Last Night's Lawyers With Guitars

Last night at the 9:30 Club, eight law firm teams battled it out to raise funds for nonprofits in the inaugural Law Rocks DC.

Here are the triumphant champions: The Fine Print from Shulman Rogers, who won in a close race. The team was raising money for Hospice Caring. The combined teams raised nearly $54k through donations, tickets and sponsorships. 

Law Rocks was founded by Navigant managing director Nick Child in London in 2009 and has since spread through Tokyo, Vienna, Sydney and Dubai. Litigation consultant Ted Scott and Venable counsel Brandt Mori expanded it to the US, where Law Rocks has played in LA, Boston, San Francisco, NYC and Philadelphia. Last night the fundraising fun debuted in DC. We snapped Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner's team, REDACTED, playing to raise money for the Children's Law Center. 

Upstairs, we spotted Steptoe's team, which also raised money for the Children's Law Center. The talented members of Attractive Nuisance: employment partner and Chief Marketing Officer Paul Mickey, Yeonas & Shafran principal Dean Yeonas, Steptoe litigation partner Roger Yoerges, IP specialist Direthea Cummings and paralegal Jill Taylor Pope (a classically trained singer who majored in music with a voice minor). The band plays everything from the Stones to the Neville Brothers to Bob Marley, and earlier this year came in the top three at the Battle of the Bands at the Black Cat for Gifts for the Homeless.

Here's Buzzard Point Caucus, which brought together musicians from Boies Schiller, McKool Smith, Peter C. Hansen Law, Polaris and the government, and raised money for Central Union Mission. A representative from each nonprofit came on stage before their band played. Min. Deborah Chambers spoke on behalf of Central Union Mission, telling about the organization's long history (it was founded in 1884) of providing food, clothing and shelter to the underprivileged in DC. She then led the crowd in a chant of "Law Rocks: DC."

An enthusiastic crowd gathered. Tortious Tones was the only law student band, made up of students from Columbus School of Law at Catholic University, rocking for Catholic Charities Archdiocese of Washington. Notice a high-profile (admittedly, cardboard) supporter on stage in the background?

Scoring was split into fourths: donation total, ticket/sponsorship, judges' score and audience favorite. Here, Buzzard Point Caucus members Justin Heminger and Jon Knight with Jon's wife, Raynel. Other bands included: Sutherland Comfort (Sutherland, raising money for Bread for the City), Splinters (Perkins Coie, raising money for So Others Might Eat), and Estoppelgangers (Latham, raising money for Miriam's Kitchen). Coming up next for Law Rocks is a battle of the bands in New York in December.