Philip Whittaker wrote:
> ...I wish I had managed to get to Nigel's mandolin workshop
> yesterday. However I was feeling ropey after an infection I've been
> fighting all week. So, Nigel, for the benefit of you and the
> participants, it's as well I did not make it to Edinburgh. How did it
> go...?
It was fantastic - for me, anyway, but everyone who attended seemed to
get a lot out of it and almost all of them said afterwards that what
they wanted was "More!" So it looks like I'll be putting on these
one-day workshops two or three times a year. We had twenty people there
(I had originally put a limit of eighteen, but a couple extra managed
to wriggle in) and several more were disappointed at not getting a
place. I don't know about anyone else, but I've never seen so many
mandolins together before (except in old photos of mandolin orchestras
etc).
I covered a lot over the six hours, from Warm-up Exercises, Scale
Patterns, Internalising Music, Double-Stops, Decoration, Building
Speed, and a lightening-fast whirl around "Up the Neck". Plus a couple
of sessions where I invited the participants to ask me questions; to my
amazement I think I managed to answer most lines of questioning.
At 4.00pm the other workshops from the day (button box (4), flute (4),
cello (3)) joined us and we each played a piece. The mandolins played a
slow air ("The Yellow Haired Laddie") with all the decorations I'd
explored and it sounded just brilliant. After much hand-shaking and
gratitude I was alone, happy but exhausted.
This is the first workshop I've ever done, and of course I had been
nervous about whether I could deliver. The reaction from the
participants more than reassured me, and boosted my confidence to a
huge degree. Thanks for asking, Philip, and perhaps you and Ted could
make the next one?
--
Nigel Gatherer, Crieff, Scotland
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
http://www.argonet.co.uk/users/gatherer/
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