Wow. Two very cool things happened Friday.
First, I discovered that the local public radio station, WUIS, has a new HD station called Xponential and it's very good. I've been listening online.
It gets better. For nothing more than liking their facebook page and leaving a comment I won tickets to Hot Tuna at Sangamon Auditorium!
The show was two hours with a stage full of virtuosos playing incredible blues, rock, country and folk jams. The first half was mostly acoustic with plenty of folk and old blues songs. After blowing the audience away, they took it up a notch for a plugged-in second set.
Jefferson Airplane members Jack Casady and Jorma Kaukonen are obscenely talented. It looked like Casady played the same bass all night, usually like a lead guitar.
Trying to keep up with what instrument Barry Mitterhoff had in hand was its own form of entertainment. He started out doing things I didn't know could be done with a mandolin. During a couple of songs in the plugged-in set I looked around to see which of the guitar players was doing the incredible solo jam and it was Mitterhoff on the electric mandolin! It looked like a tiny electric guitar for leprechauns. At one point he switched to an odd instrument with four strings, a short neck, and a wide, round body. Maybe a mando-bass?
G.E. Smith lived up to his astral reputation as a guitarist and sang lead on one song. Smith and drummer Skoota Warner stole the show with a cover of Arrowhead, which Smith dedicated to Abraham Lincoln.
Jim Lauderdale had the best voice of the group and transformed it into a country show whenever he walked onstage. Charlie Musselwhite lead several traditional blues songs and always played the harp exactly as it should be.
On top of seeing one hell of a show show my seats were next to two friends who also won their tickets. If I've seen a more talented lineup of musicians in Springfield I don't remember who.