The bus took us by surprise. At first glance we assumed, correctly, that it was full of marvel and mischief. A large fellow with jewish locks, a fedora, glasses and 2 inch ear plugs hung back in the shadows as we approached.

“You guys musicians?” I asked,
“Yeah”
“What kind of music do you play?”
His compadre, juxtaposed with a relaxed and non-menacing demeanor, replied,
“We play, kind of, Balkan Gypsy and Klezmer music.”
It was that moment that we knew it would be a long night.

The group is called Revel Me from Portland, Oregon, and they are a bunch of great people, great musicians and great dancers.

The entire posse came to our house for an all night whiskey and music session. They were weary from their travels and were as excited to find us as we were to find them. The leader, Jorge, brought out his violin and mustache. Doug had an Oud, Djembe and wisdom. The whirlwind of talent known as Gus had his Accordian. Multi-instrumentalist Russel was in luck, for he didn’t have to lug his upright bass out of the bus. We had one of those and two gypsy guitars. Danielle and Bevin, for a lack of room to show their expert dance moves, brought their beautiful selves for the hang.

We played and played and played. Everyone in the group is seriously talented on multiple instruments. Music is in their blood, and it flows out of their veins effortlessly, bleeding all over the apartment. I played guitar and upright, uke, and Doug even let me check out his Oud. Tasha was on her game, and her bass had never sounded better. The sounds coming out of the living room were energetic and comforting all at once.

Gus pointed out that out of all the people they could have run into, he ran into some gypsy jazz musicians with a place to play, food, whiskey and a couch to sleep on. What are the odds?

He also has a musician theory that goes like this: You are only as good as you can play drunk. We put that theory to the test.

It was a rough morning.




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Revel Me Website:
http://revelme.wordpress.com/