All posts tagged: Acoustic Music

Few things are better than the sound of acoustic instruments

Red Wing takes flight

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Well, that certainly was a promising start. Day 1 of the 1st Annual Red Wing Roots Music Festival promised a talented and spirited mix of the roots and branches of American music.  And in spite of gloomy skies and the occasional (and thankfully brief) rain shower, this brand new festival — located deep in the heart of the beautiful Shenandoah Valley — pretty much delivered. The festival is the brainchild of an energetic, talented, and amazingly entrepreneurial (for a bunch of roots music players) band The Steel Wheels, fronted by one of the great voices in Americana music, Trent Wagler.  Candice and I arrived back in our old Valley stomping grounds (we lived for 15 years in nearby Staunton, Virginia) after the soggy drive down from Washington just in time to walk in on the 4 p.m. set of the hosts under the tent at the Carolina Old Time Family Stage.  And given the weather, could The Steel Wheels really begin this festival with any song other than their iconic Rain in the Valley? This was …

How College Students Can Lead to a Wonderful Holiday Weekend

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When a colleague asked about our plans for the upcoming holiday weekend, I told her that Andrew and Claire each had friends from college who were in town and would be staying with us.  I assumed our role was “To stay out of the way.” Thankfully, I was wrong.  Jason, Jordi, Jackie, Kelsey, Claire, and Andrew were delightful guests and hosts, sharing some of their time with us and also giving Candice and me the space to enjoy our weekend with each other. We began with our “traditional” July 4th celebrations – and all the twins’ friends joined us (rather enthusiastically, I think).  While the Takoma Park July 4th parade didn’t have quite the pizzazz of a presidential year (I miss the “Mutts for Mitt” floats with dog puppets on top of cars and there wasn’t anything to reach the level of last year’s “precision grill team”), we still had a great time laughing at the floats and enjoying the world music you always hear at our little slice of Haight-Ashbury here in DC.  Afterwards, …

Nothing Beats Live Music

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Virtually every year I’ve made a New Year’s resolution to “play more music with friends.”  But life (or the procrastination gene) kept getting in the way. Until this year. On the first Friday in January, we had two families over for dinner and the husbands brought their instruments. I had such a good time playing music with these talented friends that I decided to finally act on that resolution…and the First Friday Music Jam was born. I went through my contacts list and found about 15 friends I’ve played with through the years.  Early in January I sent out a recurring invitation to join me in our music room on the first Friday of the month for some handmade acoustic music. Two “first Fridays” later, we’re off to a great start.  Five friends have joined me both evenings for several hours of good music, fueled by adult beverages and snacks.  Among our crew we have old folkies, a young swing guitarist, bluegrass devotees, and multiple rockers. So far we’ve had an abundance of good-sounding guitars, …

Fine fiddling in Southern California

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When I signed up for family weekend at Claire’s college, I didn’t go expecting to have my bluegrass itch scratched.  Yes, Claremont has a wonderful Folk Music Center in the heart of the village*, but I generally have time for one quick stop to play an instrument or two between all the sessions lined up for the parents. So imagine my surprise when I was reading the events for family weekend, and there — on Friday night — was an evening of “Bluegrass and Old-Time Music” with fiddler Richard Greene. Wow!  Richard Greene is a fiddle god – one of those west coast players who paid his bluegrass dues in Bill Monroe’s Blue Grass Boys in the 1960s, yet expanded the genre with the help of David Grisman, Clarence White, and so many others. I’ve been listening to his music since the early 1970s, yet had never seen him live. So with Candice and Ella, one of Claire’s good friends at school who is — who knew — a bluegrass fan (her already high stock …

A December Celtic Tradition

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If it is early December, you can count on “Celtic Guitar God” Robin Bullock heading up a holiday concert for the Institute of Musical Traditions. So tonight, Candice and I joined about 150 other traditional music fans for the 2012 edition of the IMT Celtic holiday concert. Bullock was joined this year by Scottish champion fiddler Elke Baker and hammered dulcimer player Ken Kolodner. The evening was filled with traditional Christmas carols as well as Scottish and Irish old time music, all played with great enthusiasm and musiciaenship. Baker and Kolodner played several beautiful duets, including two of my favorite holiday tunes:  the haunting In the Bleak Midwinter and the French carol Bring a Torch, Jeanette, Isabella.  All three joined together for extended sets of Cape Breton, French Canadian, and Celtic fiddle tunes. However, my favorite parts of this concert each year focus around Bullock’s solo guitar work. Tonight he had beautiful arrangements of The Wexford Carol and a great mash-up of classical carols as played in the style of Mississippi John Hurt. But one …

Guitars and Baseball

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James Nash once gave some good advice to aspiring guitarists: Rule #1 for learning to play fast:  don’t practice while watching the ball game.  Well, tonight…I’m guilty.  Two hours after starting, I’ve finally put the last instrument back on its stand.  I was watching baseball the entire time. However, I suspect that the San Francisco-based Nash would approve of my choice of ballgame, as the hometown Giants are in the World Series against the Detroit Tigers. And while I didn’t get any real practice in tonight, it sure was fun to multitask around two things that I love.  (Note to regular readers:  Candice, who has become a baseball fan this year with the emergence of the Nats, is out-of-town. I wasn’t ignoring her.) I grew up as a Giants fan.  The Braves hadn’t moved to Atlanta, so we didn’t have a MLB team in the South.  And Willie Mays is, to my mind, the most complete player in the history of the game.  He was so much fun to watch as a young kid in …

G.A.S. continued: Or how I ended up with another guitar

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I hadn’t planned to buy another guitar.  Seriously. But sometimes good things happen when you least expect it. I HAD planned to try to meet the maker of my Running Dog guitar on my next trip to Seattle. Since I bought it used from a guitar shop in Amherst, Massachusetts, I didn’t know Rick Davis, the builder who made my parlor style instrument back in 2001. But after playing it for a couple of years, I wanted to meet the guy who built such wonderful small guitars with the beautiful tone. A recent trip to the west coast gave me the opportunity to stop by Rick’s shop in the Fremont neighborhood of Seattle (aka, The Center of the Universe). Rick shares his shop with his partner, Cat Fox, and they couldn’t have been more welcoming. Rick told me the provenance of my 2001 Parlor guitar.  I learned he was the subject of Tim Brooke’s 2005 book Guitar: An American Life.  And I played a beautiful 2011 Ought-3 model. (I also noodled on a baritone guitar, …