FOOTMAD Memories
#314 / Flood Time Capsule: 2006
In the winter of 2006, Michelle Hoge was not yet a full-fledged member of The Flood. For three years by then, she had performed with us as a featured artist, the guest vocalist or, as fiddler Joe Dobbs lovingly dubbed her, “Da Chick Singer.”
With each performance, Michelle’s role in the band was evolving. She had already appeared on a Flood album. On 2003’s “I’d Rather Be Flooded” album, she is front and center on “Moonglow” and on “Don’t Get Around Much Anymore.”
From then on, the more she sang with us, the more we wanted her to sing with us. With her sharp musical instincts and her formal vocal training, Michelle was starting to create tasty harmonies for most of The Flood’s standards.
Wintertime Fun
Nothing made clearer Michelle’s ever-growing importance to all things Floodish than one particular performance on a snowy Saturday night 16 years ago this week on stage at the West Virginia Culture Center in Charleston.
The Feb. 11, 2006, event was a FOOTMAD (“Friends of Old-Time Music and Dance”) concert, at which The Flood shared the bill with another fun band, Stewed Mulligan.
For the Family Flood, it was a memorable evening of jug band songs and general jolliness, of blues and fiddle tunes and old-time string band music. And of course, of ….
Kazoory!
Recognizing the curiosity the audience had about that bag of kazoos we toted onto the stage, we offered a real hummer of a group participation number, headed by our Kazoo Komander-in-(ker)Chief Dave Peyton.
Click the button below to hear how that moment buzzed along:
Our Pivot
After listening to that bit of musical madness, you’d be forgiven for thinking the evening’s cruise control was set on silliness, but The Flood — exhibiting its celebrated eclecticism — then did a 180.
Right on the heels of the kazoo course, Michelle launched into a classic 1940s jazz standard — “Since I Fell For You” — and a hush fell over the dizzy audience.
In seconds, people were humming along (uh, sans kazoos). Moments later, they cheered so much for Doug Chaffin's sweet mandolin accompaniment that he had to do a second solo.
By the time Michelle got to the end of the number, people were on the feet to cheer her and Doug. Here’s what that sweet memory sounded like:
Incidentally, the tune also is on the band’s official(ish) bootleg album, Hip Boots: The Flooded Basement Tape. Click here to read all about it.
Preview
By the way, on the night before our FOOTMAD Saturday, The Flood appeared on Joe Dobbs’ “Music from the Mountains” show on West Virginia Public Radio.
That preview — with Joe, Dave, Charlie, Doug, Sam, Bub and Michelle — was a full hour of live music, stories and our regular store of smart-assery. Here’s a sample of the frolick, “live from Studio B,” as Joe used to say: