Fun Fun – A Night in Montreal – 2008

Manteca: Fun Fun - A Night in Montreal - 2008

Fun Fun A Night in Montreal is a live CD we recorded in Montreal at the wonderful old vaudeville theatre “Le Tulipe”. This was the second night of our 2007 tour. I remember this show well, the band was so polite with each other, time for a fill?...no, no, please after you, I insist. Lots of “air” in this show and we like air… it’s the space in between the notes, if you can hear the air that means we’re tight! That night we were tight, we were loose.

Many thanks to my co-producer on this record the wonderful Frank Opolko, who is a great trombone player and producer. Jeff Wolpert mixed this for us. He was in one of his “no reverb” periods…the engineering on the live recording was so tight that he just was basking in the sounds. The mix turned out very separate but very dry. At mastering we put a little verb on the whole mix…not usually done that way but I think it gives the record a real impact. It was broadcast as a show on Canada Live on CBC. John Johnson, Steve McDade, Rob Gusevs, Henry Heillig, Mark Ferguson, Art Avalos, Charlie Cooley, Kelly Jefferson and me. The cover photo was taken by my father George Zimbel, it’s called Fun Fun for obvious reasons.