I have been singing as long as I can remember and singing in folk clubs since 1964. I tried to played country dance tunes, for that is what most tunes in "Sessions" are, on mandolin and recorder since 1964 and I could play a few but could never "hear" all the notes in many. When I played what I "heard" kind friends said - "you are not playing all the notes".

My wife learned piano as a child. We bought a harmonium she played all the notes from the dots and we made good music.

A thousand years later I bought a mondola and played the few simple tunes I had from whenever. Then I dug out my wife's tune books and over a period of a year or so I learned to play all the tunes she played on the harmonium. I can know play very slowly many tunes from the vast collections of country dance tunes and choose the ones I like, then play them quicker.

At Whitby then later at Shrewsbury Festival I went to "Beginners and Improvers" tune workshops. Dots on the website 9 months before the festivals. For the last 4 or 5 years the "Beginners and Improvers" tune workshops at Shrewsbury attract around 100 people playing a massive variety of instruments. Most have the dots in front of them - many play from memory.

Around 4 years ago we started a "Beginners and Improvers" tune workshop in our local with a tune book of 20 tunes. We know have 100.

Last night we had 2 guitars, 1 bass, 2 fiddles, 2 recorers, 2 whistles, 2 flutes, 2 accordians, 2 melodeons, 2 concertinas, 2 banjos, 1 mandolin, 1 set Northumbrian Smallpipes and 1 uke.

Probably a better mix than usual - no 'cellos or harps on this night. And slightly more women than men. Unusual for a session? Maybe not.

We play as an acoustic ceilidh band of between 20 and 30 musos and have much fun.

We are simply doing what tune players ie musicians have been doing for hundreds of years, some learn by listening to recordings or from others, some learn from dots, some play fro dots and most play from memory.

But I have to say that, just as at Shrewsbury, the dots enable a lot of people to participate, many of which would not sit in a pub session and try to join in.

If you can learn a tune after one or even 20 hearings - good for you. If you can sit down in our sessions and play a tune you have never seen before from the dots, also good. The majority of us are somewhere in between.

Some people on this thread have explained and great length about how sophisticated the whole process is and in some cases how these great little tunes can only be understood and played by playing by ear.

Maybe they are right but I am not convinced. Perhaps they could get some of those people to say what the tunes are called. Is that too much to ask?

Best wishes

L in C
The Beech Band M21 0XJ

Folk at The Beech M21 9EG