Ed was feeling quite nervous at the moment. No, to be precise, he was extremely nervous.
He couldn't believe he had actually won the opportunity to perform at Village Vanguard. This was Village Vanguard, after all! For independent musicians, it was a rare chance to step onto an underground stage like this.
For the general public, Village Vanguard had no reputation whatsoever. Tourists wouldn't choose to visit here, as there were dozens of similar bars in Greenwich Village. It was simply an inconspicuous roadside bar. But among true insiders, the name of Village Vanguard resonated like thunder. Not because its stage was "famous", but because of the professionalism it attracted. Relying solely on word of mouth was enough to establish the reputation of an independent musician.
In simple terms, Village Vanguard stripped away all commercialism and returned to the essence of music. It tested the true abilities of the singers. Whether the performance was good or bad, brilliant or not, was immediately apparent.
Ed also never imagined that he would be given the chance to perform at Village Vanguard. It was all too wonderful, almost too unreal. He felt as if his feet were stepping on clouds, without any solid ground to stand on. His mind was a blank canvas, unable to recall the reality of it all.
And then, Ed saw Renly coming toward him.
A white T-shirt paired with black jeans, topped with a sky-Renly denim jacket. His golden-brown curls, which seemed much longer and more disheveled than the last time they met, hung loosely. It was a far cry from the polished appearance at the awards ceremony. He seemed like a completely different person inside and out.
"You're here." A faint smile graced Renly's lips. A simple greeting, but it was enough to pull Ed down from his cloud. The feeling of his feet on solid ground made everything real, "How are you feeling? Are you ready?"
Ed's tongue felt tied in knots, and his mind was tangled up too. "Uh..." Then Ed pulled out a stack of things from his pocket, cupping them in his palm, and presented them to Renly. He looked like the masked man from "Spirited Away", and Renly himself was... Chihiro?
After a mental leap, Renly couldn't help but burst into laughter. This expression only made Ed more uneasy. He looked at Renly with a bewildered and panicked expression, utterly at a loss.
Renly quickly stifled his laughter, extended his hands, and watched as Ed placed the crumpled bills into his palm. The small pile of bills looked like a little mound. "I need to count this," Renly said seriously, a faint smile playing at the corners of his eyes.
This response eased Ed's nervousness. This was the cash he had worked so hard to accumulate. If Renly had just taken it and put it away casually, as if he didn't care, Ed would have felt a sense of loss. But Renly's serious yet relaxed attitude conveyed enough respect, placing them on equal footing.
Ed couldn't help but scratch his head, revealing a big smile.
"Come with me, I'm quite familiar with this place." Renly gestured for Ed to follow and led him to the reserved booth in the corner. Carefully, he smoothed out and neatly stacked all the cash, then proceeded to count it.
Though the cash looked like a jumble, Renly knew better. These were probably the earnings Ed had saved up from street performances, every bill representing his hard-earned sweat. More than anyone else, Renly understood how hard-won this money was.
"Very accurate. A total of two hundred and fifty dollars, right?" Renly's question made Ed nod quickly in affirmation. Renly smiled and asked, "So, how does it feel to arrive in New York?"
Ed thought earnestly for a moment, "Better than Los Angeles." Feeling that this statement was too vague, he added, "The income here in a day can match a week's performances in LA." Excitement was evident in his expression. "I've always thought that Los Angeles would offer more opportunities."
"Los Angeles is a city for actors, but New York is a city for art," Renly's words made Ed suddenly realize.
Both Los Angeles and New York were cities where street performances were common. But there were distinct differences between the two. Street performances in Los Angeles featured more performers or buskers, like artists dressed as Iron Man taking photos with tourists, or fire-breathing stunts. In New York, street performances were more often about violin playing, guitar singing, and even symphony orchestras. Of course, there were no absolutes, but relatively speaking, these two cities had these tendencies.
So, for a folk singer like Ed, New York was his paradise. Singing at a street corner in Greenwich Village or inside a subway station near Broadway could easily earn him three or four hundred dollars in a day.
"So, have you had any fresh inspiration in your songwriting lately?" Renly's proactive question made Ed feel a bit shy but also excited. He eagerly said, "I saw news reports about you in Toronto everywhere."
