It's true; I really prefer when our string band meets to 'rehearse' and we actually play close to 50% songs and 50% tunes, but it rarely happens. We play a wide variety of songs from Depression NLCR stuff, to rip-offs of Double Decker, Highwoods, Critton Hollow, HotMud, Charlie Poole, Doc Watson, Tommy Jarrell, etc., to blues stuff, western praire stuff, and gospel stuff and country corn that we old-timey-fied. Two fiddles, guitar, banjo, mando- banjo and a host of inserts like uke, harp, and regular mandolin.

But there are so many tunes in so many keys (3?)that a steady concentration on songcraft and singing arrangements only happens about once a fortnight, and sometimes it only happens on account of the gig, and then we break through some new vocal wall, end up blinking at each other, then just jump to the next G tune, which is really all there is....

But songs in the gig respect are absolutely necessary if you want to leave the hall alive, unless the audience leaves first. "We play until ya leave."

I think that there is more and more new stuff (Julie Miller, Jones and Leva, others) that ought to be worked on in a string band setting. Keep singing some songs, Angeline the Baker to love songs like Elkhorn Ridge and Wild Bill Jones, and that will forgo the rut. As noted way back in the start of this thread, the old bands squawked away about chicken, women, mules and whether or not the river was whisky, and that is a part of the tradition that shouldn't be lost, never mind the good stuff about mills, mines, and politics....."Sal Went Down to the Cider Mill, she drank and she drank till she got her fill"...it's a beautiful thing; 'nough said.

If you play old-time and you're in a rut, make an effort to crank out a smokin' Milwaukee Blues or Anchored in Love, and if it works, you still got it.

Caleb