Thanks Danny,

Yes, it can be a lonely feeling at times. And I have to be thankful for the support group that I had. The annoying person crawling around in the background is the sound technician. He is trying to finish his set up for the electric band that will follow my acoustic set which is the standard format for the meeting. He was uncharacteristically late that day and so the prep that was usually done beforehand was done during my set, but no doubt distracting. The sound on the little Flip video camera isn't good to start with. It's really a delicate balancing act to preserve the acoustic nature of the music and project it enough to make it engaging for an audience. You might think an organization like CBA would yield an audience more focused on the music, but there is always a good portion that socialize throughout the meeting and I knew to expect that. But there is a good number that did focus on the music and I got good applause throughout my 45 min. set. Very happy with the way it went and the positive comments from the brass.
I just did my first gig at a little restaurant at the yacht harbor on the Columbia on Hayden Island and will be going back for more next week, so things are starting to happen. But I'm not "going out on that big road by myself" and that makes a big difference. Having a support team is a big plus. I was surprised to hear that people on the boats could hear the music drifting down so the adjustments that we made to my set up clearly helped. For me the best one was using a head set condensor mic that enabled me to focus on the fretboard when I wanted to without losing volume on the vocal. Speaking of support team, I think of you and the forum as part of that.

Pete Gallatin
http://www.reverbnation.com/patiopete