 20 people were there and I was thinking "ah oh, not good………" but by the time I started there were 110 people there and on I played. I must say I was in good form on this night musically and otherwise. Folks were real friendly and seemed eager to hear the music and certainly I was willing to oblige. I love nothing more than to play for an attentive audience!I always want to be playing on my birthday too as I believe it brings me good luck for the coming year and this year is going to be extra special for me as I played not one but two gigs in two different countries!! Cool huh?

May 16 Thessaloniki, Greece @ Milo's Club - The story of how I got from Zagreb to Thessaloniki is really worth a book in itself. The short version is that I wanted to take the train south from Zagreb all the way to Greece which is possible to do BUT I didn't have a visa to travel through Yugoslavia and that's a must have item especially for an American these days. Airflights were prohibatively expensive as well (appx $600 Zagreb - Athens via Zurich!) so I had to travel all the way back up north by train to Trieste, Italy where I caught the ferry (24 hours) the next day that would take me to Igeumenitsa where I could take a bus all the way to Thessaloniki. You'll have to look on a map to see exactly what the distance is but it's a long, long way I can tell you that. The bus ride itself is spectacular.

Central Greece is mostly just mountains and it's rugged, spacious and stunningly beautiful. Nobody there but just us on the bus and a few birds I think. I wish I had some pictures to show you. The trip itself is not for the faint of heart. The road clings to the side of steep mountains either going up or coming down and with barely enough room for two vehicles to pass each other. I swear I saw my own ass a couple of times coming around some of those curves. It was worth the trip though for just getting the chance to see scenic beauty of central Greece though. So anyway, it was at 02H00 that I at last arrived at the seaside port and ancient city of Thessaloniki.

I was met by my hosts Kyriakos and Basilias and we immediatly went to a little bar where they were having a Terry Lee Hale listening party! Cool huh! Sure was a nice way to shake off those long hour driving blues!! The club I played in is part of a converted factory space that had been very, very well thought out and constructed strictly for the purpose of entertainment. Restaurants, bars, large and small concert areas, outdoor terraces, art galleries ect. ect. make a nice place for folks to enjoy themselves. They even have their own radio station!I played the "small" room and even that would hold maybe 300 or so packed tight. I guess there were about 180 or so there for my show and we were all sweating by the end and I was very happy. Greece was quite warm even on this May night but sweating is fun with friends having fun right? I played about 2 hours I guess, solds lots of CD's and made some good new friends. I definitely want to revist this very nice and friendly city someday soon.

June 3rd Plauen, Germany @Maltzhaus - Well a lot had happened and a lot of miles had been covered between the above mentioned gig and my time here now in Germany. This Southland Tour was going to be finished up in the north with 6 shows in 6 days. Unfortunatly I had become a little ill shortly after my arrival in Berlin on May 28th and my singing voice suffered a steady decline throughout the week. Really it felt like an alien and lodged itself firmly in the middle of my vocal chords and by the Dresden show I pretty much sounded like a bad version of Kermit the Frog. What got me I think was the sudden change in temperature as it was more than 30 degrees in Athens when I left there and a few hours later I was driving my rented car in rainy and 13 degree Berlin! I think too that I was pretty tired and run down from all the many miles I had been traveling over the last 4 weeks.

In any case I was happy to be in the eastern states in Germany which perhaps is my favorite part of this country these days. This area has not been built up so much as in the west. There are still forests and wild areas and villages that don't have pedestrian malls and MacDonalds. Economically of course they are suffering. Zeitz has unemployment figures of 28 percent and the whole region is losing their young folk to the west where there are jobs and the allure of the west is strong. The east is changing fast though. I myself have seen a huge transformation in just the 8 years I have been visiting. Major highways and roads now are mostly rebuilt, a lot of the older homes and farms have had remodels (it's mostly against the law in Germany to tear down old buildings!), new factories and businesses are blooming and on and on. I think if your have construction work skills this is a good place to be to find employment. Who wants to get their hands dirty these days though?

Folks are mostly real happy to have you there to play music for them. All of them still remember the days when there was only state approved movies, books, bands and musicians. Here English is still the 3rd or 4th language for most folks so communication is sometimes a problem but music is music and good music and song need little in the way of translation. This was my first time in Plauen, a sleepy little village of about 60,000. The Maltzhaus gig was located in the cellar like club and I guess more than 100 folks paid to see me croak my way through 2 hours of song. It was fun though and despite my limitations we all had a good time with lots of smiling faces, laughing and perhaps even a few tears. All of these six shows were nice though. Again, I look forward to my return! That's it friends.

There is so much more that I wanted to share with you about my adventures but I just don't have the time or space here and now. All of those nights and days I was on the road were filled with people, music, food and drink, adventure and mischance and on and on………… I'd love to tell you about Manolis the friendly truck driver I met on the ferry and his many kindnesses or dinner at Vlado's home with his wife and kids or riding with my good friend Dusan along the coast road near Piran in his little red Alfa Spider or about the general strike in Greece on my Athens gig day or about my vacation on the island of Paros or about the cool industrial bar I stumbled upon near the Knaak in Berlin or, or, or…….. but I can't tell it all. I guess in a way though the story does come out and that is in music and, I guess that is how it should be. For those of you that I overlooked or didn't write about please forgive me and know that my time with you was just as valuable to me even though I didn't write about it or you. Your story too is in the music and the songs. Many thanks to all of you that worked the clubs and organized the shows and introduced me to your cities, friends and audiences. I will remember always!!

Concarneau June 15th, 2001

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