Beginners Tune Sessions

Subject: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 08:07 AM

Lots of festivals have beginners tune sessions but are they common outside the festival season on a weekly or monthly basis in the uk?

Cheers

L in C

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: severed-head
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 08:19 AM

The weekly session at the United Brethren pub in Chelmsford, Essex has a slower tempo beginners session from 8.00 till 9.00, then the session starts proper.
Garry

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: GUEST,Joe
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 08:24 AM

In Beverley theere is a weekly beginners session, and certain other weekly sessions are beginner friendly.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: TheSnail
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 08:29 AM

Lewes Favourites is every third Wedenesday of the month. It's an out-of-the-public-eye session for beginners to practice session tunes.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Jack Campin
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 08:42 AM

There are three weekly slow sessions that I know of in Edinburgh, and one other weekly intermediate-speed limited-repertoire one. I think Glasgow Fiddle Workshop runs one as well.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 08:50 AM

Any good advice on how to launch and manage beginners tune sessions?

L in C

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: GUEST,Joe P at work
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 08:55 AM

Well the Beverley session has a tune book of about 90 tunes, with chords. The first half is going through tunes slowly then after there is a roudn the houses type thing, so everyone contributes. It seems to work well.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Barry Finn
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 11:07 AM

The ones that are held here in Boston (USA) are usually lead by teachers who's students attend as well as many others, that way there's at least some fimilararity with the repertoires of each other. Seems to work out fine. These are held just prior to the regular sessions.

Barry

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Harmonium Hero
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 11:27 AM

Jubilee Music Workshops, run by Angie Bladen, is on the first and second Saturdays each month at Eaves Green Community Centre, Lower Burgh Way, Eaves Green, Chorley, Lancs. PR7 3QG. Time: 2-5 pm.
First Saturday is a 'slow & steady' session for all instruments. Dots available, or CDs of tunes to learn by ear.
Second Saturday is a concertina workshop - all systems. Possibility of getting a concertina on loan for a couple of months.
A lot of people attend boith workshops, and they tend to use a lot of the same tunes - standard session tunes.
All ages and abilities welcome. Disabled access. Tea & Bickies. First session free. Don't want to give phone numbers/email address here, as I'm not involved, but PM me if you want contact details.
John Kelly.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Leadfingers
Date: 19 Sep 08 - 11:40 AM

Second Monday at The Seven Stars , Knowl Hill , Berkshire ! Not exactly a Beginners session , but we DONT play at silly speeds !

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 20 Sep 08 - 10:00 AM

Thanks folks, lots of good advice

L in C

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Silas
Date: 20 Sep 08 - 10:56 AM

BBC 'Virtual sessions' are pretty good to play along to.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Stringsinger
Date: 20 Sep 08 - 01:32 PM

It would be nice to know if there were any here in the States.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Leadfingers
Date: 20 Sep 08 - 02:17 PM

There is an Old Time Session in Virginia - Not sure where , but not far from Richmond ! I think we may be going there next Thursday .

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Tootler
Date: 20 Sep 08 - 02:43 PM

Ceddesfolk in Sedgefield, Co. Durham (1st Wednesday of month) has a range of participants from near beginners to very experienced, but we play at a tempo that the less experienced can manage and also use dots if necessary.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: selby
Date: 21 Sep 08 - 03:16 AM

A dampner in my experiance when you advertise as a beginers session somewhere along the line it stops being a beginers session as all the beginers have become profficient with there own comfort zone a new beginer comes thinking its a beginers session and it no longer is if you understand what I am saying. Also on the beginers you do what you can to help everyone they have more time for practice than you and you are left behind.
Keith

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Chris Green
Date: 21 Sep 08 - 04:19 AM

There's a good beginner's session in Coventry City Centre on a Monday night from 8-9pm. Details can be found at covtrad.co.uk

Chris

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: TheSnail
Date: 21 Sep 08 - 05:26 AM

selby

Also on the beginers you do what you can to help everyone they have more time for practice than you and you are left behind.

