I'm Back From Memphis

I'm back from a delightful weekend in Memphis. In knitting news I finished Kiri and a modified Nantasket. Kiri still needs to be blocked and the Nantasket needs the ends woven in and felted.

The Beale Street Jazz Festival, or Memphis in May was great fun. We were rained on Saturday. Thankfully we were seated at the Cellular South stage, right near the Cellular South tent that was giving away free rain ponchos. It was a drizzling, yet persistent rain, and not a soak to the skin miserable rain so it was ok.

We went to Beale Street Thursday night to check things out before the festival traffic picked up. Loved the Neon and the Elvis impersonator we got to hear in one of the bars.

We visited Graceland Friday morning. I've always been a bit ambivalent about Elvis, not crazy about him but not anti Elvis or anything. I must say that I found Graceland to be far more interesting a visit then I anticipated. I highly recommend taking at least the middle level tour that includes the audio commentary on the house and the additional side tours.

As far as music goes we heard a bit of Egypt Central, Buckcherry, Big Star, Ronnie Baker Brooks, and the legendary B.B. King on Friday. Saturday we heard Yonder Mountain String Band, Gin Blossoms, John Lee Hooker Jr., Little Richard, George Clinton & Parliament/Funkadelic, and a bit of Huey Lewis & the News. Sunday we had to leave early to drive to a buddy's house in Kentucky later that night so we really only heard Galactic.

The major highlights for me were hearing B.B. King pley Lucile, and George Clinton. Dave has been playing a ton of Bootsy Collins lately. I must admit I enjoy the P-Funk. So hearing Parliament/Funkadelic perform was a huge treat, even if it was sans Bootsy and his star shaped bass.

The Ronnie Baker Brooks performance was by far the best show of the festival in my opinion. I'll admit I'd never heard of Ronnie or his famous blues father Lonnie. We had prime seats in the center, front section, last row. I had a prime, unobstructed view of Carlton Armstrong, the bass player. I'll admit I have a bit of a 'thing' for bass players. (Dave happens to be a bass player :-)) The entire band put on quite the show but Armstrong was just a delight.

I was really glad to be home Monday night. This was the longest I'd ever been away from E, who was a trooper and was very good for Dave. I missed both of them terribly. I thoroughly enjoyed the time away but am very glad to be home.