You pack the place, that's what!
It was standing room only at Ed's (No Name) Bar in Winona, MN, for the 2-17-2015 showing of "The Entertainers."
And one of the movie's two directors, Nick Holle, joined us just in time.
Faye Ballard, Nick, and I received a warm, warm welcome from the audience...an audience that included festival director Crystal Hegge, Dave from the Upper Mississippi Jazz Society, and Ed himself (the man who runs said venue).
"The Entertainers" really went over with the overflow crowd at the bar located at 3rd and Franklin Sts.
About 95 minutes after the film rolled, Nick, Faye, and I fielded questions from audience members. (And we had a ball!)
Then the crowd switched from the barroom (where the documentary was actually shown) to Ed's (No Name) Bar's concert room...where a 1970s (or maybe 1960s or 1980s) Kimball studio piano was located.
Faye and I really went at it...me doing "St. Louis Blues," E. Warren Furry's "Robardina Rag," and "Santa Lucia."
Then Faye showed the stuff that made her a frequent Regular Division finalist at the documentary's subject event, the World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest and Festival (now held at the Embassy Suites East Peoria in Illinois).
The contestant-turned-contest coordinator's selections were her trademark tune "Mack the Knife," "Sailin' Away on the Henry Clay," and "Pork and Beans."
Then the university office systems coordinator (Faye) and the factory machine operator (me) teamed up to do "Won't You Come Home, Bill Bailey."
The audience ate it up so much that they asked Faye to fire up an encore.
She did...and it was none other than "The Entertainer."
I ended up doing the last tune in the mini-concert...and it was a rag written in 1954 and recorded the next year by Fritz Schulz-Reichel (its author) and by Johnny Maddox, "The Crazy Otto."
I felt very comfortable...I felt the fun...I had real fun.
And most important of all, the people who crowded into Ed's venue had a blast, too.
When's the next screening of "The Entertainers" going to take place? Where will it happen?
Wherever it is, I hope I'll be able to make it there...and I hope you can, too.
Nope...not Winona Ryder.
Winona, Minnesota.
This is one extremely beautiful city, and the reason I'm in town (a city of over 25,000 people) is...the tenth annual Frozen River Film Festival.
Winona State University puts this event on each winter (last year, it took place in January); during five or six days, different venues across town present movies of all kinds.
The festival officially kicks off tomorrow and lasts until 2-22-2015, but tonight...one of Winona's most famous hot spots, Ed's (No Name) Bar, jumps the gun at 7:30 PM (CST) by showing that initial documentary about the World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest and Festival, the 2012 release "The Entertainers."
Right now, Faye Ballard, her mother Erma, and I are staying at the home of two of the FRFF's volunteers and supporters, Steve and Nancy Bachler.
The house isn't too far from the WSU campus...and the school isn't too far away from Ed's, the bar located at 3rd and Franklin Sts.
Faye, Erma, Nancy, Steve, and I are having a real groovy time right now; as I'm typing this out, the FRFF showing of "The Entertainers" is less than three hours away.
Speaking of real groovy time...I had one yesterday while driving from Omaha to Winona (a trip I wouldn't have made if last week's prediction of a winter storm for Nebraska and Iowa to fall on 2-16-2015 had come true).
I was tooling along in a 2014 Chevy Malibu that Enterprise Rent-a-Car loaned out to me, groovin' to the music on Sirius XM Channels 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, and 49, just glad to get on the road for the first time in 2015.
And then...at the 200-mile mark on Interstate 90 in the Gopher State, it started to snow.
Things stopped looking so groovy for the moment.
Had to pray that I could get to the Bachlers' house safely (and get that Chevy parked and out of harm's way).
Managed to make the right exit (Exit 252 on I-90)...but then, the seven miles on Minnesota State Highway 43 that led to Winona started to take a harrowing turn: After nearly driving off the road, I had to slow down.
It would've been worse if another driver hadn't sped by me.
So I decided to follow said motorist...and got inside Minnesota's Most Beautiful City at 6:54 PM.
Then I spent the next half hour finding Steve's and Nancy's house. (This, even after spending part of Sunday night studying an online map of Winona and planning out how to get from Exit 252 to the area around the Winona State campus!)
At The Weather Channel, they like to say: "It's amazing out there!"
Sometimes, I like to strip out "amazing" and put in "depressing!"
But things got straightened out, and I got to the hosts' house at 7:30 PM...when Nancy, Erma, Steve, and Faye greeted me with open arms (and my choice of beer, wine, coffee, tea, or water).
I had a roaring case of dry mouth, so...I opted for the water.
It came in a large mug. (Thanks so much, Nancy!)
If you're visiting Winona, maybe you'll like the restaurant the Ballards and I have been visiting: Jefferson Pub and Grill (on Center St. between 1st and 2nd Streets). Great sports bar, great food...especially the burgers (such as the "Goody Burger," which features barbecue sauce and an onion ring).
