The Sugar Bar

I have lived in New York City for 7 years and all of these years I've known and heard about a place called the Sugar Bar owned/ran by the acclaimed R&B songwriting couple and production team, Ashford and Simpson. They have an open mic there every week and I never went because I speculated that they would not actually be there. For some reason, I just never had the inclination to go. Maybe because I have always avoided singing too many covers. I am not sure why. Then one of my favorite guitar players,AB, came to visit from Chicago. I had to figure out something for us to do and so the Sugar Bar it was. We watched the performers one by one as they sat in with the band.Just about all of them were amazing. AB knew the band leader/bass player,Tony Stevenson. I wanted to take in the room and see what type of crowd it was.Most of the singers sang strong R&B songs from the 80s and 90s The cailber of musicianship was extremely high. Freddie Jackson was there. Natalie Cole. Andre Leon Talley. Both Ashford and Simpson were also there. They all sat at the same table and if you can believe this, sang background vocals for the open mic performers.Can you imagine? I thought it would be cool if "I sang I Put a Spell on You" I can play it on the guitar,but I have always felt more comfortable just singing. I waited until the band had a break and I went over the chords with the keyboard player. Something just did not sound right. I might have been mixing the chords up in my head. So, I asked AB if he could play and I told him the chords, but it did not seem like it was jivin' in his memory. We recorded it years ago together. Tony cautioned that it might not be a good idea to do it if the band did not know it perfectly. That I did not want to look like I was rehearsing in front of people like Freddie Jackson and Natalie Cole. I heeded his advice. The audience was really lively. I loved it. The food was excellent and I can not stress enough the level of talent.

Until Next time..... :)