The G&F band and alumni performed earlier this Fall at a Celebration of Life picnic dedicated to a dear friend who had passed a few months previously. The local folks and out of town guests sang along with our familiar tunes on a pleasant autumn afternoon.
The next day, some of the visiting musicians joined the band at the local brewpub for a jam session.
It was a lovely weekend of remembrance for a very special lady.
From the BRC: Peace
Shortly after the recent mid-day solar eclipse, the G&F musicians surpassed the $32K milestone of gig tips collected since our band`s inception in 1995 for donation to the local Childrens Hospital. A subsequent evening celestial event seen below also signaled this monetary accomplishment with a spectacular moonrise over the lake behind the BRC workshop.
Since 2009, the Broadway Brewery has graciously hosted our Sunday afternoon jams where its patrons have donated over three-fourths of the aforesaid tip money into a guitar case at the foot of the bandstand. We salute the generosity of our listeners and the brewpub`s community spirit to support our local pediatric medical center.
Other news includes the migration of our Wednesday afternoon jam sessions in a small village near the Lake of the Ozarks. We recently relocated this music gathering from the basement of a local church to the township`s community center which has welcomed us. Many of the musicians pictured below in our newly-situated picking venue frequently trek north to join our Sunday afternoon performances at the brewpub.
From the BRC: We are appreciative of these many good folks and thank them all for their generous civic-mindedness.
To celebrate the Holidays, the G & F musicians recently congregated at a nearby retirement home to entertain the clients with a seasonal song fest. One of the retirees was a guitarist/singer who had attended Thursday night jam sessions with several of us for decades in the basement of a local hardware store, and his specialty was old cowboy songs. He joined our performance and regaled the audience and his fellow musicians with bygone country western classics that we remembered well – thanks to him. The staff and clients joyfully sang along on the familiar Holiday tunes.
With December soon closing the calendar year, the Gainor & Friends musicians are reminded of the generosity of the Broadway Brewery management in inviting us 14 years go this month to perform weekly gigs for the benefit of the nearby University of Missouri Children`s Hospital. We salute and thank the Brewery for its community spirit in supporting our local pediatric medical center.
The brewpub provides the band with a meal during our mid afternoon break-time at each Sunday performance. Since our band`s inception in 1995, we have donated $31K to our nearby Children`s Hospital, and over three-fourths of those moneys have come from the generosity of the brewpub patrons. Thank you all.
From the BRC: Wishing Peace everywhere in our New Year.
The G&F band began performing weekly gigs at the family-friendly Broadway Brewery in 2009 and donating all tips to the Children`s Hospital. With the Covid plague blanketing the globe last year, the musicians were driven from the stage on the Ides of March 2020. Jam sessions were thereafter conducted at the BRC bandleader`s home for well over a year. In mid-May of 2021, the pickers ventured back onto the brewpub stage and were welcomed by the entertainment-starved customers who longed for signs of normalcy. By late August, however, a surging delta viral variant caused the band members to retreat once more from the venue. With the recent availability of vaccine boosters and seasonal flu shots, the G&F band has again returned its music to the Brewery during the Sunday brunch hours. Our percussionist nicknamed Bones, a showman and audience favorite, happily holds his rhythm instruments aloft.
In the meantime, we await a foreseeable future when hopefully the G&F Singers can again serenade kids and families at the Children`s Hospital, and the band can perform on the psychiatric ward of the university hospital during the Holidays. Time will tell, but we remain optimistic. We wish you renewed optimism and good times ahead, too.
From the BRC: Be well and have a restful Thanksgiving weekend.
Made with in Missouri.