I saw a post by a friend of mine tonight on social media. She is a writer and had a book signing event/Q&A scheduled at a local library. Apparently no one showed up. So she went home after 20 minutes of waiting. This led to a whole series of questions in her mind I am sure–about her talents, her worthiness, her success. I posted my own words of encouragement on her blog.

And then I remembered the time this happened to me. It was long ago and far away, but I’ll never forget the one time I had a concert planned with my trio back in the 1990’s. We had been on the road for some time and stopped in Arizona for a show. And no one showed up. Well, actually it was worse than that. ONE person showed up.

We had promoted the show (or so we thought). We had rented the hall. We had hired the lighting/sound techs. On the day of the show, we loaded in. We rehearsed. Earlier that morning, I made a little side trip to visit my old friend Barbara who had recently moved to the southwest from NJ. We used to be neighbors. A former soap opera actress, she was now a real estate agent. We had a lovely time catching up. I was so proud of her for reinventing herself and told her so. She said she was so impressed with what I had accomplished and took great pleasure in following my career via my web site and was thrilled I was making a living as a national touring musician. I left to get ready for the show. She said, “see you there,” and that she did.

And she was the only one who did.

We were in our dressing rooms when the stage manager knocked on our door. It was fifteen minutes to places and there was no audience yet. How many people did we expect? I went to the box office and asked the staffer there how many tickets had been sold and she said none. I kind of wish someone had snapped my photo in that moment, because I bet the look on my face was priceless.

Now what?

For some reason I still can’t explain (nervousness/exhaustion/disbelief/irony?), I began to laugh as I broke the news to my fellow musicians.Then we all started to laugh–the cellist, the guitarist, me…we had worked so hard and had been so demanding and exacting of one another when it came to our music. We had been so SERIOUS about the content of the show, but apparently we did a terrible job promoting it. And here we were, all dressed up, ready to do a show and there was no audience. It was funny. We laughed until we cried. It was all just so….so….ridiculous.

We decided in that moment to play anyway. We were in a lovely hall. We had great lighting, a good sound system, and we had paid for the space. We might as well play. And then the door to the theater opened and in walked Barbara. Seeing the three of us alone on the stage she shouted across the theater, “Robin! What’s going on? Where is everyone? Did you mix up the date?”

Suddenly it wasn’t funny anymore. I had just told Barbara that afternoon about my successful “career,” and here I was in the most embarrassing of situations. “No, Barb. We didn’t mix up the night. This is just what we call a secret concert. No one knows about it. No one but you.”

Without another word, we began to play. Barbara looked around uneasily as we began to play,  and chose a seat. And she stayed. We played. We played a beautiful concert. Barbara gave us a standing ovation at the end. I think she even bought a CD or two. And if she was embarrassed for us, she never showed it. She thanked us for a lovely evening and off she went.

So what did all of this mean? Was I a failure? Did I suck? Was I  unworthy? Nope. None of those things.  In the grand scheme of things, it didn’t mean a darn thing. It was one show out of hundreds that I have played over the last 25 years or so. Like all shows, I played to the best of my ability, and if I say so myself, we all did a rather fine job. It was the best concert no one heard.

To answer my friend’s question, the answer is YES. If you play a show and no one shows up (or if one person shows up)….it is still a show. How do I know this? Well, because I was there.

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