(This is just a small section of the photo. For the complete version, in which everyone is identified, check out http://www.texasmonthly.com/mag/issues/extras/greatday/)

By Michael Corcoran
Austin American-Statesman
March 16, 2000

Willie Nelson wasn't there. Also out of town were Jimmie Vaughan and Charlie Sexton. But almost 130 prominent Austin musicians did show up at the Stevie Ray Vaughan statue on Town Lake for a group portrait Wednesday afternoon.

"A Great Day in Austin," shot by Andrew Yates in homage to a famous 1958 photograh of prominent jazz musicians in Harlem, will run in the May issue of Texas Monthly magazine.

"Man this is big," said Fastball's Miles Ziniga when he saw Lee Roy Parnell and Abra Moore chatting with Billy Gibbons, just as Shawn Colvin rode by on her bike. "I thought it was going to be like Kelly Willis and the guys I play softball wtih."

The musicians were chosen by the magazine's staff based on their contribution to Austin music, which led to some heated lobbying when the invitations were sent three weeks ago.

"We kept getting calls like, 'Why wasn't so-and-so invited?'" deputy editor and shoot ringleader Evan Smith said. "But we simply had to cut it off at a certain point."

That's what Cathy Casey heard when she complained that her stepson's band, Pushmonkey, one of the few Austin acts with a major label deal, was omitted. But as special projects editor for Texas Monthly, Casey took the rejection in stride and helped assemble the project.

A few artists who weren't asked to be in the picture showed up anyway. Wayne "the Train" Hancock was unapologetic about his shoot-crashing. "I know I aint invited," he said.

"It's a good thing they're having this outdoors," cracked Mark Rubin of Bad Livers. "No room could contain all these ego's."

But for the most part, the session had the feel of a music scene reunion.

Or a funeral with food.

It's amazing to see all these people together in the daylight and nobody died," onlooker T.J. McFarland said.