The Bubbling Hot Tub of Humanity in Blanchard, Louisiana

I try to take my mandolin with me on business trips and find a bluegrass jam in the town or city I am staying in.  It such a great thing to get out of the hotel and meet some people, and it is always an adventure.  Through the powers of the internet (especially folkjam.com) I can find a jam in pretty much any town I go to.

Well this past week work took me to north Louisiana.  I knew for sure I would be able to find a bluegrass jam somewhere in the area on a Monday night, and sure enough, Blanchard, LA, fit the bill.  Through folkjam.com I was able to contact some folks and confirm that the jam was on.

Blanchard is a one stop light town just on the other side of the Texas border and about 10 minutes north of Shreveport.  My traveling partner and I were able to easily make it to Blanchard from Dallas by the 6:30 jam start time.

In fact we arrived about 15 min early.  The jam takes place in the town hall, and as we walked up we could see that there were already a lot of people inside jamming.  In fact, there were about 10 people playing in a jam circle, and then there must have been 20 people in seats just listening and tapping feet.  I didn’t know we were going to have an audience!

My friend and I walked into the room and of course everyone turned their heads to check us out.  We were a bit out of place.  One kind soul came up to greet us and welcome us to the jam.

The jam itself was….relaxing.  The pace was slow, there was no pressure other than the audience who seemed to enjoy anything that was being played.  There were a lot of guitars and the jam improved immensely when the bass player showed up.

I had a great time just soaking in the “bubbling hot tub of humanity” as my dad would say.  Mostly gospel songs were played.  Not everyone took a break, but everyone sang.  It was just a genuine and downright joyful experience.

I think I also broke out with a couple of big improvements.  On most of my breaks I stuck very close to the melody.  I was able to utilize some tasty Monroe licks that I have been working on.  Most of all, I just played to have fun.

Here are a couple of clips I am proud of.

This first one I like because it is pure Monroe.  These are actually licks from “First Whippoorwill” but changed up just a bit.

Monroe Style Clip

This second clip is from my 9lb Hammer.  I like this one because I really let loose on it and got raw.

Blanchard 9 lb hammer

The final clip I am most proud of.  “Jumbalaya” is a pretty popular song and I have always had a terrible time coming up with a break for it.  The reward for trekking to Blanchard, LA, was this break.  It is raw, and I may never be able to summon it up again, but it was sure fun when it happened.

Jumbalaya clip

Filed under: Jam Reflections, Music & Mandolin Meditations, Music Clip, My Journal, Traveling Man

Time To Settle Down (for a month at least)

Well, the month of June was very hectic for me.  I don’t think that I picked up the mandolin the entire month.  I certainly didn’t go to any jams.  I was able to pick up the guitar from time to time, and even got Hurt’s “Make Me A Pallet On Your Floor” down pretty well.

Well, check that – I did take my mandolin with my on a trip to Memphis and got to jam with my Dad at a dinner party.  That was a lot of fun.  We play this very chill Brazilian jazz together.  It is totally improvised and I gotta say we sound pretty good.  Well, at least the friends enjoyed it.

I went to Switzerland – while there was a lot of interesting things I did and saw, none if it was music related, and I didn’t bring my instrument with me.  I have really hit my stride with twitter – I kept a running diary of experiences on it.  I am open ears for any suggestions of folk and/or bluegrass jams anywhere in Switzerland – I know they are out there.

I go through waves and cycles in my mindscape.  The last couple of months have been heavy on bluegrass.  June was big on Blind Blake and John Fahey.  Right now I am moving into an academic mindset – listening to university lectures, being a total news hound, and learning French.  The academic mindset is hardly ever sustainable for me, and I suspect that July I will move back to bluegrass.  Maybe a kind of tough blues + bluegrass…. = Monroe!

And I am looking forward to continuing my lessons with Taterbug.  I want to put in a good month of lessons with him for July.  I also want to get out to some jams, but that is always difficult with all the things I have going on in my life.

That said, July promises to be a fun and exciting month!  New baby is imminent within weeks.  I can’t wait to see how my little one react to another little one.  In fact, there is NOTHING more exciting and fun than a new baby in the house!  July/August are going to be good months.

Filed under: Music & Mandolin Meditations, My Journal, Traveling Man

Mandolin Practice in L.A.

I went out to L.A. this week for a couple of days of training.  I was really looking forward to this trip – not for the training, or for going California – but for the chance to get some alone time with my mandolin.

I did get in some good practice.  My homework from Taterbug from last week was to compose a solo to “When You Are Alone” using the licks and techniques I have learned over the last 6 weeks or so.  I had fun with this, but I also ran through some basic exercises and played some fiddle tunes.

