{"id":323,"date":"2011-01-31T21:10:00","date_gmt":"2011-01-31T21:10:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/victoriatheodore.com\/index.php\/victoria-theodore-february-performances-online-hiatus-week-3-4\/"},"modified":"2014-07-06T14:59:03","modified_gmt":"2014-07-06T14:59:03","slug":"victoria-theodore-february-performances-online-hiatus-week-3-4","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/victoriatheodore.com\/index.php\/victoria-theodore-february-performances-online-hiatus-week-3-4\/","title":{"rendered":"Victoria Theodore: February Performances & Online Hiatus: Week 3 & 4"},"content":{"rendered":"

“Love is in the air…quite clearly…”<\/span>
\u2013 Stephen Sondheim, A Funny Thing Happened on the way to the Forum<\/p>\n

It’s February! The month of love! Let’s hope it’s full of love and better luck!<\/p>\n

Um\u2026yeah\u2026 January is gone. Thank GOD! Ok\u2026 2011 has been a doozy of a year so far: My 14 year old dog got sick, then had a bad reaction to his meds. I spent several hundred dollars on a problem that didn\u2019t really exist, and disappeared when I stopped giving him the meds. Sigh. Then my other 2 dogs both had bad skin allergies. Another couple of hundred dollars. Sigh. Then mom\u2019s roof was blown off in a bizzare wind storm that behaved like a tornado (northern California, folks. We don’t get those here!!). Insurance company only wants to pay 2\/3, made the check out to the mortgage company, so it has to be sent back east for endorsement and approval before the contractor can be paid. Sigh. Then I pulled a muscle in my chest (feels like my diaphragm) while doing yoga. Yoga! WTF???? I’ve been doing yoga for 15 years. I’ve NEVER pulled a muscle. Sigh. Then my aunt Debra was in a major car accident. Sigh. Thankfully, no one died, and there is light at the end of each of the proverbial tunnels, but January has been taxing. Conclusion: My family and I overcome obstacles with confidence, grace and determination! Yes!<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve been doing an online hiatus. Or trying to. Well, to say I’m trying is lame. I intended to and failed. Oh well! I have managed to experience some great music. Last weekend, I played and sang for a fundraiser in Oakland. I did a few standards in homage to Billie Holiday. I\u2019d never really done anything quite like it, and despite my still present cough (maybe I should go to the doctor?) I did a great job. Well, I haven\u2019t seen the video yet, so I guess we shall see! Fingers crossed that I did the songs justice…<\/p>\n

After the fundraiser, I went to dinner with my sister at Bistro Liason<\/a>. Wow! I had a delicious veggie pizza with butternut squash, and a spinach salad with pecans and goat cheese. The next day, I went on a mini-vacation to Napa with my BFF Amy. It was her birthday and since the vacation was already paid for (no refunds), I decided to take advantage of the time off, despite the chaos in my family life. The highlights of the trip to Napa were the amazing meals we enjoyed. We had dinner at Farmstead<\/a>, where I dined on delicious roasted chicken with kale, and a yummy kale salad. We had lunch at the CIA at Greystone. I was in a veggie mood, so I ate Brussels sprouts (one of my favorite things on the planet), Broccolini and butternut squash soup (yes, I\u2019m a superfan of butternut squash). But the best meal by far, was the meal we had at Ubuntu<\/a> in downtown Napa. OH MY GOODNESS! This was definitely one of the best meals of my life. All of the dishes were delicious, creative, full of flavor, delicious (oh! Did I already say that??) and DELICIOUS! And the chef is cute too! He came out to our table to serve our final dish and we both were effusive in our praise of his creations. The dishes were served family style but were presented as works of art. We started with the \u201cgarden snake\u201d, a collection of leaves, flowers, roots and herbs gathered together in the shape of a snake with sprinkles of \u201csoil\u201d (if you go to Ubuntu, have them explain the \u201csoil\u201d to you and then don\u2019t hesitate to gobble it up. OMG it\u2019s good. For real.), the steamed bun with sunchokes persimmon and green tomato, the roasted potatoes with kraut ash (cabbage prepared in a specialized manner that ends up resembling ash, but tastes divine) and a celeriac based dessert (yes, that\u2019s celery root, and it will totally surprise you). The chef, Aaron London<\/a>, is brilliant.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve had a few spectacular musical experiences in the past week as well. On Thursday night, I went to hear my friend Elaine Romanelli<\/a> at the Union Room in San Francisco. She\u2019s now performing her own music: a hybrid of folk, pop and bluesy jazz (when I met her she was doing mostly classical and standards). She\u2019s a brilliant songwriter and I loved listening to her set. Friday night I went and heard 3 piece and a Biscuit<\/a>, Ashling Cole\u2019s band, most of whom also perform with Larry Graham, touring around the world: Brian Braziel, Eric \u201cEQ\u201d Young, Eric Daniels, Jimmy McKinney, Dave Counsil, and Wilton Raab. The first set was a tribute to the genius of Teena Marie, and I had the chance to sit in on my favorite Teena song, Portguese Love. But the rest of the night, I was in the audience dancing and having a great time listening to the band. They were HOT! Saturday night, I went to see my BFF Sundra perform with Miko Marks: country music in the Bay Area! Who knew? The band was great, and included my friends Brian Braziel and Victor Campos. I had a great time and even learned country line dancing with Miko\u2019s uncle. Yee haw! And then Sunday night, I was present for the recording of Valerie Trout\u2019s<\/a> new CD, featuring more Bay Area musicians: Maya Kronfeld (one of my favorite pianists, and not just in the bay area!), Darian Gray, Jaz Sawyer and Dave Ewell. Stunning arrangements of standards and some beautiful tunes by Valerie. What an inspiring weekend! Time for me to get to work. I\u2019m going to do myself a favor and REALLY not go online this week. See you next Monday with a report of the music I\u2019ve composed! Yes, I\u2019m making a challenging for myself to stop just talking and start doing! Love love love\u2026<\/p>\n

I have a couple of shows coming up in the Bay Area. Check out the calendar, and I hope to see you at a show!<\/p>\n

Sat, Feb 5
8:30pm – 11:30pm
Marcello’s Restaurant & Piano Bar<\/a>
Open mic! Come sing! Bring your instrument! Play a song or two with me!
515 San Ramon Valley Boulevard Danville<\/b>, CA 94526 | 925.838.8144 | map<\/a><\/p>\n

Sat, Feb 19
8:30pm – 11:30pm
Marcello’s Restaurant & Piano Bar<\/a>
Open mic! Come sing! Bring your instrument! Play a song or two with me!
515 San Ramon Valley Boulevard Danville<\/b>, CA 94526 | 925.838.8144 | map<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

“Love is in the air…quite clearly…”\u2013 Stephen Sondheim, A Funny Thing Happened on the way to the Forum It’s February! The month of love! Let’s hope it’s full of love and better luck! Um\u2026yeah\u2026 January is gone. Thank GOD! Ok\u2026 2011 has been a doozy of a year so far: My 14 year old dog […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/victoriatheodore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/victoriatheodore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/victoriatheodore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/victoriatheodore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/victoriatheodore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=323"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/victoriatheodore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":929,"href":"http:\/\/victoriatheodore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323\/revisions\/929"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/victoriatheodore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/victoriatheodore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/victoriatheodore.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}