Featured Essay: The Story of Woof! A Dog Opera

by Billy Francis

My usual advice would be to avoid following an older man with a mustache you’ve just met into the basement of his house during a party, alone, especially when he wants to show you “something special.” 

Fortunately, when I followed Jake down those stairs, there was no sex dungeon (that I know of), but a Wonkaland for at-home recording: guitars lined the walls, a drum kit in the corner, mic stands dotted around, DIY soundproofing, and a Moog centre stage. I could hear music from the past seeping out of the walls, and as we drank tequila late into the night, like Lennon looking at McCartney strumming at that church fete, I could hear our future, too.

I told Jake about Knight & Day, my first-ever narrative podcast about two deranged policemen, how I played every character, and edited in sound effects and music. Some said it was difficult to understand and lacked any real plot. Others said it was borderline offensive. I personally thought it was hilarious, and fortunately for me, so did Jake. Bagelbob Productions, a mashup of our dog’s names, was born that night.

Knight & Day morphed into our first collaborative creative work, Southbound: A Simon Fogg Mystery. We recorded the whole thing in Jake’s sex dungeon recording studio with a cast of actors made up of friends. Jake added his sultry soundtrack full of wailing Moog solos and guitar with a Southern twang, and we released five episodes to the world. Then, Jake approached me with an idea of his own: Woof! A Dog Opera.

Jake and his wife, Lydia, have a Shih Tzu named Bob Seger, who was being recruited into a Shih Tzu Instagram cult. When the online obsessives started photoshopping Bob into pictures with their own dogs, he left the group hastily. Bob’s survivor story led Jake to start scribbling down ideas for his own dog rock opera centering on the online world of four-legged fame. While Bob provided the spark of an idea, Jake’s musical inspiration came from the rock opera Phantom of the Paradise, and his narrative style drew from his love of The Point by Harry Nilsson. By the time I joined to help shape the story, the songs and vibe were well underway. 

Woof! A Dog Opera transformed into the story of Mary and her beloved dog, Bob, and their attempts to make him the world’s biggest animal star. But when a famous evil feline arrives on the scene, Bob’s journey takes an unexpected turn. 

As our story was reaching its denouement, Jake started to flick through his little black book from his years of gigging in the area, enlisting the help of Marc Gwynn, Broadway singer, to portray the evil cat Marcell and local musical legend Darby Wilcox to sing Mary’s songs alongside Jake’s heartfelt portrayal of Bob. We called upon a whole host of talented actors to fill in the blanks. Oh, and then I was tasked with narrating the entire thing, channeling my inner Ringo (but with a little more oomph). 

The final version of Woof! A Dog Opera is just under 30 minutes of joy and revelry, a throwback to those musicals that Jake took his inspiration from, and the best thing we’ve made together. But Bob and Mary’s story wasn’t over. Not by a long shot. 

Jake is a vinyl head, so, like anybody who makes music, he has always dreamed of getting his own music pressed onto vinyl. Woof! was the perfect project to press onto vinyl. Two succinct acts, ideally placed for flipping the record over and enjoying. Mixed by Jake, mastered by Zac Thomas at the Jam Room in Columbia, SC, and pressed by Kindercore in Athens, GA (RIP). 

The stack of records took a whopping 14 months to arrive due to COVID-19 supply chain issues, but they were worth the wait: plain white sleeves, each one pressed lovingly by hand with a digital rendering of the original embroidery for the show’s name and a picture of our hairy hero, Bob. The Woof! vinyl is available at our local record shops, Cabin Floor Records and Horizon Records, as well as on our website. 

Jake’s master plan, which I now know he was making up as he went along, was to bring the show to a live audience. I’m a writer, and as any other writer out there will know, we often prefer to stay out of the limelight. Jake, on the other hand, is a performer. He absolutely loves it. So, I agreed to perform with him because I’m not just a writer, but I’m English, and I couldn’t possibly say no. 

Our first live performance was a pared-down version, featuring my narration and Jake’s singing, for an audience of 5,000 people. You’re probably wondering how we sold out a stadium. Well, most of those 5,000 people were walking directly past us clutching bags of carrots and handmade soap during Greenville’s downtown farmers’ market, and probably wondering what the hell we were doing. But occasionally, they’d stick around to listen to the show. 

Beers followed, and I thought that was that, until Jake told me he’d booked us into an open mic night at a meadery. My first thought was, a meadery? What century is this? I downed my complimentary mead before we went on stage, and we rocked out like Bill and Ted in Medieval England.

The meadery show left me wondering if a narrator and a man with a mustache singing and playing the piano are enough to captivate an audience: had the show reached the end of its leash? 

Not according to Jake. Here we are, just a few weeks away from our biggest live show to date at Centre Stage in Greenville, SC, on Friday, October 24. And the final piece of the puzzle will be on display, too.

Alan Hester, a friend who fell in love with Woof! A Dog Opera, when he first heard it, has created original artwork and animations to help tell the story, along with a full cast of local actors, Jake and his band Hot Yoga, Darby Wilcox reprising her role, and yours truly. The show opens with me placing a record on a turntable and hitting play, flipping it halfway through. Of course, we await reviews with bated dog breath. 

That’s the story of Woof! A Dog Opera so far. It has grown and changed as we have together in our partnership at Bagelbob Productions. My advice to anybody is to do the thing, no matter how weird it may seem. It will find its home. Better yet, try to find the person who will make you do the thing. And, if you manage to find them, make brilliant weirdness with them for as long as they’ll let you. 

Go down in the basement with the mustachioed man; you never know what you might find down there. 

Woof! A Dog Opera is the latest offering from Bagelbob Productions. It tells the “tail” in song of a little dog in the big city, his epic rise to the top, and the trouble he finds there.

Hailing from Greenville, SC, Bagelbob Productions is the collective mind of Jake Erwin and Billy Francis, who create audio productions equal parts music and comedy. Jake is a talented composer (check out his solo album, Natural Man), and Billy is a writer of humorous stuff (check out his Substack, Lad2Dad). 

Recruiting local legends and friends to play roles in Woof!, Bagelbob’s first rock opera began in 2020. The project’s journey has gone from singing in the studio all the way to the vinyl record press.

Thank you for supporting us at shows or purchasing a record. By doing so, you are helping to write the next chapter of Woof! Next stop: Centre Stage on Friday, October 24 at 7:30 pm.