Nonsense. Helping beginners is a great way to learn and it don't half concentrate the mind when they start catching up with you.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 08:13 AM

Do Beginners Tune Sessions tend to fizzle out as people learn and move?

L in C

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: TheSnail
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 08:15 AM

Nope. Beginners are in infinite supply.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 08:35 AM

Mmmmmmmmmm Mr Snail,

Beginners are in infinite supply.

I have no particular reason to doubt you but what makes you think this?

How many not bad to sort of average tune players do you need to run a Beginners Tune Sessions?

L in C

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: TheSnail
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 08:48 AM

OK, it was a bit of a throw away line but I suppose that the Lewes Favourites has been running for about ten years now. We generally have eight or ten people and, apart from the organisers, none of the participants are the originals.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 09:03 AM

I guess the hardest part is finding reasonably good players with the long term commitment to play with and support beginners?

L in C

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 09:15 AM

We regard the Lewes Favourites as a sort of self-help session; none of us consider ourselves teachers. Although we have a selection of over 200 tunes available in printed and computer formats, anyone can turn up with a tune they've heard and introduce it to the group. We go round the table inviting everyone to choose a tune and, if they feel capable, to start it off at their preferred speed. This varies from slow to very slow.

We hardly ever count people in as that's not what happens in the wild and is more appropriate to the playing of formal arrangements. Someone starts the tune, occasionally with a few bars of introduction but more usually from the top of the first A music, and everyone else eases into it. We keep plugging through the tune until a natural close is reached: this is quite surprising, but it generally happens that everyone stops at the same time without having agreed how many times to play it. The speed tends to increase with repetition.

People who are proficient at one instrument occasionally bring a new instrument which puts them back to the beginner's level again. Others may try playing familiar tunes in unfamiliar octaves, which has a similar effect.

We all learn from each other. Invaluable benefits of these sessions are getting used to playing with other people at a steady speed, getting nerves under control, learning to play through mistakes, and learning to stop after falling off a tune and mug it when it comes round the corner.

Valmai (Lewes)

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 11:27 AM

Thanks Valmai that's really clear and sounds like an excellent way to run a beginners session

Chiz

L in C

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Domnull
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 02:59 PM

Val
"The speed tends to increase with repetition"
...that's often the case even outside "beginners'" sessions!

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 03:38 PM

Apols for stating the obvious about speeds.

At the Lewes Favourites, we've found computer music software a splendid tool for capturing tunes, sending them round by email, comparing them, and editing them to reflect what gets played locally. The software we use most is Noteworthy Composer, but abc is very valuable and adaptable as well; there are a lot of collections such as the Village Music Project on the web in abc format, and it is easy to send in emails.

Andy Warburton and Bryan (The Snail) Creer have done a terrific job in getting our local session tunes into computer formats.

We also encourage people to record the practice sessions as an aid to memory (and possibly as a hideous example).

Valmai (Lewes)

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: VirginiaTam
Date: 02 Nov 08 - 05:06 PM

ALERT! New folkie in da thread. I am going to ask a stupid question. What exactly is a tune session? I gather it is like a formalised jam session of specific folk instruments (concertina, whistles and fiddles) and specific folk type music (jigs, reels, hornpipes etc). Am I wrong? Is it more than this?

Also in English sessions, do other instruments attend? Specifically mandolin and appalachain dulcimer? What about people who are not very good at reading music? Welcome or considered a nuisance?

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: mattkeen
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 06:28 AM

Is Nick Barbers book and CD any good as a way of learning some tunes that you might encounter at a session before attending your first one?

Anybody know it?

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 07:15 AM

VirginiaTam: yes, you're right. A tunes session is an informal gathering, usually free and not advertised, of musicians playing sets of mainly traditional dance tunes from a common repertoire. People join in tunes they know and pick up the ones they don't by ear, or go and hunt for the dots or a recording later. All acoustic instruments are welcome; electric ones generally don't fit in so well, although there are honourable exceptions.

There are often tunes sessions at festivals. Otherwise they are mostly in pubs.

