Picture this - you set up a gig at The Club in Gibsons and you ask a couple of singers, new to the group, to join in.
The day of the performance, one singer falls ill with the flu and the second breaks her arm leaving the rehearsal. What to do?
The trials that the Bergevin/Dunaway/Herder Sweet Fridays jazz group were going through last Friday night certainly didn't show. But this kind of thing happens, and it is a measure of the professionalism of this group that they can play around it.
Boyd Norman, a local bass guitarist, joined the group on Friday as well as a salsa-style drummer, Roy Guerriamella. He has broad experience, including having played with Stan Getz and as a member of Salsa Brava. One of the highlights of the evening came for those who stayed until the late hours when the group's regular drummer, Pat Haavisto, teamed up with Guerriamella for a drum battle.
The other members of the group left the stage while these two put on a great display of originality and technical ability. The music of the group generally tends towards jazz rock with "You Can't Always Get What You Want" and "Don't Get Me Wrong," sung by Gaetan Bergevin. But there was music for all tastes: "Bump Down Boogie," "A Teenie Weenie Bit of Your Love" and a Luci Herder standard, "Good Morning Heartache." There was even some ethnic content with "Mamoushka," which is of Russian/Ukrainian origin, reminiscent of the music from Fiddler on the Roof. Dunaway's violin fit this music like a glove. Then there was the food. Michael Riley is a fine chef doing everything from pakoras to pecan pie. Guerriamella mentioned that The Club in Gibsons is just like the Commodore on Granville Street in Vancouver, but on a smaller scale. Yet, Sweet Fridays has not attracted the audience that had been hoped for and the format will be changed in future. If you enjoy dancing to live music, The Club is the place to be.
