Bruce Hornsby, Part II: The show

Bruce started off noodling on the piano... playing some folk song about Sadie, and that turned into "White Wheeled Limousine," which morphed into "Questions and Answers," then back to "White Wheeled Limousine" and "Long Black Veil." Then, "Circus on the Moon" and "The Low Country."

Then he read my request, in which I said: "The new record rocks, why not just play the whole damn thing?" He said my name and everything, then laughed and said he couldn't play all new stuff because there were people there to hear the old stuff. Then he talked about being a 10-time Grammy loser, and told that great story about his wife sitting next to Sting at the Grammys, which blended naturally into "The End of the Innocence." Next, "Tango King", in 9/8 time, which he said was very difficult to dance to (not for me!).

After that, he picked up the dulcimer and strummed "Shadow Hand" and "Prairie Dog Town." Next, the accordion for "Defenders of the Flag" (with a screaming guitar solo from my new friend Doug). After that came "Pete and Manny," which somehow morphed into "Barcelona Mona." Then, "Fields of Gray," which became "Where It's At." One of my favorite songs, "Sunflower Cat," came next, and blended into the old Bob Dylan song "It Takes a Train to Cry," with a good drum solo by Sonny Emory in there somewhere. Then came the song that pays the bills, which went all the way to No. 1 in December 1986: "The Way It Is."

It was so funny to watch the band, laughing and exchanging befuddled looks at all the changes Bruce was making. For my part, I was keeping up nicely, though my knees, feet and calves started to hurt a little after a while... Intermittently, there was another woman who came down to dance next to me... You would call her a hippie stoner, except she was like 22. Do they still have hippie stoners? Anyway, she thought I was "awwwesome."

Rosemary later would tell me that the young women with Tony La Russa kept elbowing him and gesturing toward me... Yikes. I hope there is no cell phone video of my performance!

For an encore, the band came out and did "Cyclone" off the new album... and thank goodness, because Bruce really was true to his word and seemed to be totally ignoring my request to play new stuff! Then came a pretty jaunty version of "The Valley Road."

And that was it!? No second encore!? Well... I would later learn why...

Next up, Part III: After the show