History, Ancient and Otherwise: Students

Some of my mid-level students. We're having lunch at TGI Friday's, which looks just like TGI Friday's in America:


These are lower-level students (we're at a really nice Korean restaurant)...


...as are these:


One of my high level students with his wife and son, at his son's first birthday party:

Some of my highest level students, at a guitar bar (a cozy little establishment that basically has an open mic; I played a few tunes to entertain the folks). A good time is being had here, as you can see. We're laughing at a hilarious Frenchman who is taking our picture:

There was a group from a French class there, including four French folk. We had an international, non-competitive sing-off. The Korean bar owner played a song, the Frenchmen played a song (in French), and I played U2's "With or Without You" to represent the USA (yes, I know U2 is an Irish band).

Happy Thanksgiving, Everyone!

Speakeasy II

Saturday night was all about rock 'n' roll. First, Canadian Matt Amond played a solo acoustic set...


...then I tuned my guitar...


...then we became the Matt Amond Band (We did several covers and several of Matt's originals. He writes countrified, funkified, Beatlesque-ified, tongue-in-cheek-ified, all-good-ified tunes)...

...followed soon by a transformation into the Jordan Emmans Band (that's me, appearing to scream bloody murder into the mic, with bassist Dave Janssen and drummer Dan Lloyd looking on in concern. I'm not sure if the girl on the left is dancing or just saying, "Whatever!"):


(The sharp-eyed reader will notice that the date has now changed. Yes, the Jordan Emmans Band didn't start playing until after midnight. Oh yes, it was a late one.)

Matt, intently playing tasty ear candy and appropriate leads on his gorgeous Epiphone hollowbody:Deep in the musical moment:


Oh, remember when I said playing in a bar was like practicing in public? Not this time! I think because we were better rehearsed, and I was playing an in-your-face electric (the guitar sounded like a dream, by the way; I was mucho happy with it), people were by-and-large listening to us. And I brought a bunch of my BCM friends, so it was a friendly crowd.

Probably the coolest moment came at the penultimate song, which was U2's "With or Without You." There were times when Dan said he couldn't hear me because the crowd was singing along so loudly. Very epic. I can only wonder how Bono and the boys must feel when 50,000 + of their closest friends are singing along with them -- and they, of course, actually wrote the song. We were just temporarily borrowing a bit of U2's glory, riding their coattails, so to speak. But it was an amazing ride nonetheless.

Thus far, this gig was probably the most fun I've ever had on stage. I mean, it was awesome! These guys are a ton of fun to play with. We'll be playing again in the near future, and hopefully recording some stuff. Apparently a lot of people really like my tunes, so we need to produce something for the eager fans.

BCM Language Center Party

These are from October 27th. It was my birthday party, our teacher Jeff's going-away party, and new teacher Daniel's and new night secretary Ji Un's welcome party.

I didn't take a picture of Daniel or Jeff, but here is Jeff with his little son, Hugh, at his first birthday party. They're both arrayed in Han-bok, traditional Korean garb (Jeff's wife is Korean). This was back in February when I first got here:

Here some of us are at the restaurant. From left to right: Nathan (Korean-American from Wisconsin), Yun Sik (pronounced Yoon Sheek), and Alex (Yun Sik and Alex are native Koreans):

A close-up of Yun Sik, because the assembled demanded it:

Here are, l-r, Sun Ae and Kyung Ae, former night secretary and current morning secretary, respectively. They initially refused to be photographed...

...but I persisted:


Actually, Kyung Ae continued in her refusal, but I was too quick for her:

Ji Un, our new night secretary, had no problem:


It was a fun night, replete with various forms of carousing. We imbibed, we puffed a few stogies, we shot pool, we even went to a night club and got our grooves on. Zero sleep and a good time were had by all.