Southside Johnny & G.E. Smith at the Standard Hotel, East Village

G.E. Smith, Southside Johnny & David Broza

John Lyon of Neptune Township, New Jersey, first achieved prominence in the mid-1970s as Southside Johnny when Southside Johnny & the Asbury Jukes became the second act to emerge from the Jersey Shore music scene, following Bruce Springsteen. George Edward Haddad was born in rural Stroudsburg, Pennsylvania, and started playing guitar at age four. He became G.E. Smith and went on to play lead guitar in Hall & Oates, Bob Dylan and Roger Waters' touring bands and was the musical director of Saturday Night Live for 10 years.

In a living-room-sized glass-enclosed penthouse with a near-dusk view of the lower Manhattan skyline behind them, Southside Johnny sang and  G.E. Smith played acoustic guitar without a set list, deciding what songs to perform as they went along. In a departure from the music they normally play for large audiences, they instead sang obscure country and blues covers to an audience of less than 100 invited guests. They spontaneously invited singer-songwriter David Broza to play acoustic guitar with them for most of the set. Johnny sang and played harmonicas well, and Smith and Broza improvised beautifully on their guitars, so the impromptu half-hour jam turned out to be a delight for the chosen few who attended.