January 20, 2008 by Ro.

“I brothe here.”

As you can see, we are inventing our own language. This is probably due to the fact that we sing so much doo-wop music, involving a lot of nonsense syllables, like “doo” and “wop.” Wow! Coincidence? I don’t think so. But, it is clear that our command of real language dwindles in direct proportion to the amount we rehearse.

Especially Jeff. As our bass he undoubtedly sings more “doos” and “wops” than the rest of us. Audrey generally sings a beautiful melodic line with actual lyrics in the English language, and Steve and Ro, the middle parts, harmonize on some syllable like “Ah” or “Oo,” or if we’re being really creative, “Oh.” But good ol’ Jeff The Bass is carrying the bottom line, doo-wopping and dip-dit-ditting and dum-dippy-dooing in his amiable and winning way. I believe we’ve had entire rehearsals where he hasn’t sung a single actual word.

Jeff is also responsible for starting many of our songs. If you’ve ever seen us perform, you’ll notice that we have a set list on our music stand. Steve, the computer genius, has established a very detailed and complicated database of all our songs from which he creates a set list for each performance. It gives the song title, the starting pitch, any choreography cues, the lead singer, and the all-important starting cue: who starts the song and how.

Poor Jeff. Most of the starting cues go like this:
Jeff start “Doo doo doo.”
Jeff start “Did dit”
Jeff start “Dum dum dum”
Jeff start “Dum dit dit”

How in the world he ever remembers one from the other is one of life’s great mysteries.

Audrey and Ro start a series of “doo doo” jokes, always a favorite. I swear you never outgrow this stuff:
“Why is Jeff leaning to the side? Because his starting cue was written in italics.”
“How does Dyslexic Jeff start a song? boo boo”
“How does Jeff start a song in Hebrew? ood ood”
“Why is Jeff shouting? Because his starting cue was written in boldface.”

So it is no surprise when we are trying to decide where to mark “Every Time I Feel the Spirit” for breathing that Jeff, who probably hasn’t had to speak a real English word for the past hour of rehearsing, says “I brothe here,” inventing a whole new past tense. Naturally this sparks a protracted and hilarious snort and weenie session and the rehearsal is pretty much down the toilet, so to speak, for the day.

Oh, we do have fun!

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January 6, 2008 by Ro.

It’s January, which means SALES SALES SALES!! All the stores are eager to unload their glitzy holiday merchandise — which translates to “COSTUMES” to the female half of Moderately Bright Four. Audrey and Ro are, naturally, the eye candy of the quartet, so it is up to them to dress themselves accordingly. This means sparkly glitz and glamor. This means sequins and satin. This means crapola up the ying-yang!

The best part is this means Ro and Audrey get to go shopping on a Sunday afternoon and to laugh themselves sick in the dressing room at Macy’s with an armload of the most dreadful holiday rejects Macy’s can’t discount enough to sell.

And laugh they do! And they entertain every other customer in the dressing room as well, who can’t wait to see them sporting what they are giggling about.

“What are you trying first, Ro?”

“Let’s try the brown shirred number.”

“OK”

[insert hysterical laughter here]

They meet at the communal mirror:

“OMG I look like a stuffed sausage. “

“No, you look fine. I look like something the cat left outside its box.”

“Maybe under stage lighting it would be OK.”

“This wouldn’t be OK even to blind people left in total darkness.”

“Maybe it will look better when it’s on the clearance rack.”

“Maybe. We’ll revisit in a couple weeks.” (They return to their dressing rooms.)

“How about the copper sequin tee? It might be nice with black pants.”

“OK.”

“I’m thinking it makes me look like a greased pig. It kind of matches my skin when it’s oily. And I can’t move my arms.”

“I know. It feels like a straitjacket. Clearly a bad thing.”

“Try the hot pink muumuu.”

“I never thought I would see the day when I would be trying on a hot pink muumuu. And yet here I am.”

[At this point we are starting to draw crowds in the dressing room. We explain that we are “show folk” and they all nod wisely and appear to forgive us.]

We continue in this fashion (to pardon the pun) through the pink muumuus, the gold sequin cardigans, the yellow and black sparkle tops, the black and gold beaded numbers for which Audrey clearly needs a different bra, and the Carmen Miranda-inspired fou-fou skirts with fabric flowers the size of Cleveland. We are dying laughing. For sure the security cameras will have us both on YouTube in the morning.

And we emerge from the dressing room victorious! We have three new costumes!

What did we choose? The muumuus? The sparkle tops? The Carmen Miranda skirts? The only way to find out is to come to our shows! See the Events link at www.moderatelybrightfour.com!

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