Usually people take turns to lead a set of tunes, sometimes by invitation and sometimes just by plunging in, depending on whether any individual is steering the session or not.

Beginners are generally welcome to experiment quietly in the back row, where they stand a better chance of being able to hear themselves. Getting a book of dots out in a full-speed session is a bit unproductive, because by the time you find the tune you want the others will probably have moved on to another one, and anyway you need to watch whoever's leading to get indications of speed and whatever signal is being given to herald a change of tune. It's best to try to pick out the bones of a tune by ear in the session and put in the work with the dots at home in private.

Finally, about 75% of English tunes are in G and most of the rest are in D. If someone's leading on a one-row melodeon they are most likely, although not certain, to be in C. Scottish fiddlers love A.

I'm sure other people will have more helpful thoughts to offer and I'm not claiming that what I've said applies to absolutely any session anywhere.

Above all, session playing is very good fun and an excellent social activity.

Good luck,

Valmai (Lewes)

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: .spiderman
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 11:01 AM

...does anyone know of any beginners sessions in the Manchester area?

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 11:19 AM

Not yet ....................

L in C

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Brakn
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 11:20 AM

L in C are you thinking of starting up something?

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 11:27 AM

Well Brakn,

could be. I don't see myself as other than a beginner and I think we would need a decent nucleus of people who could play 10 or 20 tunes and enough others who were genuinely beginners.

Peter Hood and others run a good session in Stockport and their is an amazing Irish session in the Lloyds in Chorlton but its too good and too quick for me.

Mull, mull. How do you feel about this kind of thing?

CHEERS

Les

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 12:03 PM

From personal experience, I'd say you don't actually need even a core of experts; you just need people who are enthusiastic and happy to practise and improve together.

I should also have explained that before attempting to play a tune together we all noodle away at it for a few minutes at our own speeds. It often happens that the tune gradually emerges from the general noise without anyone formally starting it.

Our way is just one way; there's bound to be room for others.

Demand for practice sessions is steady: as Spare Parts (Bryan Creer, Suzanne Higgins and me) we run them at a few festivals every year, and we always get a good turnout.

Valmai (Lewes)

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: GUEST,Dave_
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 12:15 PM

Dave Mallinson at mally.com has an orange and a blue beginners cd book and cd, great to learn some nice beginner irish tunes.
Dave_

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 12:38 PM

I'd be happy to support a begginers session Les - As an attendee and to assist with the organising if you like. I have been playing Anglo concertina for about 10 years or more but never realy got involved enough to play more than a couple of tunes and accompany a couple of songs!

Good luck and keep us posted.

Dave

PS - If you want a room, the club room at Swinton is usualy available:-)

D.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 01:18 PM

Thanks Dave that's a really generous offer. I certainly will keep you posted

cheers

Les

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Will Fly
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 01:33 PM

Valmai has already posted a link to the Lewes Favorites site. As an adjunct to that site, and with permission, I've created tablature transcriptions of the tunes for tenor banjo (standard CGDA tuning) and for mandolin. Guitar transcriptions - melody lines only - are currently in the pipeline. Each transcription shows the original score with the tab underneath.

You can find the current transcriptions here - still a little work to be done to tidy stuff up and also get a title index page up, but you might find it useful.

If anyone finds any silly mistakes on my part, or discrepancies between music and tab, there's an email address on the home page - please let me know.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 01:46 PM

Thanks Will that looks really useful. I have a collection of tunes that I have put into Noteworthy mostly to tidy up keys and such like. I have used these with a few friends and even when people don't read the dots, which I can barely manage, its still gives much needed structure to busking tune players.

Les

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 03:06 PM

A handy feature of Noteworthy Composer, and probably of other music programmes as well, is that you can turn the dots into midi files and send them round to non-readers.

If you choose an instrument voice such as oboe or saxophone rather than using the default noise, which reminds me of an infant's index finger on a piano, the result sounds more like a tune and less like an exercise. You can also vary the speed and set the number of repeats.

