The Good Old Thursday Night Jam

I went over to the local jam last night. Why do I go to that jam? I've said it before in these pages: PRACTICE. But on some Thursdays the practice is easier than on others. Now, when you get into real life jams, some of them aren't as easy to play along with as (for…

Stereotype Much?

So on Tuesday, Red and I went to see this movie titled, unbelievably, Red. Which I can now highly recommend, especially if you want to see the tender, touchy/feely side of Bruce Willis. (Really!) With his sidekicks Mary Louise Parker, Helen Mirren, Morgan Freeman, and John Malkovich, he plays a Retired and Extremely Dangerous ex-CIA…

Enthusiasm

I started a student about three months ago, an older fellow who had been playing from tab for several years. He knew the basics but when I asked him to play me a tune (I needed to see what he already knew so I would know where to start) it turned out that he couldn't…

A Frank Wakefield Concert

Devoted mandolin fans and pickers (such as myself) were treated to a rare spectacle last Saturday night at the Garret Park Town Hall in Maryland, where superlative picker-and-showman Frank Wakefield presented an outstanding show along with the Patuxent Partners. Chris and I drove over for the concert. Neither of us had seen Frank since he'd…

Warmups

I got an email question the other day regarding warming up. This student said that it takes him about half an hour to get up to speed, and he wondered if this was normal. He also inquired about a good warmup routine. A thirty minute warmup is absolutely normal, especially for adults who aren't as…

Playing and Judging at Music Contests

Some of you may have entered a music contest from time to time. A few of Murphy's students enter contests as often as they can. If you live in a part of the world where there are contests, you might consider entering a few yourself. There are several benefits from entering contests. The first reason…

What Kristin Scott Benson Said

So, as you might have seen in my Liberty! blog, I was teasing Marty about my not granting him permission to learn "Liberty". (My advice had less effect early on when I told him not to learn "Old Joe Clark" out of sequence, but I think he saw the light after that episode! Kind of…

Professional? Amateur? or Both?

I'm just back from Hiawassee, Georgia, where I was one of the judges at the Georgia State Fiddlers Convention. There were contests for fiddle, banjo, guitar, mandolin, Dobro, and other instruments, so we did probably 15 hours of judging over two days. The judges, along with contest MC Barry Palmer and friends, played a set…

A Couple of Videos

I was trolling around on YouTube yesterday and I found a couple videos from past shows that we haven't yet posted here. The first one is from Kaufman Kamp in June 2010. It features myself and Tim May playing "I Am A Pilgrim" with Pat Flynn. I actually really like my break on the song,…

Liberty!

Logan, now a senior in high school, is going great guns on the banjo at the moment. He’s in that space where he is learning song after song after song. (I know you don’t want to hear that, Marty and Susan!) Lately we’ve learned Goldrush, Daybreak in Dixie, and Shenandoah Breakdown. All of these are…