For the past two weeks I've been looking forward to coming to Britain. Not that I was ready to leave Spain neccessarily, but it was so freaking hot down there it could be unbearable at times. I thought the UK would be a nice cool-down at the very least.

Geuss what? Record-setting heatwave up here. And in a way its worse since not many places have AC.

Regardless, Scotland was fantastic. As some sort of promotion for the festival we flew in a helicopter from the airport to our hotel after we had landed. It was a lot of fun and I got some good pictures. Nairn, Scotland was beautiful. We saw an old castle, walked along the beach, played a great gig for hundreds of people, and sampled some fantastic Scotch. All of this lead to me not getting to sleep until around 7 AM, but that has been par for the course for this trip.

We arrived in London yesterday. There was a big debacle with the hotels and after shuffling us around for a few hours I finally got to my room where I proceeded to crash out.

The soundcheck is today. I'm looking forward to this final week of the tour. Not only do I love London, but I have some friends here and the club we are playing at is a world-renowned jazz club. It should be a nice way to end the trip.

It has been a pretty good week. Mostly I´ve been at the beach during the day and out at bars at night. Not bad for a week off. The beach here is really beautiful and the water is really warm (I´m on the Meditarranean Sea if you don´t know). The nightlife here is fun as well, there is an area called El Barrio which is where we´ve spent the most time, bars with outdoor seating and a lot of folks around, we´ve met some nice people. I actually went dancing tonight, that´s the second time in one week ... Pretty rare for me.

In the middle of Alicante there is a beautiful old castle on a huge hill called Castillo De Santa Barbara. We walked up the other day, I got some pretty good shots that I´ll post eventually.

I think Spain is my new favorite country besides the US. Beautiful land, beautiful people, and a relaxed attitude toward life. One more day of coolin´ out then it´s back to work and off to Scotland on Monday.

The rest of our time in Vitoria was just fantastic. I think it's my new favorite city in my new favorite country. We met some great people and went to some local bars and clubs in additions to playing every night and seeing concerts by Serio Mendez and Sonny Rollins.

Sunday(after going to sleep around 6 AM) we hopped on a plane to play the San Javier Jazz Festival. It was fun despite being exhausted. Delfayo Marsalis and his group played before us and sounded great. I had actually met his bassist years ago and got to catch up with him.

Now we are in Alicante with the week off. Alicante is a tourist spot, today I went to the beach and plan on seeing some sights tomorrow. It will be nice to unwind after two very busy weeks. Here are some pics fo' ya'.

On stage in Vitoria


Downtown Vitoria


At the club

We are in Spain right now playing the Vitoria Jazz Festival. The town is really beautiful and the weather has been fantastic. We play every night around midnight here at the hotel after the big concerts at the arena are over. Its been a lot of fun.

The best part about the festival is that all of the musicians are staying at the same hotel so there is a big hang and jam session every night. Wynton Marsalis and his band were here jamming all night Tuesday, it was fantastic. I had breakfast with Ben Wolfe a fantastic bassist who's played with Harry Connick and Diana Krall. I've hung with the legendary Sergio Mendez, Ronnie Mathews, Alvin Queen, and Victory Lewis ... But the best story so far is me doing laundry with the Bad Plus. Ive mentioned a hundred times how they are one of my favs right now. I go to the "lavendaria" to wash clothes and there they are, they are super cool guys.

We are here until Sunday when we head to the south of Spain to play another festival and some time off.

So before you look at these pictures let me say you should read the post below about Montreaux, Vienne, and Milan first. I have many more pictures that Ill post later but this will give you a great idea of what Ive been up to. So here we go!


Istanbul:


On the street in Montreaux


Vienne:


"Whattsa Matta fo You?" eating my prosciutto in Milan


The scene at Duomo Square, watching the World Cup:


The party after Italys victory,
"ITALIA, ITALIA, ITALIA!"

The past few days have been pretty incredible. We've been busy and on the move and I've been pretty tired, but they've been incredible nonetheless.

Our last day in Montreaux was fantastic. We gave a clinic for students during the day and had the rest of the night off. Since we were artists we had backstage passes to any of the concerts we watned to attend. We saw the incredible John Scofield, Jack Dejonette, and Larry Goldings. They have an organ trio that plays some pretty experimental stuff. The music was really inspiring. Afterwards we went to the Jazz Cafe (the venue we had played the first two nights) where we knew all of the folks who worked there. We partied with them while watching a great Cuban trio. I met up with a friend Id known from Kalamazoo who was there performing as well, small world. I ended up jamming with the final act of the night, a singer we had met earlier at the festival. His bass player had bailed so I helped him out. It was a lot of fun playing some other music. I think I got to bed around six AM.

The next day we traveled to and performed in Vienne, France. It was nice and the gig went pretty well but we were in and out of there so there wasn't much time to see anything.

Yesterday we flew to Milan where we played the Blue Note last night. The gig was okay, there weren't many people there and Steve had to shush the crowd at one point because they were so loud but cest la vie, you always have gigs like that here and there.

Today we had the day off in Milan. As you all probably know Italy played in the World Cup championship against France today. So we headed down to the middle of town to watch the game. We ate a bit, walked around a castle, hung out at a cafe and then proceeded to Duomo Square to watch the game with approximately 10,000 insane Italians. You heard me, 10-fricking-thousand. The place was packed, everyone was going crazy, Italian flags and bullhorns everywhere. Once the game started the people were in a frenzy. France scored first which shut everybody up but it didn't take long for Italy to even it up. The game went to overtime then to penalty kicks. When it was all said and done Italy was victorious.

I wish I could truly convey to you all what the celebration was like. It was absolutely crazy, I doubt Ill ever see anything like it again. Thousands upon thousands of people walking, cheering, dancing, yelling, singing, waving their flags, sounding their horns, cars honking with people hanging out of them shouting at everyone on the streets ... It was the largest, purest celebration I've ever seen. I have pictures that Ill post eventually that will hopefully do it some justice. But the experience was a blast and one I will never forget and I feel lucky to have been there.

Getting home was a chore however. The city had shut down so there were no taxis and many of the subway stops were closed. Luckily we were able to catch a train for part of the trip then talk a concierge at a different hotel into calling a cab for us. We made it home safe and sound.

So that was my incredible day. Tomorrow we head to Spain where Ill be for the better part of two weeks. Hopefully Ill be able to talk my one of my bandmates into letting me use their laptop so I can get some pics up then.

Hope everyone is well. Besides missing my wife and my dog terribly, I am sparkling.

Here I am in gorgeous Switzerland. Im on a computer in the hotel lobbzy, the computer is french and quite annoying to type on so ill keep this short.

Istanbul was fantastic. The people were great, the weather was wonderful, the gig was a lot of fun. We got to see some beautiful mosques. I have plenty of pictures that i hope to post soon.

Today we traveled to Swityerland where we are playzing the world famous Montreaux Jazz Festival. We have all access backstage passes to attend whatever show we want (namelz Diana Krall and John Scofield) and we dont play until midnight.

The trip is going well. The jet lag is all but gone as is the cold.

The cold is almost gone and the driver is almost here.

The European adventure is underway.