Ballgame, Then Concert: Williams Hits Perfect Chord
By JACK CURRY

CHICAGO, July 14 - Bernie Williams was so nervous performing at the House of Blues on Sunday night that he had to close his eyes. Many musicians do it, but Williams, the Yankees' center fielder, was doing more than drifting into a musical trance. He was protecting himself from an eager crowd probably wondering what kind of guitarist this baseball player really was.

Eventually, Williams opened his eyes, peering at his surroundings. There were 750 people studying him and his 11-piece band, and they quickly concluded that he was as skilled and dedicated on the concert stage as he is on the stage he normally mans in the Bronx.

For Williams, the 35-minute concert to promote his debut recording, "The Journey Within," ended a hectic and dazzling day.

He began Sunday by playing scales in his hotel room in Toronto, thinking about facing Kelvim Escobar, the Blue Jays' starting pitcher. He collected two hits in the Yankees' victory over the Jays, practiced his guitar again while waiting for a chartered plane to fly him to Chicago, then played a tight and energetic set.

"It was probably as good as it will get," Williams said. "I had a chance to really do what I love. This is as perfect a day as you could have."
Rudolph W. Giuliani, the former New York City mayor and an ardent Yankees fan, introduced Williams, who sat on a stool and answered a few questions from Giuliani before the performance. Dressed in jeans, a black T-shirt and sneakers, Williams seemed antsy. When he introduced his band members, he read their names off a sheet of paper.

But after a roadie helped Williams strap a guitar over his shoulder and he began to play, he was in his element. He opened the concert with

"Ligia Elena," with Rubén Blades handling the vocals. Williams said he used to listen to the song before he played Little League games, and he called Blades one of his heroes.

After that, Williams played original material. "La Salsa en Mi," a song that Loren Harriet, his producer, said took Williams six years to write, was jazzy and upbeat. He performed "Just Because," a song for his wife, Waleska, and he nodded to where she was sitting in a box above the stage.

He kept it in the family with "Para Don Berna," a song about his deceased father, Bernabe, the man who first taught him to love the guitar. Hiram, Williams's younger brother, accompanied on the cello. Williams said this was the most emotional moment of the evening.

Williams was obviously the leading man, but he deferred to his band mates on several occasions. He walked away from the center of the stage to let some of the musicians unleash solos.

Like Williams the ballplayer, Williams the musician prefers sharing the attention. Except, of course, when he whipped out a specially made Yankee-pinstriped Fender guitar adorned with his No. 51. The price for the ax: $4,200.

Williams finished the night in a room upstairs at the House of Blues, surrounded by his wife and three children, his mother, his brother and other relatives and friends.

He looked weary but thrilled and called being with so many familiar faces the best way to cap a long, fulfilling day.
" It was a dream come true," he said. "I always thought I'd have the opportunity to do something like this."

http://www.nytimes.com/