Date: 03 Oct 1999
To: MitchMailList
From: Danl Blackwood
Subject: [MitchMailList 043]: Three Texas reviews, Sept 24-26

Date: Tue, 28 Sep 1999 14:39:06 (PDT)
From: Tina Eldridge
Subject: Another Texas weekend with Mitch...

as posted to the Ragamuffin Mailing List

My husband and I were once again given the blessed opportunity to go
to 3 of Mitch's concerts, back-to-back-to-back!  I'm still basking in
the glow of the whole experience, and no words that I can say will
begin to do it justice, but I'll see what I can come up with.

Our weekend began in Dallas at the Park Cities Baptist Church on
Friday night, September 24th, at 7:00.  The evening opened up with a
praise and worship time, led by "The Band" of PCBC (their youth band),
who did a wonderful rendition of "Hope To Carry On", among other great
music. Before they went on, someone went up to the mic to welcome
everyone and said something to the effect of "we're glad you're here,
whether you're a member of this church, or a member of the community,
or whether you're some sort of Mitch McVicker groupie who flew in from
somewhere!"  Well, we didn't think of ourselves as "groupies" at that
point,(besides, we didn't fly, we drove!), but I'll get back to that
later.  Mitch and Brad took the stage at around 7:30, and did a great
job.  I didn't take any notes, but the concert matched the ones I've
read about in recent past, right down to the "Dead Space Song", the
polar bear impression and the comment about not being able to fry
technology in a wok!  One thing that was different (I think it was
different) was that after a few songs, Mitch had to stop and take a
water break.  He apologized for that, and said that he hates it when
people do that during a concert, but he had come down with something a
few days ago and they'd given him a bunch of pills to take plus an
inhaler and it was all drying him out, and since he'd heard that it
was hard to sing with a dry voice, he figured he'd better drink!  It
was pretty funny.

One of the highlights of the night for us was getting to meet Mitch's
mom. She and his dad had flown in on Friday and were going to go to
the concert the next night as well before returning home Sunday.
Beverly (fellow raglister) introduced Paul and I to Mrs. McVicker and
told her that we had driven up from San Antonio just to see Mitch and
that we were going to his other 2 concerts of the weekend and that
we'd done this type of thing before and so on, and she  looked at us
and said "thank you".  We thought that was very kind of her, although
it is entirely our pleasure.  We feel very blessed to be able to do
it.

On Saturday night, September 25, we traveled to the Green Acres
Baptist Church in Tyler for the 7:00 concert.  We'd met someone on
Friday night who just "happened" to be a member of that church and who
gladly gave us directions from Dallas (God was at work again!!), which
came in very handy!  We arrived along with Apryl (another raglister)
at around 5:30 to find a crowd of around 40 or so had already
gathered.  They opened the doors at 6:00, and everyone rushed in like
a herd of cattle since it was open seating.  We sat about 7 rows back,
then spotted some space on the 3rd pew, so we moved up.  We sat and
watched the people pour in for the next hour, and just as things were
about to start, who came and sat at the end of our pew?  Mitch's
parents.  I don't think they saw us, but we saw them.  The concert was
pretty much the same as before - terrific!!!!!!  Mitch has written
some wonderful new songs that I can't *wait* to have on a CD!!!  He
and Brad are hilarious to watch.  They play off of each other like
little kids!  One of my favorite stories of the weekend was the one
about driving through Nevada.  Mitch said that on their way back from
California they were driving through Nevada, and they didn't realize
that it was such a big state.  They got so tired of it after awhile,
and they were so ready to, as Mitch put it, "move on to whatever state
comes after Nevada" (or something close to that) that they re-named
it!  I can't come up with a good way to write what they called it, but
if you take away the "va" in the middle of "Nevada" and replace it
with a nice big raspberry, you should get the idea!  Mitch said it was
beautiful, but one can only handle so much beauty!  Brad said that
after they got out of Nevada (or whatever those two are calling it
these days!), they moved right into Utah, which they renamed in the
same fashion (just replace the "Ut" with the raspberry this time)! 
This spawned the discussion of how salty Utah is, and Mitch said that
it made him wanna go buy a whole package of hot dogs, roll them around
in the salt and eat 'em!  It was so funny...

