.......................Thomas, Mario & Georg .................................. Christian, Matthieu & Martin

We woke on a crisp, cool Autumn morning, ingested the necessary amounts of caffeine to get us moving and got on the road. It was a bus ride to Bregenz and then train on to Wels. A compliment to the magazine / book shop in the train station in Bregenz - well organized and with an outstanding selection of newspapers and magazines both Austrian and international, just about the best shop of it’s type that we’ve come across. Reading material is very important for the touring musician because otherwise band members might get sucked into listening to one of the trombone players ...
Ed: "I hate that idiot George W. Bush ..." or "Fucking Amis"
Christian: "The philosophical aspects of Bruckners earlier works..."
Robert: "In the Bible it clearly states that ..."
Adrian: "have you ever heard Donna Lee on the Didgeridoo..."

Hannibal our trucker

Harry

And so to avoid a fate worse than death "boredom by trombone players" most VAO members either pretend to sleep or pretend to read magazines and newspapers on long train trips.
Anyway, we arrived in Wels. Got checked into our snug little hotel and then got the bad news: the equipment truck broke down near Salzburg! Not just the entire PA system, but all of the instruments, music, music stands, lighting rig and projector / computer. A PA system was rented in Wels and a 2nd truck was rented. Of course all the important equipment had to be transferred to truck #2 and driven to Wels. Well, that was the end of mathias plan to rehearse and for the several hundred fans expecting an 8 p.m. start. They were greeted by a sign saying "come back later".

.......................... magic Jojo .................................................... Hank & Bumi

The 2nd truck finally arrived around 7 p.m. and the crew did an AMAZING job of getting everything up an running in little over an hour. It would have been even faster if Harry hadn’t kept asking" where are the instrument cases?", "where is my Soprano?", "has anyone seen my music?", "can I get more Soprano Sax in the monitor?", "where are the little shelves for the music stands?", "which reed sounds better #1 or #2?". But anyway GREAT JOB CREW!!!! You saved the day!
The band also rose to the occasion - not having played ART&FUN since July, without a rehearsal and because a lot of friends and family were present. It was a fun gig with great solos from Robert B., Klaus and especially Bumi’s one-handed scream solo. A short warm-up tour ending too soon but we can’t wait to get back on the road in November for much more ART and FUN !!!

Anna & Matthieu

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The last leg of our 25th anniversary tour began in a cold, rainy Vienna. We boarded the night train bound for Switzerland.
In spite of the weather, everyone was in high spirits and happy to get back on the road. Everything was going fine until shortly before departure when we discovered that Anna was nowhere to be found and her mobile number was no longer in service. Much to our relief she was found in the dining car a few minutes after we pulled out of Vienna. Otherwise, the supply of beer and Hungarian schnapps in the dining car was sufficient and the sleeping car was surprisingly comfortable. We were rousted out of bed at 5 a.m. to change trains and that is when our troubles began. The night train was delayed at the Swiss border so by the time we arrived in Sargans ( where we were supposed to change trains ) our connection was already gone. So we had to wait an hour for the next train, the connection to Thalwil, where we had to wait 40 minutes for our next train. This was too much for a few people, who took a taxi to Altdorf ( only 250 Swiss francs! )
Well, our 40 minute wait turned into an hour and 15 minutes because this train was also delayed---and we thought that the trains ran on time in Switzerland!!!

the venue

Meanwhile, the crew was having problems with the Swiss customs agents at the border, owing to a small discrepancy in the customs declaration form. This took hours to clear up, so once again the set-up had to take place under extreme conditions and the rehearsal and sound-check were delayed by over two hours. But as always, the crew did a kick-ass job. Thanks Ronny, Tom, Gerald, Silke, Hannibal, and Karoline.

Tom "turbo" working ...


Karoline & Thomas

In spite of all the stress and lack of sleep the band got back into the groove fairly quickly helped by outstanding solos from Roberts Bachner and Riegler as well as Florian and Andy. The friendly crowd had us play two encores but then it was time to call it a night and have a refreshing beverage (or two). We found a small bar near the hotel that stayed open late for us and where we could play our Sinatra CD’s. They also had an internet connection for The Roberts (R + B) and plenty of whiskey for Hank so everyone was happy.

Robert R., Martin & Thomas (before the concert!)

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On Tuesday we traveled to one of our favorite places to play, Uznach. The folks at the "Kulturtreff Rotfarb" always take great care of us and the audience is always friendly and very receptive to our music.

Swiss way to announce VAO

The band performed acoustically, with only solo mics and the intimate room sounded great (as always). Solo highlights were presented by Alegre and Robert R.; the duos with Anna were also outstanding - first with Martin and then Adrian. After the concert we hung out in Uznach drinking (as always) and meeting some of our fans and friends. A Swiss inventor/musician named Michael Boxer was also there with his latest "toy", a metronome type device for testing your time. You can select any tempo and other parameters (laid-back, swing etc.) and then the test subject snaps or claps along and the tempo and percentage of variance is calculated. There were some surprisingly LOW scores! In fact, the only band member to score 100% was Robert R.

