San Francisco bay area 1989-1992

    Carol and I moved from State College, PA to Davis, CA in the fall of 1988 to
take up our faculty and administrative positions at UC-Davis.

    After getting settled in our new home and learning the ins and outs of the
University, I started looking for music opportunities.  The Sacramento Jazz
Club held monthly meetings in a nice venue.  It was a poor day if there were
fewer than 300 people at their monthly meeting.

    The venue was a large main room which could seat 400 people.  There was
also a small side room for jam sessions for beginners.  A third room was the
Gold Card Room, reserved for the more accomplished musicians.

     
    To jam with those “Pros”, you had to audition.  I was given a list of about
100 tunes and told that the following Sunday I could sit in and be tested for
my ability to play those tunes without a lead sheet or other sources.  I was
given no advance notice of what the tunes would be!  I passed the audition
and was the permitted to play in the Gold Card Room for zero pay!

    The important thing was that I began to connect with other musicians.
In the 1989 - 1992 time frame I played with several bands.  Five bands with
which I played most often are listed below in no special order.

       
    I have one or more audio or YouTube recordings documenting the date,
time, place and personnel of the bands.   Also listed are some sample tunes
from the recordings.