The concert wasn't much different from Friday nights - mostly the same
songs, same goofing around, same water comments... - until about
halfway through.  During one of the breaks between songs, Mitch said
that he saw some "familiar faces" in the audience; that there were
some people there who had gone to several of his concerts and were
pretty much following him around Texas!!  I'm sure I began to turn
about 15 different shades of red at this point!  He went on to explain
that a lot of folks may call those people "groupies", but the truth is
that he just pays them really well!  Of course, everyone laughed,
since only one other person in the entire audience (Apryl) knew who he
was talking about.  Paul and I just looked at each other and smiled. 
After the concert was over (and after they'd done a **great** job on
"No, Not One" as part of their encore), we waited for the crowd to
thin out as we always do, and we talked with Mitch for a few minutes. 
I asked him if that comment was directed at anyone in particular, or
if he just felt like saying it, or what?! He just laughed and said "I
just felt like saying it". Uh-huh, sure Mitch! :)  He went on to say
that he really thinks it's great that we go to all those concerts, and
I told him what I always tell him - it's our pleasure.  Apryl and I
took pictures with Mitch and Brad, and we got to meet Mitch's dad
before we left that night.  We talked only for a minute or two before
we had to go, but he shook our hands as we left and thanked us for all
the support we've given Mitch.  I hope they all understand that we
*love* getting to go to all those concerts!! It's no chore, it's a
huge privelage and we're *so* thankful that God allows us to do it. 
There aren't many things that we can think of that top the fun we have
and the joy we get from Mitch's concerts.

We finished off our weekend on Sunday, September 26 at the Calvary
Worship Center, just north of Austin at 7:00. We got to sit in on
soundcheck this time (thanks to Angie letting us take our front row
seats early!!), which was quite an experience!  Not sure what *kind*
of experience, but definitely an experience!  After waiting for nearly
an hour and a half, things finally got underway, right on time. 
Pretty much the same as before - awesome!  Things were going along
just great (if you don't count the few problems they had with their
monitors and Brad's broken guitar string!) until the Enemy decided to
make his presence known.  After the love offering, Mitch and Brad
played one last song (the one Mitch just wrote about "living in a
world that's inside out..."), and Mitch just didn't look good at all. 
He looked like he was having trouble keeping his eyes open, so much so
that I was going to ask him after the concert if he was OK during that
last song.  When they finished it, they put their guitars down and
walked off stage.  We had some friends with us that night, and I said
to them "they're not done, they'll be back".  The lights came on and
the soundperson started playing a CD, and I knew then that they
wouldn't be back.  As everyone started leaving, Paul and I stayed in
our seats and waited for things to calm down so we could go talk to
Mitch.  After maybe 10 minutes, Mitch came and found *us* and said
that he just wanted to come say hi because he was about to fall over. 
Something hit him about halfway through the concert and it just wiped
him out.  I felt so bad for him; one look and you knew he was feeling
rotten.  He got pulled in another direction, and during that time Brad
came up to us and I talked with him for a minute about Mitch before he
he got asked to play the dulcimer for someone.  The fact that Mitch
was feeling so sick and yet he stayed out there and visited with
everyone who wanted to visit with him, in my humble opinion, speaks
volumes for his character.  A lot of folks wouldn't have done that,
but he did.  We got to talk to Mitch for a few more minutes before we
left, and he thanked us again for being there all weekend.  I gave him
one last hug and we left, feeling once again that we had been truly
blessed to have been able to take part in what we had.

It was a very full weekend for us, and we did a lot of driving, but we
*loved* nearly every minute of it (we of course didn't love it that
Mitch got so sick), and we'd do it all over again if we had the
chance.  I cannot say enough about these guys - they're great
musicians,  and it's obvious that they love Christ with all their
hearts.  If any of you ever get the chance to see them - DO IT!!  You
won't regret it, I promise.  Mitch's CD is being re-released real soon
(with his version of "My Deliverer"!!!!!!), and I for one can't wait!

I don't know if I really did the whole experience justice, but I gave
it my best shot! What can I say except that it was one of the most fun
and most special weekends I've had in a very long time.

rag hugs -  Tina

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