Misfit Jam

The Misfits are coming on strong! As they were leaving tonight, I said, “We can hardly call this a slow jam anymore. We’re playing everything so much faster.” Showing up to play faster tonight were Susan, Mark, and Logan on banjos and Bob Van on bass. Susan was just back from a clawhammer camp (ahem!)…

Live From Kaufman Kamp

Hello from muggy Maryville, Tennessee! I'm teaching this week at Kaufman Kamp and have stolen a moment in between watching the evening concert and overseeing the post-concert open-mic to write a few words here. Bossman Steve Kaufman always keeps me hoppin' during my time at Kamp. This week I'm teaching fiddle, a little clogging, assisting…

White Springs Trip, Day 5 (Monday, May 25th): Recording with Dale

In my last blog, I left you all hanging on the edge of your seats with a promise to talk about recording with Dale. Well, it was an experience we'd all looked forward to, and it was every bit as rewarding as we'd hoped. But you have to understand some things about Recording with Dale.…

Graduation Party

Just back in from playing at a high school graduation party with a couple of the Misfits, Bob Van Metre and Logan Claytor. The party was for Logan’s lovely sister Hannah who is now college bound. Son Chris was kind enough to join us for a set and I must say, with him on the…

Moving Servers

We are moving this blog as well as our main website to a different server this weekend. Hopefully there won’t be any major hitches, but please be patient if posts and pictures here appear and disappear for a day or two. Yesterday the comment link wasn’t working for a while, but it’s back to functioning…

Misfit Jam

By Murphy Henry What a thrill it was tonight to have one of the Original Misfits sit in with us! Yes, indeed, the Fabulous Ruth Steelman and her Gibson banjo joined Mark, Ellen, Logan, Bob Van, and me for an hour of hilarity mixed in with some rousing tunes. I wrote quite a bit about…

A Couple Station Inn Shows

(Note: apologies for the lack of pictures here...we're moving servers and are working out the kinks! Thanks for your patience!) A couple weeks back I went to the Station Inn to hear a group that I'd never heard before--the Quebe Sisters. They are a trio of sisters from Texas who play triple fiddles and sing…

White Springs Trip– Sunday, May 24th

Sunday was a busy day for us at White Springs, and was going to be a long one. So, when I rolled out of the car at about 7:00, I went looking for coffee. Once that was found, it was time to wake up and get ready to play, including some picking, starting at about…

Improvising: Hearing the Words

As I’ve been telling you, I’ve got several students who are working hard on improvising right now. And one of the things that has become even clearer to me lately is how important it is to hear the words of the song in your head as you are playing your break. You don’t need to…

Doodles

In the course of rearranging my office today I moved some boxes containing my high school notebooks. I started looking through some of them and happened to see, on the back of a page from my 11th grade (1994) Algebra II notes, five and a half measures of banjo tablature. I had written out the…