Dan Bern made his annual stop in the area last night. This time he played at Jammin’ Java in Vienna — probably my favorite place to see him — it’s intimate and the sound is great. He played a good mix of old and new stuff, and did a lot of chit-chatting in between songs. He seemed in great spirits as well. Pretty much a perfect show.

The audience was attentive and appreciative, if somewhat sparse. I didn’t recognize anyone — either all the folks I knew who used to go to Dan’s shows have moved to other artists or states — or I didn’t look closely enough.

Paul Kuhn played his cellocaster to accompony Dan for all of the songs and 1/3 of the way through the show, Holly Montgomery joined Dan and Paul on stage to sing along with some “oldies”.

Dan mentioned winning a new guitar in an egg-eating contest and claimed to be drinking zrii and vodka. He started singing one of his earlier songs a second time, but caught it before he got too far. He forgot the words to a couple of songs as well.  But he seemed to have a good time.

This is one of my favorites: Walking Through Glass

Here’s one of his most famous: Marilyn

 
My only complaint? No encore. I’m used to him coming back at least once to sing more — but the audience just got up and left when he said “Goodbye and thanks for coming.” Was it because it was a Sunday night and we had work the next day? Was it because the audience felt like it had enough? I can’t figure it out. I don’t blame the band — I blame the audience. I sat and clapped while people got up and left, then I got embarrassed and left too.