Hi everyone, I've been hanging out on the sidelines for a while now, but thought I'd chime in on this topic since I was also at the Portland festival that Root attended. Root, I agree with your observations about the festival to some degree - the number of jams was kind of ridiculous. Literally every possible jam space was filled to capacity. A couple of friends and I were looking to jam on the Saturday afternoon, but it was physically impossible to find a space that wasn't in the way or contaminated with bleed from other jams. However, we were patient and eventually a prime spot opened up in the kitchen and we had a great jam.
In terms of "fitting in", I understand what you're saying, but just like anything it takes some time to get to know the lay of the land and find your place. I'm sure may of us have had experiences at bluegrass jams where someone joins who doesn't know the protocol (in fact, most of us have probably been that person at some point). It doesn't mean the person is a jerk, a bad musician, etc, just that they are not familiar with the culture. I agree that old timey folks can be snooty, but so can bluegrass folks. Music is a form of communication, so your musical experience will partly depend on the communication skills of those you're playing with. Regarding the "unwashed halitosis" element, I understand why you might not feel like you fit in there, but I'm sure a lot of people on the bluegrass scene were saying the same things in the late 60's and 70's when Grisman, Rowan, Greene, etc were breaking in. I gather that John Hartford was fond of saying "There's nothing new under the sun." I think that certainly applies here. A few of things I have found helpful in those situations: 1) If you can, try to have a group of folks that you're travelling with. Instead of trying to join someone else's jam, you can start your own and sort of shape the vibe of the jam. 2) Try to strike up some conversation with folks who aren't jamming. If you get to know them a little bit, you can make a connection and get a foot in the door for some jamming. 3) Be patient. Old time jams tend to be constructed in a hierarchy of circles, with a core of people driving the jam. You'll probably start out on the fringes, but if you hang in there and show good taste, you can make it in there. It's annoying playing to someone's back, but that's often the way it is. As Mike said earlier, it's particularly difficult for a mandolin player in the old time world. Not too many folks will get excited about having a mandolin player join their jam, but they'll happily welcome more and more fiddles and banjos. In my opinion, it's revisionist to have that mentality, as lots of early string bands had mandolins. I think it stems from an "us vs. them" mentality. Old time players usually agree strongly on one thing: they don't play bluegrass. Mandolins, particularly the F5 variety, raise their hackles a bit because they're so strongly associated with bluegrass. Fair enough, but again, it's a matter of learning about how to play the music, rather than trying to force the square bluegrass peg into the round old time hole. Aggressive chop chords will often turn people off in that setting because they mess with the groove. Lots of other folks have chimed in on what it is to play old time mandolin. I'm no expert, but in my experience, it's almost all in the right hand (just like bluegrass). If you can pick up on the timing of the tune and make your right hand work with that, it doesn't matter much what you do with your left hand (melody, block chords, open chords, doublestops, etc). So much of old time music is about creating this groove, almost like a musical machine. If you can contribute to that in a positive way, people will usually be happy to have you. Anyway, those are my long-winded comments. Old time music can be a lot of fun, but it just takes time and patience to find where you fit in. I really enjoy both bluegrass and old time and find that playing in one style can improve my playing in the other. I'm glad to see that there are so many folks on this list who appreciate both styles, along with a lot of other stuff. Mark On Wed, Jan 20, 2010 at 8:18 AM, sgarrity <[email protected]> wrote: > I got to play in a old-time jam last night in Pegram, TN. It wound up > being 3-4 fiddles, a guitar, a tenor guitar, and 3 mandolins, all oval > holes. It was mighty cool to get to pick with Alan O'Bryant playing > mando. Who knew?? Anyway......rhythm wise I played open chords, > double stops, some chop chords, some tremolo, lots of melody......it > all sounded good and no one raised an eye brow. The tenor player was > doing mainly sock-style rhythm which worked really, really well. It > was a great jam and the folks couldn't have been nicer and more > accepting of the stranger with the mandolin. And the best > part......no banjos!! LOL.....just kidding.... > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Taterbugmando" group. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected]<taterbugmando%[email protected]> > . > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/taterbugmando?hl=en. > > > >--
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