DALLAS -- 'Play that violin, Jessy Greene!"
The Foo Fighters were midway through a two-hour show last month, and Dave Grohl had already called out Minneapolis' best-known rock violinist twice. He never just called her "Jessy," either. It was always the full name, always with a tinge of affectionate snarkiness that a guy might render on his kid sister.
Later, during the encore at Dallas' American Airlines Arena, Greene got her third and biggest call: She and Grohl sang the band's first megahit, "Big Me," as a boy/girl duet.
"Me and Jessy Greene sing this one together real nice," Grohl told the 15,000 fans, who seemed to agree. They cheered the broad-smiling Greene -- Jessy Greene! -- when she exited after the song.
Not bad for a working Twin Cities musician who, a year earlier, made a deflated return to Minneapolis from Los Angeles.
Greene had moved out west to be on a radio show with R.E.M.'s Peter Buck and Minus 5's Scott McCaughey, but the show got canceled three days shy of making it on the air.
"I decided to move to L.A. anyway and give it a try, which wound up being a disaster," she remembered, talking backstage a couple hours before the Foo's Dallas gig. "I couldn't wait to get back. I love Minneapolis, even if I'm behind on the bills a little and working at the Gasthof," the northeast Minneapolis German restaurant where she worked as recently as last spring.
"Minneapolis is very artist-friendly. I can work on my music, play with so many other great musicians, wait a little tables on weekends and make a pretty good living."