Played today with the Johnny Rodgers Band at the U.S. Embassy’s
Independence Day celebration in Minsk, Belarus. Afterwards did a TV interview at ONT second national TV.
The event was held in the Belarusian president’s former residence. It’s very similar in design to the US ambassadors residence in Moscow. This cool American flag cake was one of many Fourth of July decorations for the event today.
Pictured below is our wonderful friend Scott Rauland the chargé d’affaires and his wife Fran greeting all the guests at the reception line. Scott has been our champion in bringing us here and to Malaysia multiple times.
A shot of the band before leaving for the television station to preface a morning show.
These are they same drums I’ll be playing tomorrow night as a guest of the Belarus Philharmonic at their beautiful hall here in Minsk.
Some more party scenes, a demonstration of a 3D printer and some American cultural books on display.
Here are some shots of us getting ready for our interview at the ONT second national TV station.
after we all got our makeup done We sat down with our wonderful hosts to talk about our concerts and our mission here in Belarus.
We hung out by the Svisloch river and Yanka Kupala Park which is named after one of the great Belarusian poets. (Janka Kupala – was the pen name of Ivan Daminikavich Lutsevich, a Belarusian poet and writer.)
Brian and I went out to explore the city and had some wonderful local beer. I was getting some funny looks from the bartender and after I went to the restroom I realized rain and I hadn’t taken off our makeup from the TV station;)
Here are some more shots from our outing.
Well it’s getting late and we have a long walk home;) spokoynoy nochi (good night)