Renly chuckled softly, "I thought we were discussing music now." After a day of adjustment at Mount Sinai Hospital, the last thing he needed was to keep talking about Toronto.
Ed nodded repeatedly, excitedly continuing, "When I was in the UK, I came up with a song, but it's never been perfected. Last week, at the intersection of 42nd Street and Broadway, I finally completed it!"
42nd Street, Renly was aware of it, it was a well-known red-light district on Manhattan Island.
"Well, are you planning to perform it tonight?" Renly picked up the conversation, giving Ed the courage to continue.
Night had completely fallen. After 8:30, the bar was finally starting to liven up. However, due to it being a Monday, only eight or nine tables were occupied. The performance, originally scheduled for 8:30, was pushed back to 9:00 by Stanley.
Though there weren't many customers inside the bar, Ed still couldn't help feeling nervous. Not because of the number of people; he had faced much larger crowds during his residency in LA bars. It was because of the venue itself – this was Village Vanguard! It also meant that the audience might be discerning professional music enthusiasts!
This caused Ed's adrenaline to surge constantly.
From Ed's performance, one could hear his nervousness – his voice wasn't fully opened, resulting in some intonation issues in the details. Moreover, his voice was too thin, a problem that was now laid bare. The whole performance seemed somewhat tense.
For Renly, he found this understandable. Not to mention that Ed was only nineteen, younger than Renly. This was Ed's first formal performance stage, and trying to control the entire audience wasn't an easy feat. Just thinking about Renly's own first scene in "The Pacific" would suffice.
But for the bar audience, this was incomprehensible. Nearly every guest had the same thought: What happened to the Village Vanguard's resident singer today? Far from their usual standard!
Stanley couldn't help but sweat in his palms. Before tonight's performance, he had conducted a simple audition. He had Ed play a song directly, and while Ed's singing then wasn't awe-inspiring, it certainly showed potential. Tonight's deviation was quite abnormal.
Ed couldn't help but feel flustered. After finishing the song, his rapidly trembling pupils betrayed his true emotions, and his greenness and inexperience were hard to hide. Yet compared to Renly, who had shown such mature control at a young age, Ed's performance was much closer to his age.
For a moment, Ed sat in the center of the stage, dazed. Renly couldn't help but massage his forehead, having to remind him, "About that."
Ed took a moment to react and then remembered. Forcing himself to calm down, he plucked the strings again. The clear melody flowed gently from the milky halo, with a faint sadness and a shallow chill permeating through the notes. "White lips, pale face, breathing in snowflakes. Burnt lungs, sour taste, light's gone, day's end. Struggling to pay rent, long nights, strange men"
This was Ed Sheeran's breakthrough song, "The A Team". The sorrowful lyrics combined with the chilly melody, succinctly portraying the tragic life of a prostitute. Especially the line "In this world, so cold and harsh, even angels can't fly," had moved the hearts of countless listeners.
Presently, Ed still had his youthful rawness, but it was precisely this youthfulness that brought forth the most primal, pure, and genuine emotions, slowly infusing the song with emotion. Perhaps Ed's voice was still somewhat thin, and it trembled slightly; perhaps his vocal skills were still somewhat immature, and he wasn't yet able to handle them with ease. But he managed to interpret the essence of folk music, and that was enough to captivate the audience.
The commotion and chatter in Village Vanguard gradually subsided. It was apparent that people temporarily paused their busy activities and turned their gazes.
At this moment, the bar's door swung open once again, and a middle-aged man entered. He gracefully found a seat and settled down without making much noise, not disrupting Ed's performance.
Out of habit, Renly turned to look. This was a familiar regular customer. There was no need for Renly to approach; a server naturally came over. After that, Renly returned his gaze to Ed in the center of the stage.
Village Vanguard possessed this magical power – in its not-so-spacious space, it focused all the patrons' attention on the performer at the center of the stage, stripping away all extraneous attributes. The audience concentrated solely on the music, solely on the performance. As long as their performance was dazzling enough, the audience would readily deliver applause!
As "The A Team" concluded, Village Vanguard immediately responded without hesitation: "Clap, clap, clap."