I brought the Carver mandolin with me.  I acquired the Carver mandolin with the express intent of making it my travel mandolin.  Indeed it is a great travel mandolin – it sounded wonderful in that little hotel room.  I know it was the acoustics playing inside a thick walled square, but man did that mandolin sound great.  The Carver mandolin really reminds me of the Dudenbostel that Chris Thile plays on his Mandolin Techniques DVD.  She has a modern sound, but she can get dirty.  She likes a soft touch, but she really loves to chop also.  Probably what most reminds me of Thile’s Dude is this mandolin sounds so good all the way up the neck.

So I had a lot of fun getting to know the Carver mandolin.  I don’t know if I annoyed my hotel neighbors, but no one complained.

The other item I would like to comment on is mandolin travel cases.  I have recently acquired two new cases.  One Alpine Gig bag, and one Presto hardshell case.  I bought the Presto specifically for when I travel, but I have really fallen in love with the Alpine gig bag.  I have used the gig bag exclusively to and from jams the last couple of weeks.  It is light and has great pockets.

So before the trip I convinced myself that I didn’t need to take the Presto.  I figured that the mandolin would be with me the whole time, and besides, I was only going from taxi>airplane>taxi>hotel.

Well I learned my lesson on this one.  Basically the new rule is that anytime you are in situation where someone else will be handling your mandolin, you better use the hardshell case.  Not that anything bad happened, but I did have a incident where a taxi driver tried to pack the mandolin on its head in the trunk.

All in all a good trip, and I got a great idea for a blog post that I will be putting up soon.

Filed under: Music & Mandolin Meditations, My Journal, Practice Session Notes, Traveling Man , Carver

Florida Recovery

Well, I have returned from Florida and am in the process of recovery.  I found out the day before the trip that Yonder Mountain had cancelled all of the Florida shows due to a family emergency and sickness in the band.  Several days later Yonder cancelled the entire February tour.

I was pretty, pretty bummed.  But as I was packing the night before, I started to get excited.  Hey, how could I not find a good time with my greatest travel partner in the world, H.L.?  Indeed we found the good times.  Jacksonville was a good way to kick things off, as we tore up the bar scene.  The next day we went to St. Augustine and had a wonderful seafood lunch and strolled through the historic district.  It was a beautiful day and and beautiful drive down to Del Ray Beach.  We blasted Phish the entire 5 hour drive.  That night we went to see the Dead cover band Crazy Fingers.  It was quite a scene at the show…dancing hippies everywhere.  On Friday we went down to Miami.  I navigated us to a great hat store where I bought a nice straw fedora.  Next, we explored the industrial district of Hileah to fulfill my work obligations.  Finally we parked at South Beach, where we had a wonderful Cuban lunch, the best Mojitos, and a stroll on the beach.  That night we went and saw Crazy Fingers play acoustic Dead.  We stayed up until sunrise talking, laughing and drinking in his backyard.  The next day we took pretty easy and that night we still partied pretty good.

It was a trip for the history books.

Filed under: My Journal, Traveling Man

Yonder Mountain String Band – Florida Mini-Tour

I love my job, and I love opportunity for travel it gives me.  I have been able to incorporate a lot of music into my travels lately;  jazz lessons in New Orleans and bluegrass jams in Atlanta and Minneapolis.  But the best is when I can catch a good concert.  Next week my  job takes me to Florida, I am so stoked that I will be able to see 3 nights of Yonder with my good buddy H.L..  The last time I saw Yonder was at the Stephen Talkhouse in Amagansett, NY. I was staying at the Merchant Marine Academy for Terrorism training, and caught a ride with some other fans for the show.  Amagansett is basically Martha’s Vinyard, and the venue was about the size of my living room.  It was a real special night of music and I was so blessed to be there.

This is going to be a mini road trip, of the college days variety.  H.L. and I first see Yonder in Jacksonville, at a bar which is a stone’s throw from the beach.  The next day we drive to Gainesville, the consummate college party town.  Friday we drive down to Ft. Lauderdale, and to a venue where Yonder has a reputation of absolutely tearing the roof off.  Three straight nights of Yonder, and one day+night sipping beer on the beach.  I feel sorry for those poor souls stuck in the wintery north and mid-west.  Florida (and Texas, for that matter) is a sunny 70 degrees!!  We are already getting started on spring!  And nothing goes better with the spring than bluegrass.  Fast-ass, rippin, snot-snortin’ bluegrass.

