A set of unrelated topics: birthdays and "it's a small world"

Right after Central America, I had the lucky opportunity to celebrate my 22nd birthday in Woodstock, Vermont. Because I had visited the town 2 years prior while away at the Killington Music Festival in Killington, VT, it was exciting to have my birthday in a place I knew and loved. It's definitely one of the neatest places I've ever visited.

My mom called the venue prior to my arrival and had even coordinated the delivery of birthday cookies from the local farmers' market! And she got the woman at the hotel to hang a birthday banner in my room! Gotta love moms.

Looking up the river out behind the theatre in Woodstock.

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Next topic: "It's a small world."

Any musicians who read this post will probably understand the following: the music world is really, really, really small. That is, it seems as though everyone knows everyone else. Case in point: I had at least one friend in common with all 3 American violinists in Barrage prior to joining.

This spring I had a moment where this happened very unexpectedly. At the theatre in Easton, Pennsylvania, there's a "Star" Dressing room covered with autographs of hundreds of people who have performed there (two of the names that stick out to me are Tony Danza and Yo-Yo Ma).

And then I noticed up in a tiny corner the "3 Redneck Tenors" collection of autographs. And though it's not discernible in this tiny picture, the name Lydia Veilleux is written in the top right.

Here's where the "small world" moment occurred--I did a Barrage gig with Lydia Veilleux nearly three years ago, and this autograph (to my best judgment) was prior to when I met her.

Prior to the Barrage gig in September 2006 (L to R: Lydia, Arlyn Valencia, me,
and Lynae & Denis Dufrense, two original members of Barrage)

Crazy! It's ridiculous how much smaller the music world seems to become every day.