Well, that's it for now...and I hope to see you at the Frozen River Film Festival!
By the way...to learn more about this event, log onto www.frozenriver.org.
That's where I went last week.
And I found out just how San Diego, CA lives up to its nickname: "America's Most Beautiful City."
Until 3-12-2014, I'd never, ever set foot on America's West Coast before.
National University's decision to show "The Entertainers" (that 2012 documentary about the World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest and Festival) gave me all the more reason to come out to California.
To get to the Golden State, I caught a pair of Southwest Airlines Boeing 737s (I changed planes in Denver, CO).
On the way out to San Diego, I was nervous. After all, this was just the fifth flight I'd ever taken in my life. (My other plane trips happened in 1967, 1981, 2002, and 2012.)
And this 2014 flight was the first plane excursion that didn't involve work or going to see relatives.
Once I saw Michael Zimmer (one of the documentary's codirectors) at the San Diego International Airport, I started to finally relax.
I knew everything was going to be all right.
Michael rented a Chrysler 200 sedan and drove us out to our hotel, Courtyard (by Marriott) San Diego Central (8651 Spectrum Center Dr., 92123).
Great place to stay!
Not only did National pay for our hotel rooms and fly us out to America's most heavily-populated state...the school (Michael teaches a screenwriting class at National's Los Angeles campus) wined and dined us.
Matter of fact, a few hours after I had a chance to kick back in my room, we ate dinner at a restaurant on Park Blvd. [I've been racking my brains trying to remember the eatery's name. All I know is that its name has "Bellezza" in it...and that its menu features pizzas with people's first names as the pizzas' monikers (handles such as "Julieta").]
And we- Michael, girlfriend Tiara, his parents (Michael Sr. and Margaret), "Perfessor" Bill Edwards, and I- really loved that restaurant.
The pizzas themselves are fired up in a brick oven- the same way they were made when pizza came over to the United States around and after World War 1.
Speaking of fired up...I was really fired up about the next day, one that would culminate in the actual showing of "The Entertainers."
And after we ate breakfast at the hotel's restaurant, we went sightseeing...and we focused on Balboa Park.
Balboa Park, all by itself, makes Ess Dee earn the "America's Most Beautiful City" nickname. Lots of gardens (including a striking Japanese one)...lots of museums...and the Spreckels Organ Pavilion, home of America's largest outdoor pipe organ.
The 1915 installation (built by the Austin Organ Co.) used to be the world's largest...until one of the cities in Austria put up an outdoor pipe organ that passed up the San Diego one. (But now, the Spreckels Organ Society and San Diego's government leaders are out to give the lead back to the instrument that currently boasts 4,518 pipes with 73 ranks...with four manuals to control it all.)
We split the pre-movie sightseeing in half...and in the second half, Faye Ballard joined us. (A blizzard messed things up in the Chicago area, forcing flights out of O'Hare International Airport to get canceled...meaning Faye couldn't get a plane from Champaign, IL to Chi-Town that Wednesday. So she got a plane from Champaign to Dallas-Fort Worth, then changed planes in the Metroplex and came out to San Diego.)
Meanwhile, Four Arrows was in San Diego...at a teaching seminar across town.
Before we were all given the chance to get inside the Spreckels Organ Pavilion, the entourage splintered...and Faye and I got a chance to tour Balboa Park's Museum of Photographic Arts (the very venue where "The Entertainers" would be screened that night).
That week, MOPA exhibited a mind-blowing display of photos depicting political leaders in action, acts of civil disobedience, and virtually anything else that could've been ripped out of your local newspaper (or at least out of the Associated Press files).
Then, after touring Spreckels, we all made it inside MOPA, whose 200-seat auditorium was set up to show that documentary about the World Championship Old-Time Piano Playing Contest and Festival.
At that time, Four Arrows (an online college professor when he's not playing old-time piano) was en route from the seminar across town.
It was 7:00 PM (Pacific time)...and just as the film started rolling, Bill, Faye, Tiara, Margaret, the two Michaels, and I went out to eat (Bill: "We've all seen the movie before!").
So we ate at a restaurant in the middle of the park, The Prado.
Even if Omaha's got more eateries per capita than any other city in America, that's no reason to put San Diego's cuisine down. When it comes to restaurants, SD gives the Big O a run for its money...and The Prado is one of the many proofs.
At The Prado, they serve a half chicken as an entree...and that chicken rocked!
As things turned out, the 140 people who came to see "The Entertainers" found out the movie rocked, too.
They loved Bill, Faye, Four Arrows, Michael the Younger, and me. The Q-and-A session was a blast...and so was the concert Four Arrows, Faye, Bill, and I launched into after the Q-and-A.
Had a great time in San Diego...and if things turn out, I'm going back there as soon as possible.
