The museum was packed with folks when we got there at around 17h00 to finish setting up and all and by 18h30 there was a line of people waiting for the workshops to begin.
At 18h45 we were swamped in the crowd…
I had inherited the Tonatem table, being a “specialist” of this instrument since I’ve made quite a few of them helping Bill on various projects these last years. He had surprised me earlier by telling us that he thought two participants at a time was enough, I had imagined more like 4 to 6 but it’s a fact that after considering the workspace and tools at disposition it seemed that three was probably a good number of instrument builders to begin with.
How it worked out for my colleagues at the other tables is anyone’s guess, the first ten minutes were shear pandemonium, crowded by the mass of folks trying to see the different going ons, it was almost impossible to move and so the next two hours just went by step by step, drill two holes, screw this piece there, choose a piece of styrofoam, watchout! that wire can be pretty nasty…
I could go on and on with the details; what we forgot to bring (pencils!) or what was planned but simply wasn’t going to happen like rotating between the three tables, every time an instrument was finished someone else was there to start making one. Fortunately Thomas, who was the first and as it turned out only one to get behind the video camera, came over to help; Tonatems being the more complicated to make of the instruments proposed.
Suddenly it was 20h30, nearly the announced time for the “after workshop concert”, so it was finish everything as quickly as possible / clean up time, as well as the moment the event organizers came over and said “dinner is served”… They figured we needed a break, which would have been nice it is true, but it was also obvious that the folks waiting for the concert were getting impatient, especially those with small children. Since the workshop participants were all invited to be part of the improvisation, it seemed best to get it going before they all gave up on us, and it was!
Parade through a couple of rooms of the museum was the plan, and so we did, joined by 6 or 7 of the kids and teens who had made something, no adults though… too shy? Or just not inclined to make noise, be it organized or not? Whatever… It was fun and that’s good enough for me plus after it all, our dinner was still warm!
Fed and somewhat exhausted we found energy to pack up in the loud & rowdy blues of Guitar Fucker who was playing near the bar, finishing out the night in style!