More Music Production

View Original

Cyndi Lauper encounter

Needless to say I am a huge fan of Cyndi’s. She made her way to the Bay Area on multiple tours. On her “Hat Full of Stars” tour she announced that she was going to do small clubs and in San Francisco she had a stop at an intimate 500 seat South of Market Street club called Slims. When you get to see an artist in this setting it is like being in your living room. Performing many songs from her newest album of the same name, a stand out song at the time titled Sally’s Pigeon; a song about Teen pregnancy and back alley abortions.This song was co written with Mary Chapin Carpenter and helped make the album and tour deep and meaningful. You could just sense the performance had an undercurrent to it. Sometimes you just get the feeling of the mood.

Fast forward to the end of the concert and the mood changed with a trio of her hit’s as an encore to end the night. As fans made their way out to the night, I asked a friend to join me for a night cap at (the then Micro Brewery across the street) called Twenty Tank. Upon crossing the street and heading over I saw a couple in front of me, and it looked like Cyndi Lauper. I reached out and touched her shoulder and said Hey Cyndi the night’s performance was magic, Thank’s for performing in a small club. She stopped, turned around, smiled and said “do you think so”? I told her “I liked the material from the new album and that her writing on this one had deeper meaning”. She leaned over, kissed me on the cheek and said “Thank you, that means a lot.” She then said “hey have you met Pierre Andre” my percussionist! If you don’t know who Pierre is; do yourself a favor and check him out. Pierre is a Poet, Visual artist, Sax and percussionist who is into macchina. He was instrumental in taking Cyndi’s hit “Girls just wanna…” to another level with a Reggae Dub House version which they rolled out on this tour. Pierre was cordial and cool, adding to the already amazing night.