The Coffee Cup: Jim Keaveny Has a Romance With Ecuador

The Coffee Cup: Jim Keaveny

Has a Romance With Ecuador

For a musician who loves to travel, the country was a God send--talented musicians to back him up, cheap hotel rooms, and extravagant lunches. Jim Keaveny, so good vocally and on guitar and harmonica, has just returned from more than a month in Ecuador.

"I have always wanted to spend a lot of time in South America," he said as we sat on the balcony of High Sierra. "I want to live down there to be honest. I just like seeing new places after being too long in one place."

He played two solo gigs, "but the second night I made so many friends, and they said tomorrow night we're doing an open jam, and you should come in.

"It turns out they were very talented guys, one on drum and guitar, and the other on guitar, bass, and drum. They invited me up to play for an hour. They backed me, and we had a great time. And the bass player's wife came up and sang.

"They just jumped in and played my songs perfectly. It was unbelievable."

Where did you stay?

"Mostly in hotel rooms," Jim answered. "If you do a little shopping, you can find really nice rooms with your own bathroom for roughly $10 a night.

"I stayed in Puerto Lopez eight days in a row. For $8 a night, I was on the third floor of a beautiful place, very friendly people running it, two blocks from the beach, and a maid cleaning my room every day. There was a balcony on one side and a patio on the other."

Lunch is the big meal daily. "It always comes with juice and soup," Jim said, "lasts as long as three or four hours, and costs $2 or $3."

"I'm thinking of snowbirding down there," he said, "spending the winters. The winters are nice here, but the wind starts to annoy me. That's one thing about Ecuador, there's never any wind. They are right on the equator, and there is no turbulence. You get nice sea breezes, but you don't get high winds."

The last time we had talked Jim was planning another CD. Have you worked on that? I asked.

"Funny you asked because I have been working on it all day," the Terlingua musician replied. "I've got the material. I'm planning to go do the first session in the studio in one or two months."