Soul Exposure Photography
Ben Majeska: A guy you can trust on the stage.
This month, guitarist Ben Majeska will come off a festival tour and have a week to prepare for a three-hour set of songs he’ll perform with three different bands on the same night.
That’s actually a lot of time for rehearsing compared to some of the past 49 editions of the kamikaze-style spectacle known as Majeska Mondays, a monthly residency that pulls national, regional and local musicians off the road and onto the stage for a one-night-only jam. Majeska has produced and hosted the monthly Mondays at the Up North Bar since February 2018. May 13 will be the 50th.
If this approach sounds a bit risky, it is. Why would a performer slam together three hours of music with players he won’t see until the day of a show? “It’s as exciting as all get out,” explains a perpetually grinning Majeska while sipping a cappuccino at an east-side coffee shop. The format developed organically after Majeska moved to Madison from UW-Stevens Point in 2018, and soon after found his way to the Up North Bar. That’s where he familiarized himself with the many local players who flock there.
“Before you know it,” Majeska says, “I’m bumping elbows with some of the people I’ve seen and they’re inviting me to sit in and play with them.” When the band that played there the first Monday of each month pulled out, bartender Teresa Hardy (also in People Brothers Band) asked Majeska if he wanted to take over. “I remember asking her if she wanted me to play solo, or what I should do,” Majeska says. “She said you can do whatever you want.”
Majeska, who plays guitar with Madison-based Armchair Boogie (currently on tour with Pert Near Sandstone), among other projects, knew of a band at the time, friends of his who were touring through Madison from Kansas City. “I asked them if they would want to stop for the night and play with me for this residency.”
Majeska Mondays was born.
After that, the Monday slots became “a collaborative thing, whether I feature a band coming through and play with them, or I’m forming a one-night band out of local or regional acts.” Musicians he meets out on the road immediately go on his long and constantly growing list of prospects to perform at a future Up North Monday.
Past mash-ups include members of Buffalo Gospel, Chicken Wire Empire, Old Soul Society and the People Brothers Band, to name a few Wisconsin-based acts. Recently Majeska arranged for bassist Mark Hembree, a former member of Bill Monroe’s Bluegrass Boys, to join in.
You can’t magically create and execute a without-a-net production like this unless you have serious music skills yourself. “Ben is one of my favorite guitarists in our music scene,” says Pert Near Sandstone founder J Lenz. “His technical talents and creativity are second only to his warm personality and friendly vibe.”
I second the vibe thing. At the coffee shop Majeska comes across like a lovable first cousin you don’t get to see often enough. He seems like a guy you could trust on the stage and off. Turns out, trust is a significant part of the Majeska Mondays experience.
“I just love to be in those spaces where you don’t know where it’s gonna go,” says Majeska. “And I love being on the edge of a cliff with all these people on stage and some of the people I’ve only met that day.”
If this sounds overtly jammy, it is. But it’s also a product of work. Players exchange sound files of tunes in the weeks leading up to the commitment. Songs are selected and the chosen Monday members set about learning them from wherever they are in the country or state, meeting in Majeska’s apartment on the afternoon of the show for the one run-through.
Majeska’s rarely been turned down. “I’m so happy people are happy to do the homework like I am, because I like my 20-song-a-month assignment.” Still, it can be a tricky balancing act.
Majeska will celebrate the 50th show with some hands he’s mostly shaken before. The May 13 party will feature several of his side projects: a rumble of bluegrass, rock and country in the vehicles known as Wonderfunk, Harder Deeper and Big Country.
Talking with past Monday performers, it’s clear a large Majeska Mondays family is in the making. Says Chicken Wire Empire fiddle player Ernie Brusubardis, “Even having played so many Majeska Mondays, each one is amazing and I can’t wait for number 50 and 1000.”
How many more Mondays does Majeska think he has in him? “I always say I’m going to do at least 100 of them.” But, he adds, “Now I feel like I need more than that, to do everything I want.”
