day 25, at sea

what a lovely visit we had in bora bora the past couple of days… it seemed to put everyone in good spirits!  i am tentatively reporting i may be slowly but surely bringing my heckler around, trying to kill her with a little kindness (and clearly craved attention…); i am also knocking on wood as i write, lest it be a fluke, but she has been much better the last couple of nights and even… gasp… nice when i chatted with her during the day… will keep you posted… i also got piano man’s last obvious hold out to come in and have some fun, so i feel fairly victorious today.  it has taken 3 weeks to develop my own room, build my own fan base, dispel the grumbles and convert his followers… not bad!   

tonite was formal nite, tropical formal to be precise, and my 7-8 was packed, even the benches and window seats in the hall outside the lounge… i wore a black and purple floral top with a black skirt and draped a hand-painted pareo with giant hibiscus all over it (from artist’s studio on bora bora) on the piano… my theme set at 9 was called “what are you wearing?” and featured songs with items of clothing in the title – the audience kept thinking it was still random request time, and i kept trying to guide them back to the program i had planned (people have no idea how many hours it takes to plan and prepare all the pieces for these themed sets for 110 nights in a row!)… after the 4^th failed attempt at maintaining a topical thread, i told them we would abandon the planned program and i would do a song lyric association set instead… this means i would do a song and that some lyric within that song would suggest the next, and so on… i had to remain steadfast and play a cohesive set from 9-10… i always do open it back up to requests (mixed with my choices when they aren’t sure what they want) after 10 or 10:30.  i wish they understood that i simply can’t do all-request all night 4-5 hours a night 7 nights a week unless it is only a week or 2 week cruise… otherwise, we will have blown through everything they can think of before we hit sydney and i will be in constant repeat mode ever after… the planned sets have tons of stuff they love and won’t think to ask for, but you play it, and they are like “ooo!”, audibly, even… most of the time, they are trusting me, but last night… oy!  thanks for letting me vent a little…

i am in the café writing surrounded by many happy dutch people all speaking at once… kind of surreal after 15 minutes… our ship has mostly americans, canadians, dutch, european and some aussies…

i was a bit twitterpated that one of our guest entertainers, the celebrated  Australia singer/actor peter cousins came in and introduced himself at the end of my set last night and complimented what i was doing – he said he had heard about me and wanted to hear some of my port songs next time i played… they are getting more popular as people figure out they are a regular feature – i am sure they lose something in translation here, in a written format, but it is a little gimmick i think is mine alone in the fleet, and, yes, if i sound a little pleased, i am… it is hard to find a way to be unique in the herd, and i am not a prop (hats, glasses, toys, etc.) player like a handful of them, or a really flashy dresser (like piano man), or a pyrotechnical player (louder, faster, higher); i mostly just play and sing without any schmaltz, talk to people, we all share our adventures like show and tell each night, do a few singalongs and games here and there to keep them awake and a part of things, and i do port songs and special occasion songs and toasts that are a bit silly.  as an entertainer, what makes you different is what makes you special or memorable, so if people are chatting up the port songs, i am a happy camper… cheers!  -df