02.11	Jacksonville	Freebird Cafe
02.12	Gainesville	The Venue
02.13	Ft. Lauderdale	Revolution

Filed under: My Journal, Traveling Man

12-04-08 Trip To The Tundra

I went on a business trip to Minneapolis last week and was able to take my mandolin along for the ride.

Minneapolis is an awful place this time of year.  The beer is cold and the women are tough.  I can’t stand that accent, but I suppose they can’t stand my Texan accent.

I was able to attend the Wednesday night bluegrass jam at the Homestead Pickin’ Parlor.  This is a really neat store.  It is basically a bastion of folk and bluegrass music.  The front of the store is full of every kind of folk and bluegrass CD, and the back of the store is stocked with instruments.  It was really great to be able to check out different CD’s and DVD’s that I would otherwise have to buy online.  My only complaint was that, except for the Webers, all of the instruments were Pacific Rim.

The jam turned out to be alot of fun.  There was a total of 6 pickers, including myself.  The leader of the jam was a very friendly guitar player.  There was another gentleman present from Virginia who was also traveling on business.  He was a great rythm guitar player.  He sang a song that he wrote about eagles and it was actually very nice.

It was a good jam – slow and easy going.  I had a nice evening and made some new friends.  I really wanted to go to the flatpickers jam the next night as it was billed as a little more advanced, but I instead opted to get the hell out of Minneapolis and go visit a good friend in Chicago.

Filed under: Jam Reflections, My Journal, Traveling Man

Funky Butt…And Other Treasures

Well, just this week I am getting back into the groove of being at home.  I haven’t really picked up the mandolin in almost a month now, and that’s on purpose.  My fingers are really starting to itch for the mandolin, but I am making them wait.  I have found that it is a good thing to put down an instument, or any other activity of practice, and let yourself yearn for it again.  Many times, when I come back to the instrument, I find that I have improved.  I come back with a fresh approach to the instrument and renewed vigor.  This is what I am hoping will happen with the mandolin.

In the meantime I have been really exploring the world of Mississippi John Hurt.  I have gotten to the point where I have the technique down, and the so the songs are coming fairly easily and quickly.  Right now I am studing “Funky Butt” and “Let the Mermaids Flirt With Me”.  I am thinking that when I get the songs down well enough I might make a video and post them on youtube.com.  Right now, there are really no good videos of those songs on youtube.

Other than that, I have been looking into the possibility of riding a scooter or electric bike to work everyday.  These gas prices are killing me and my ‘95 Range Rover is relentless.

FUNKY BUTT

I thought I heard somebody say

Funky Butt, Funky Butt, take it away

Cause I don’t like it no how

You see that gal with the red dress on

She got funky butt stinky butt sure as you’re born

Well I don’t like it no how

You see that gal with the blue dress on

She got stinky butt, funky butt, let it alone

Cause I don’t like it no how

I thought I heard somebody shout

Open the window let the foul smell out

Cause I don’t like it no how

Let The Mermaids Flirt With Me

Blues all on the ocean

Blues all in the air

Can’t stay here no longer

Have no steamship fare

(CHORUS:)

When my earthly trials are over

Cast my body out in the sea

Save all the undertaker bills

Let the mermaids flirt with me

Wife controls our happy home

My sweetheart I cannot find

The only thing that I can call my own is a

Troubled and a worried mind

(Repeat Chorus)

I do not work for pleasure

Earthly peace, I’ll see no more***

The onliest reason I work at all is

Drive the wolf from my door

(Repeat Chorus)

Blues all in my body,

My darlin’ has forsaken me

If I ever want to see her face again

I have to swim across the see

Filed under: Music & Mandolin Meditations, My Journal, Practice Session Notes, Traveling Man , Funky Butt, Mermaids, Mississippi John Hurt

Amelia Island

Amelia Island is a woderful place to vacation…having a convention there is not bad also.  I am back home for about a week and then on the road again to the west coast and Mexico D.F.

Filed under: My Journal, Traveling Man , family pics, Jude, Nola

Next Stop: Florida

I am back from Central America. El Salvador is a really beautiful country, as is Honduras. The seafood is really great in both countries. I made it back into the country with a good stash of Cuban cigars.

So, after a brief pitstop at home in Dallas, I am out again this week to Amelia Island, Florida. This is a far cry from Central America. The Ritz Carlton on Amelia Island is listed as #7 in the world be Traveler Magazine. The family is coming along as well, so it should be a very fun weekend.

Filed under: My Journal, Traveling Man

Ancient Tree

An ancient tree in San Nicholas, Honduras.  It was magical.

Filed under: My Journal, Traveling Man