Oversized Sombreros

Rockapella in Pasadena

Saturday, December 7, 2013

CalTech Beckman Auditorium

Pasadena, CA

I woke up early in the morning to finish baking goodies for the guys.  I needed a couple of ingredients for Calvin's share of the goodies, plus I forgot an ingredient for Geo's share, so back to Ralphs I went.  Then I got home and had to deal with much ticket shuffling craziness.  Jenn asked if I had an extra ticket, so that she could invite Mariah.  I did not, because I had already given my extra ticket to Lori, whom was using Cindy's ticket, because she was ill.  Then I received a message from Wendy that Jeff was sick, and wouldn't be able to make it.  So I tried to get a hold of Jenn before she could buy a ticket for Mariah.  Then she had to call Mariah to find out if she still wanted to go.  Oy.  I was going NUTS.  But all was well, Mariah could take JeffEvs' ticket, and I had one less thing to think about.

I finished baking, and prepared the goody bags for the Pella before going to Mass.  If any of you see me smiling while I cantor at Mass, I challenge you to figure out why I'm smiling.  Usually, it's because I like the lyrics that I'm singing and I'm truly praising God in that moment.  Other times, I've been insecure about singing that day, and I picture somebody from Rockapella sitting in the pews, and I don't want to let them down, so I smile and sing my heart out, just as they would.  (It's OK.  God's aware of my craziness).   Either way, after the Mass, I thank Him for letting me have the gift I get to share with the congregation.

So there's my confession / sermon for the day.    

I went home to change into more festive attire.  Lori was dropped off by her family, and we made our way to CalTech.  I really wanted to give the guys their goodies before the show, so that I wouldn't have to deal with having bags at my feet, so we arrived early.  Linda and Wendy arrived early, too, so we walked to the auditorium together.  We found the stage door, and got someone to open it, and we asked the stage manager dude to give the goodies to Pella.  It's so funny how I get shy all of a sudden and can't possibly knock on a door.  So Lori did that for me, but I was able to talk.  Yeah, I'm weird like that.  We met up with the rest of the Posse, and then the stage manager guy came out to the same area.  Wendy told me to look for crumbs on his jacket, to make sure he hadn't gobbled up all of the goodies himself.  I asked him, "Did you give the goodies to the guys, or did you eat them all?"  He said, "I gave them to Jeff and he was excited to see them."  Yay!  Thanks, dude!  Liz didn't even notice that I was standing behind her until I squealed and frightened Joe.  We bought Cracker Jacks.  I wished for a tattoo as my prize.  What did I get?  A MERMAID tattoo-ish thing.  Happiness!  More squealing.  More Joe being frightened of me.  Sorry about that, Joe.

We went inside the auditorium, and I went to the restroom before going to my seat.  It's a good thing, too, because the line got really long.  APPARENTLY, the place was built before there were a lot of female engineers, because there were only 4 stalls in there for the entire auditorium.  After situating stuff at my seat, I looked for my friend Mona, who was there with her family, and they were all seeing Rockapella for the first time.  I walked over to chat them up for a bit before the show started.  Then when I got to my seat, I realized that I was missing 2 members of my posse.  Where were June and her husband?  Well, I couldn't worry much about that, because the show was about to start.  I was sitting between Liz and Joe (Joe's idea), behind Jenn, Lori and Linda.  

THE SUN BROTHERS

Whoa.  What?  They weren't at the Napa show.  The Sun Brothers took the stage, wearing their sunglasses and...hmmmm....sombreros.

The Hat I Got For Christmas Is Too Big/Feliz Navidad

This song is hilarious.  Geo sings "Cha cha cha".  I love Calvin's voice in the Feliz solo.  I think it was Karla that asked about the song later, and she was told that it was done by Mel Blanc.  I couldn't find any original animation of the song, so here's something that someone made with Blanc's vocals.

ROCKAPELLA

I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day
CSL4 spied the posse.  They are already gelling better than they were on Thursday.

"I'm...I'm...I'm Scott!"

The Hope We Hold
Hi, Steve!

CSL4:  "I love this theatre, man.  What a gem.  We were in Napa Valley the other day and drove down through another planetary place.  We don't have the brown valleys in Tampa....People here don't want to go outside because it's cold.  It's not that cold.  It's 40 degrees!  You know where it's cold?  Oklahoma!  We flew out from there the other day....Hanukkah and Thanksgiving were at the same time, which won't happen for another thousand years."  <Somebody corrects him in the audience>  "Seven thousand.  Seven THOUSAND?!  Well, I definitely won't be around by then.  I was thinking that maybe I'd be here for the thousand, but not seven thousand."

Dreidel
This crowd is dead.  I mean, they seem to like it, but they're so quiet!  Maybe it's the acoustics.

Winter Wonderland
JT''s walk at the end is funny.  

Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree
Scott spun around like a ballerina in a music box.  Not really a pirouette, but kinda.

Glow Worm
Jeff's intro -- pfffttt--- had some hip action.  I like the feature of Steve and Scott with JT in the middle.

Little Mary Snowflake
YAY!  I love that line: "conquering kingdoms and hacking at dragon heads".

CSL4:  "You know what you're getting when you've got Steven, a great guy with the voice and the moves."  I refrained from yelling out, "AND FLIRTY FLIRTY EYES!!!"    

Simply Having A Wonderful Christmastime
Thank you, Scott, for making this song so much better by arranging it yourself and including Tchaikovsky.

CSL4: We didn't have VCRs or DVDs back in the day...we had to earn that thing.  We'd sit there at 3pm, waiting.  But now we have Rudolph.com.  It's a nice little page, and I spend most of my time there, throughout the day.

Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer
Calvin almost ran into SD while the reindeer were backing up.

CSL4:  "This is Calvin's first week with us.  He comes from East St. Louis, Illinois, where he was in a group called "Men of Note".  They were discovered in Illinois and brought to Busch Gardens.  Then we took him."

Merry Christmas, Darling
Uh-oh, the tenor trio intro was not working.  They needed Geo's intro before they could get on track.  

CSL4:  "Jeff has been with Rockapella for over 20 years.  He started when he was 5.  He's a child prodigy.  "

SD called CSL4 "the man with the lovely locks of gold, and the monkey legs".

CSL4: "Rockapella started in New York, made it to PBS, and that led us to Pasadena in 2013."

This Christmas Day

Don't Be Late
Geo made sure to wave at Wendy (Liz?) on the way out.

<Intermission>
I still didn't see June.  But I got a message from Geo, thanking me for the goodies.  :)  Intermission took awhile longer than we expected.  Liz blamed it on me, saying that the guys were busy eating.  So she was going to look for crumbs on their clothing.

Jingle Bell Rock
I like JT's vest.  So does Liz.  "In the frosty air" -- SD looked at me and pointed. What'd I do?  Oh, probably just smiling and swooning as usual.  It looks like Calvin got the hang of the megaphone.  

CSL4:  "Sorry, that was stupid."  (But it was fun, Scott!)

Please Come Home for Christmas
Scott tried a real pirouette this time and almost fell.  Liz said he was having a sugar cookie rush.  

Matunda Ya Kwanzaa
The audience, though quiet, did respond to "Hambadi Ghani".  CSL4: "Ooh, you're ready."
So Geo started the intro.  I whispered to Liz, "Mufasa" a la The Lion King hyenas.  Then Liz and I could not contain our giggles.  

SD checked with the posse to ask if they were here last year for the holidays.  We said no.  We're not bitter about it or anything.  He talked about Lapland.  "For those who don't go to Rudolph.com...."  When they were in the area, he said, "Jeff, we need to go to Lapland!"  JT saluted him from the wings.  Then SD talked about who he saw there, and said, "Not Elvis, the ELVES."  He then called out the name of Emma to join them on stage.

Santa Claus is Coming to Town
"I called on dear old Santa Claus" and CSL4 said, "YO!"  SD played with her hair, and tried to get her to move.  Nope.  She sang a little, but she was quiet and clearly mortified.  

Silent Night
Geo: "That one got more reaction, probably because you know the lyrics, not just the chorus...A lot of laughs out here tonight."  He tried to pitch in the key of D.  "No, that's not gonna work out."  Then we all sang.  He said, "I couldn't reach the highest 'peace' note, but that's OK."  Then he turned on us, and said, "Christmas trees, joy, happiness: that really makes my stomach turn."  

Grinch

CSL4 is a self-proclaimed "TCM Junkie" (which makes Liz love him even more now).  "I see all of the architecture here in Pasadena, and it reminds me of those movies.  You live in a lovely place."  (You're welcome to move here, Scott!)  "This next song is inspired from 'Waterloo Bridge', starring Vivien Leigh and Robert Taylor."

Auld Lang Syne
I need to watch that movie.  I so, so love this arrangement, and would like to see the source of CSL4's inspiration.

Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas

Angels We Have Heard On High
I love this song.  The theme of my Christmas tree this year was this song, and my ornaments were angels, singing, and hearts (ooh yeah, thunder in my...).  The only thing that I don't like about this song is that it signals the end of the show.  

Encore

Silver Bells
I like how Geo caught up with the choreography.  "Soon it will be Christmas Day": JT did a hip check.  

Carmen / Billie Jean
I love seeing Geo do the MJ moves.  

CSL4: "Our first Christmas records were made for Japan, strangely enough, and Christmas in Korea makes for some strange lyics."

Hold Out for Christmas

I had texted June at intermission, and she texted back, saying that they were watching the end of the MSU game (her son went to college there).  At least they won, or I would have been more irritated.  

Meet and Greet

There were no tables set up, and they put the guys by the door, but they moved away from that.  We were concerned that they wouldn't, but they're smart and protect themselves.

JT thanked me for the goodies, said "it was very sweet of you, literally."  

SD thanked me for the goodies, and said, "What are you doing to me?  I'm trying to lose weight."  He told me his favorite one, which I made because I know that's his favorite.  I told him that he gets more than the others because of that.  Lori told him that "Feliz Navidad" is her favorite song.  He said it was the first time they performed it.  He wanted to make sure that it wasn't offensive.  No, it's funny!  He's so damn cute.

CJ thanked me for the goodies.  He already ate some, and will be up all night because of the sugar.

CSL4 gave me a hug and said that I'd been baking up a storm.  I told him that I was tired.  But they're very much worth the love I put into their goodies.

Geo hinted that I gave him goodies with special ingredients and didn't want to eat them before the show.  (Perhaps he knew that I was upset at him after Santa Clarita).  He's so silly.  He knows that I would never do that to any of them.  

The guys had a meeting to attend, so we got kicked out of there.  KP stayed and talked to Fred for a while, though, since he didn't need to attend the meeting.  

Lori, Linda and I went to Chili's, where they told us that they already had the last call at the bar, and the grill would close in 10 minutes.  At 11:00?  On a Saturday?  That's weird.  Of course, because we had to hurry up and order, I got all flustered and had trouble deciding what to order.  Or was my fluster from seeing Rockapella?  I don't know.  

More fluster awaits!

Coming up:  Pella in San Juan Capistrano