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Andrew McKenzie: I was playing in Lithuania, and out of the blue, asked one of the organisers if they knew any dancers (I'm boring to watch, especially when twiddling knobs). A dancer was gotten, and did her "I'm a tree, and all my branches are waving in the wind" routine, which everyone loved. I was the hit of the Kaunas jazz festival =)
So in Vilnius, where I was to play a few days later, I thought I'd try the same trick. I met with a Ukranian "exotic" dancer. She couldn't speak English or Lithuanian. I had a friend who could speak Russian, but he doesn't speak english very well. I speak German, and the dancer, Nadia, had spent six months in Switzerland, and had a bit of Swiss German, which is pretty different to regular. So we went to a bar, and had an absurd conversation where I tried to explain what I wanted, and what I was doing. As I said, I'm not good at explaining it in ANY language. She sounded intrigued and we went to my hotel so she could hear something (she is AMAZINGLY beautiful, by the way). Anyhoo, she thought the stuff was great.
I had her sit in the audience, pretending to be a normal memeber of that audience. And about 15 mins from the end, she got up and did her stuff. No-one, from the moment she stood up heard a single sound I made.
Now the point is this: She had NO exposure to anything even vaguely approaching what I do, and yet, she threw herself into it with such amazing enthusiasm that it was just gorgeous. Something REALLY happened there that night, something extraordinary. I had no idea what she was going to do, and neither she, I. At the same time, the audience had their expectations totally shattered, but in a way that showed them that something "else" was possible. So more of that sort of thing, I'd like =)
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