Playing along with the computer's noises can help to make you aware of points where you are varying the speed or not giving notes their full value, but is no substitute for playing with other people.

Valmai (Lewes)

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 03 Nov 08 - 03:42 PM

Thanks a lot Valmai, I have just bought Noteworthy

Cheers

Les

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Brakn
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 04:53 AM

4th Birthday today - well done Les!

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 05:12 AM

Thanks Mike, and big thanks to:

Friends who sang or played at The Beech include:
Alan, Alice, Alison, Amanda, Andrew, Angela, Ann, Annie, Ant, Anthony, Bill, Bill, Bob, Brian, Brian, Bruce, Chris, Chris, Clair, Colin, Corinne, Dave, Dave, Dave, Eddie, Ellie, Ged, Glynne, Gordon, Helen, Helen, Ingrid, Ishbel, Isobel, Jack, Janet, Jenn, Jennifer, Jill, Jill, Joe, Joe, John, John, John, John, John, Jules, Julia, Julie, Karen, Karina, Kate, Kath, Kath, Kay, Keith, Keith, Ken, Kieran, Laura, Leo, Liam, Liz, Lucy, Mandy, Marie-Claire, Mark, Mark, Martin, Mary , Matthew, Matthew, Michael, Michael, Mickey, Mike, Mike, Mike, Naomi, Nigel, Norman, Olga, Paddy, Pete, Phil, Phil, Rachel, Richard, Richard, Rob , Roberto, Rosie , Ruth, Sandra, Sean , Shelley, Sid, Steve , Steve, Sue, Suzie, Ted, Tom, Tom, Ursula and Wes.

These are most of the instruments played:
Anglo-German Concertinas, Banjos, Bass Guitars, Bodhrans, Bongos, Contrabass Viol, Bouzoukis, Citera, Cellos, Cittern, Clarinet, Dombra, Electronic Shruti Box, Octave & Tenor Mandolas, English Concertinas, Fiddles, Flutes, Guitaron, Guitars, Hammered Dulcimers, Harmonicas, Harp, Karadeniz Kemence (Black Sea Fiddle), Mandolins, Melodeons, Northumbrian Smallpipes, Spoons, Piano Accordions, Recorders, Tambourines, Trumpet, Ukuleles, Uilleann Pipes, Voices and Whistles.

It has been a brilliant 4 years of Tunes and 5 years of songs.

Exciting day to day for all Beechists: Les & Ged take the 6th Edition of The Beech Tune Book to the printers - a proper book with a cover and such like. Book Launch and Book signing to follow. Well done all those who gave us tunes and generally helped knocking it into shape.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 05:14 AM

All the tunes and much else will be available here:

Our website

Best wishes

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: GUEST,Keith Price
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 05:59 AM

Well done Les and all at the Beech.Happy Birthday and here's to many more successful years.

Keith

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: terrier
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 07:10 AM

After four successful years, can you still class yourselves as 'beginners'? Time to move on and call yourselves 'improvers' ;)

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Mo the caller
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 09:09 AM

Greetings and best wishes.

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Les in Chorlton
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 09:54 AM

Thank you kindly Keith and Tom and Mo. Good point from Tom about moving from Beginners to Improvers. This from the intro to our Tune Book - gone to the printers today:

"During the Summer of 2009 we met Rob Phillips, melodeon and concertina player, Storyteller and Caller and we asked him to call a dance in the Beer Garden of The Beech at the end of a display by Bollin Morris. Few people were injured and we felt we were moving towards a being a Ceilidh Band. The Beech Band was ……. sort of born. Our first Ceilidh was during the Summer of 2010. We have since played as an acoustic band of around 20 for more than a dozen Ceilidhs and our Sessions have moved on from "Beginners" to Improvers".

Thanks again

Les

Subject: RE: Beginners Tune Sessions
From: Valmai Goodyear
Date: 13 Feb 13 - 01:40 PM

Great stuff! Congratulations. Volume 2 of The Lewes Favourites is at the printers now, too.

Valmai (Lewes)