Had dinner with Juana, her family, and Alejandro, her keyboard player. I asked how it was for her abandoning a successful career as a TV comedienne for music.
She said it was horrible. She was very successful. I suspect she was like an Argentine Tracy Ulman - she did characters. But after a while it wasn't fun any more, a treadmill. So she abandoned it, a brave move, and started doing music, but the audiences there demanded the characters she’d created on TV. There seemed to be no way out. No record company was even interested in releasing a record. So the first record was done small, independent (though Gustavo Santoalla produced). But then she heard that Chris Duritas on KCRW was playing two songs off it, and she and her family moved to LA to begin performing (and recording) where she said "at least one person liked my music."
Her husband Frederico advises me that playing the casino in Punta del Este in Uruguay might not be the best idea. I didn't even know we were scheduled to play a casino. He said it might be carnival week (candomblé music, said Alejandro) - Montevideo should not be skipped for a casino on the beach. (I would like to hear some candomblé, the Black mostly carnival music of Uruguay and Argentina.)
The South American dates are all in flux. I have asked that the Brazil venues be changed to more appropriate ones on the advice of a loca. The freight bill is out of control — so high I will lose money — and the other dates seem to change from time to time as well. Hope it gets sorted. It is getting worked out, but in small increments.
