I was in Portland a couple weeks ago playing at one of my favorite dueling piano bars, The Barrel Room. While down there I scheduled another gig on Sunday night at the Rock Bottom in downtown Portland. I cannot explain in words how much fun I had performing a solo piano bar show at this venue! I drove down from Seattle on Friday afternoon, grand piano strapped to the roof of my Suburban. All weekend long I drove around getting looks and comments about the piano on top of my car, it was quite entertaining.

The Rock Bottom crowd was amazing for a Sunday night, the place was totally packed! A majority of the crowd stuck around for almost the entire show and I ended up playing an extra hour and a half just because we were having so much fun. From the start, the crowd was getting involved, singing along and requesting songs. I started getting so many song requests it got a little challenging to manage all of them in any kind of order, but I think I played about 90% of the songs that got put down on the piano.

The way I learn songs and expand my song list is by taking requets at shows and learning the ones that get requested the most often. I keep all the requst slips each night and focus my efforts on songs get the most bang for the buck. Lately, I've been getting a LOT of request for Pearl Jam.......it's embarassing that I'm a musician living in Seattle and I don't know any Pearl Jam, yet I can play 4 songs by Katy Perry! WTF?!? It's finally time I fix that little problem. I started last night and learned 'Better Man' by Pearl Jam and have a list of 5 more Pearl Jam songs to learn over the next few weeks. Other songs I'll be adding from that night include: 'Army' - Ben Folds, 'Unforgiven' - Metallica, 'Nothing Else Matters' - Metallica, 'ET' - Katy Perry (I know, another Katy Perry song : ).

I've got an upcoming show at the Bellevue Rock Bottom and I'm hoping to get another Portland Rock Bottom show scheduled for July when I make another trip down to play at the Barrel Room Dueling Piano Show! Check my calendar for upcoming dates and come hang out and have a good time!

I was in Portland playing at the Barrel Room Dueling Piano Bar this past weekend. It was towards the end of the night, I was getting some fresh requests on the piano when it happened......"Bruno Mars - Grenade". I hadn't learned to play that song yet, but lucky for me it's on the radio like every 20 minutes, so I'd at least heard it a thousand times. Now put me in a room full of people demanding I play it NOW and paying money to make sure I do it and the stage is set! I reluctantly pulled out my iPhone and did a quick search on Safari while the eager crowd awaited the start of what I could only assume would be a huge embarassing disappointment. I tell the drummer, give me some bass, giving him the fist pumping in the air signal that we all know and love. I look at the crowd and say, everybody clap with me......I might've been hoping for enough noise to drown myself out during the initial attempt. It worked! Before I knew it, I was through the first verse singing into the chorus when people started yelling, "We can't hear you!" "sing louder". Then I'm pretty sure I heard someone distinctly say "This sucks....that's not good enough. I paid you 20 bucks, do it better!" I love a supportive crowd! Half way through the song I had already realized that Bruno Mars has the voice of an angel and I'd never be able to pull off the song in the original key so I'd have to drop it down and start all over. Now fully determined to satisfy this group of people who suddenly seemed almost as motivated as I was to make this song work, I wasn't going to give up until it had some kind of success....

It was a lot of fun seeing the different personalities come out during a single song. I found everyone from the supportive sideline coach that had my back all the way to the hard critic that may have had a few too many adult beverages leading up to this moment in time and was having way too much fun yelling at me during my song attempt. Either way, everybody in the room added to the fun of the moment. People were cheering while others were heckling! Some were just waiting anxiously with nervous attention worried that I was just auguring in for the face plant of a life time. In the end, I made it through two verses and two choruses in a key that was manageable for my low vocal range yet high enough that everybody was able to sing along. The mixed reviews were drowned out by enough cheering to make me feel good about myself.

There's something to be said about a show that has that much spontaneity and crowd interaction. It's what keeps me coming back for more and more. I love me some dueling piano shows......

I had some crazy times at the Barrel Room Dueling Piano Show this past weekend! I decided to cowboy up and hit the Portland night life wearing all my country gear....gigantic belt buckle and all.

The Barrel Room is literally the only dueling piano bar in the Portland Metro area. And, it appeals to everybody's desire to have a crazy night on the town.

Saturday night, there must have been over 1,500 people that came through the doors to party with us. The lines wrapped around BOTH corners of the block! It was unbelievable.

Just to give you an idea, the piano I played on all night has a stripper pole mounted right in the middle of it! And, just a tip for you partygoers: if you decide to drink enough liquid courage to dance on the piano pole, and you get up there wearing a mini-skirt, don't forget to wear underwear for cryin' out loud!! I'm just sayin'.

There aren't any other dueling piano bars around that cater to such a high energy party crowd. I love me my Seattle dueling piano scene, but this is ridiculous! I can't wait for my next trip to the Barrel Room!