There are many ways to measure the success of a given night on tour. The obvious is in numbers: number of tickets sold, at what price, number of CDs sold, number of mailing list signups or autograph requests. Number of encores, even. There’s the quality of the performance itself, whether the emotion and the energy was there, simple matters of singing in tune or hitting keys at the right velocity. Then there’s the palpable quality of the audience: is the room dead silent during a song, or is there still chattering at the bar in back? Do they cheer just for the flashy stuff, or for a really good rendition of a quiet slow one? Is the between-song talking like having a conversation with friends, or like speaking to a black void?
But all that is just the show. Sometimes what makes a great night (or at least rescues a bad one) is learning something new about where you are. Traveling the country for months at a time is a rare privilege, but you don’t always get to sink your toes into each place you land. It’s a lot of driving on interstate highways, with their standard-issue gas stations and fast food, the real soul of the land hidden elsewhere. And sometimes a great show, ironically, aggravates the problem: lots of happy fans means eating up post-show time until you’re too exhausted to explore, and each face in the line becomes more anonymous. What can you say when you’ve only got ten seconds? There’s no time to ask for life stories, much less invite one another out for dessert.
At Clemson University in South Carolina I played for eight people. Started as two, then built up to eight as the evening went on. Not the same experience as a sold-out Joe’s Pub in New York or a packed Cowell Theater in San Francisco, certainly. But they paid attention, they were quiet, and they stayed. Never take a listener for granted, ever.
Afterwards I pulled up a chair at one table and said hello. A few of them had heard the recent NPR radio broadcast, and were excited to find I was playing for free at their school. One student (in a straw cowboy hat) was half-Korean and had been dragged, kicking and screaming, through three years of piano lessons. Another fellow lived for eleven years in San Diego before moving here. One girl was studying civil engineering, in part because she needed to see real, tangible results of her work. The classes were hard, but worth it.
“Where’s a good place to eat?” I asked. “I know there’s a Chili’s, but…”
Cowboy-Hat shook his head. “I’ve lived in Clemson seven years,” he said. “Here’s where you should go.” It’s a Turkish/American restaurant called Riviera, where Route 93 hits 123, and here I was served by a quiet hemp-necklaced guy who was applying to Clemson’s program in ecologically sustainable landscaping. He had a friend, he told me, who’s vegan and also studying to be a Baptist minister. The manager of Riviera, a gray-haired and bespectacled Turkish man, was watching something about Condoleezza Rice on CNN, and out of nowhere turned to us. “I’m sorry,” he said, “but she’s a lying bitch!” The waiter and I blinked, then burst out laughing. Somehow I’d stumbled upon left-wing central, smack in the middle of small-town South Carolina.
There was a piano in the corner, and before I left I played Enough To Go By for the staff. Applause, handshakes and smiles. When I got back to the hotel, it felt a lot less lonely.