In interview, Joanna Hacker tells us how everything started and remembers some stories.
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In interview, Joanna Hacker tells us how everything started and remembers some stories.
In January 2015, that same flamenco band from the bar in Cais do Sodré – the Diego el Gavi Band – accepted our invitation to perform at the first Lisbon Living Room Session in our own house. We weren’t sure what to expect, but everyone loved the experience, and it just took off from there. Less than a week after the first session, we had already booked our performer for the second.
Our partnership with Esporão was also one of the fruits of friendship and community and connection, and is absolutely crucial for the project. For our very first session in January 2015, Ricardo and I bought the wine that we served. But after seeing how well it had gone, and once we had booked our second performer, I think I recall that Ricardo decided to go out on a limb and ask a friend about possible partnership with Esporão. But if I remember correctly, Esporão was enthusiastic about the project from the very beginning. Began to offer wine to each of our sessions starting already with #2, in February of 2015, and the support has increased ever since then. Now Esporão supports our photography and videography as well.
And even better, to pair with its wine, we also have the generous participation of a wonderful local restaurant that features inventive Portuguese/Brazilian fusion food: Aromas e Temperos. So LLRS has really become a gastronomical event, as well as a musical one.
The future of the Lisbon Living Room Sessions is a tantalizing riddle, and a paradox, because of our spreading notoriety. Someone recently asked me how we will accommodate the growth that fame brings – and the answer is, we will not. By its very nature this project must remain small: it can never outgrow the intimate spaces of private homes. If we were to abandon the literal “living room” we would lose one of the most important parts of the experience. So our growth model is more like an anti-growth model: we will always stay small. This means that we seem increasingly “exclusive” in the sense that – as more people request attendance – more people must be excluded. This is, by far, the hardest and most unpleasant part of what we have to do: we hate turning people away. We hate having to say “no.” We really struggle with it. But for the time being it seems there’s no way to avoid it. Now, our sessions often “sell out” within just a few hours of being announced. That’s the hard part.
Meanwhile, that being said, the incredible attention that we got in 2016 brought all kinds of new opportunities and possibilities for 2017. And the whole thing has grown so organically, so naturally, of its own easy momentum. Of course it requires a lot of work from us, but really, the project is so obvious – so simple – it touches something that so many people just really want and value in their lives – in some ways it has barely really needed our help to grow. So many people have been together, so many unexpected and happy connections, so many hours of music and conversation, so many post-concert parties and dinners. It’s really astounding.
So we’re thinking about doing several different things with the project in 2017, much of it having to do with expressing our thanks to our hosts, our musicians and our community. It’s all going to remain like this, as far as our role is concerned: word-of-mouth, friend-to-friend, and all from the heart. We couldn’t be happier.
For example, we’re only about two degrees of separation away from Seu Jorge: he is a friend of a friend. He came to Lisbon to perform with Ana Carolina in October of 2016, and if only his flight back to Brazil had been scheduled slightly later in the evening, we are sure would have welcomed him into the living room. Sara Tavares was an absolute phenomenon that month – so we have no regrets whatsoever. But once you’re at the level of Seu Jorge, there is really no limit. Our hopes are very, very high.