Swiss train station Arth-Goldau: 05.11. at 12.45
"Men in Black" alias Ed & Thomas

Afterwards, it was back to the hotel for the usual ceremonial emptying of our mini-bars and a few hours of sleep before our trip to Amstetten and full day of travel and changing trains: no less than six different trains over a period of eight hours.

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We survived and got checked into the luxurious "Hotel Gürtler", where we had time to shower and get changed for the gig. We tried a new stage set-up, with the saxes and trumpets in the back row, and the trombones up front. The trombones and some of the saxes were happy, but Andy and Hank felt a bit lonely. We’ll have to see if we keep it or go back to the old set-up (band meeting!).

Barbara is back - see her next time at the concerts in Vienna

The audience was nice but somewhat reserved and the solistic highlights of this cold November night were provided by Hank, Christian and Adrian. Andy played great (as always) and in his solo cadenza really took it harmonically to another dimension - thank god he found his way back to ours! Then it was back to the hotel bar, where we celebrated the birthdays of Andy and Robert Riegler. Gansch and Gonzi rigged up a laptop and speakers in the bar so we could listen to Sinatra and Louis Armstrong. And then it was time for bed and 40 winks before another day of travel (9 hours) and concert in Trier (D).

Matthieu "the tiger" and Robert Riegler "our sunny boy"

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It was freezing cold as we got going towards Germany and the town of "Trier" (near the border to Luxembourg). But because of ANOTHER delayed train (thanks Deutsche Bahn) we missed our connection and arrived at 7:40 p.m. for an 8:30 concert - a bit close for comfort.

Adrian

We had literally enough time to change clothes and do a 30 second sound check before they opened the doors. The crowd was friendly and the band played GREAT in spite of our 12 hour travel day and frustration at the German Railway System.

mathias with the organizers

Afterwards it was time for a drink at the hotel bar, where we had a laughingly incompetent bar tender and where we had to deal with a stupid, robot-like grumpy night clerk. Sample quote "this is not a disco!" He reminded us a lot of the last moronic night clerk we had in Luxembourg in May. Since this was a Mercure Hotel and Luxembourg was an IBIS and both chains are owned by the same company - we can only conclude that the company (Bad Hotels International) has a training camp where normal people are brainwashed into non-thinking, grumpy zombies. Otherwise, the incompetent bar tender made the cocktails much too strong (yeah!) and let us play Sinatra, so it wasn’t too bad!

The 8th was that most deadly combination: VAO & day off & alcohol. We started in the first train’s dining car and kept going until the hotel bar in Dortmund closed that night (almost 14 hours!) and had some great discussions about the future of society and the arts and came up with solutions for most of the worlds problems - unfortunately theses solutions took place during the fuzzy / foggy times and the memory loss that occurred as a result of massive alcohol consumption. One sample quote Adrian to Klaus: "Klaus, where were you last night? What did you do after we got to Dortmund?" Klaus to Adrian: "You and I went to dinner together I sat across the table from you for almost two hours" Adrian: "oh".

Andy & Hank

Matthieu & Mario

Our Saturday got off to a strange start at our hotel, the "Astron Suites" in Dortmund. The hotel itself was fine but the service at breakfast was really, really bad and really, really, really unfriendly. They didn’t have enough coffee cups or silverware. Everything on the buffet was empty and when we asked (very nicely) for eggs to be brought out it took an amazing 25 minutes for 4 fried eggs to be cooked (is that enough for 20 people?). But otherwise, Saturday was spent relaxing and shopping in town.

We played the new concert house with over 800 people in the brand new, acoustically perfect hall. Ellington fit the room perfectly and high points included Gansch, the Breinschmid / Dickbauer Duo, Anna & Andy’s touching rendition of "Day Dream" and Gonzi. Matthieu let loose on Diminuendo and then it was back to the hotel for a few drinks on the bar and then a party in Gansch’s room - complete with laptop & speakers & Sinatra.

Things got a bit out of hand with bottles of vodka and gin appearing out of nowhere and most of the people present not getting much sleep (that what trains are for!). So it was a very hungover VAO that (in some cases) crawled to the train station Sunday morning for another long trip down to Innsbruck (9 hours).

Bumi sleeping at the train station

The sold out "Treibhaus" was our venue and the crowd was really up for it. The band fed off the energy.

mathias & Norbert (from the Treibhaus)

The gig might of been the best one so far with each-and-every soloist on top of their game and the band incredibly tight. Home town boy Florian really flew but it was a group effort and everyone deserves a pat on the back and a gold star for effort.

Florian

After two encores most of the band went straight to bed (I wonder why?) to rest up for our two concerts in Vienna.
Home - Sweet - Home!