I guess when we all agree to publish this we can clean up the typoes, eh?


Do you have a limit as to how many people you can teach at one time? In workshop mode, only as many as the cound can reach. I've led as many as 30 in a workshoppy jam.... with my husband handy to help be a spare pair of eyes and ears and point me to anyone struggling who needs a word of help. I guess I wish I'd had an amp that time since I hurt my voice, just so I could speak and sing more relaxedly. But then prior to leading music events I led a lot of workshops and group things, and my husband is a clergyman used to leading and coordinating the participants in large liturgical events, so we have a edge there I think. I've seen a fiddle tunes workshop of 100 led well, BTW, at Clarion Folk College. Best jam I was ever in. Sorted itself out just fine, in terms of what instruments went where to hear each other.

How do you handle the ones that tend to want to take over to the detriment of the group? Like I would in a support group-- first we describe the operating guidelines briefly, never assuming there is not a newcomer or someone who needs to hear it again. We do a round of introductions, too-- names, what they play, where they live, how long they been playing, and so forth. When there is trouble I'll point out things about sharing time equally, being very directive about turns whereas without their presence I would usually be more laid back and let it flow. If they are good players I may ask them to show some skills to newer players. I'll also point out that they have the hands to watch for the evening, as I see their chord changes are crisp and their fingering basic and easy to read. I make them sit where the newbies can see their hands. They feel very good about this, I think! We have several rooms we can break out into if it seems like the group is too big (or too small for the egos present.) I don't go out of my way to invite people back who seem to be unable to support the growth of community as well as musical skill. (I'm building a community, not putting people through a skill machine.) But these same people are often fun to play with one on one, and sometimes the guitar people (ooh, space aliens, The Guitar People, LOL) will tend to set up side conversations about riffs, and this is very distracting to other instrumentalists and very discouraging to newbie guitarists. We just... take charge, not so as to cotrol, but we do make it clear we are hosting and have some ways of working that may differ from what people are used to but which we have found do actually promote good playing AND a good time. I think it boils down to spotting what the real needs are and what the unmeetable, unhealthy needs are. We feed the real needs and redirect the others to more productive approaches to being in the group, where we can.

How do you integrate the various aspects, singing, playing, different instruments and playing levels? We throw them all in the pool at once for the first hour as a beginner's jam, and the more experienced players have been very good about helping newbies in this time period. We call chord changes as needed for a few verses or repeats, and so forth. Real newbies often like to sit next to me to see chord names on the autoharp. (Or a good guitarist with good hands will sit there to see the chords and then the other guitar players watch him.) Then we break into groups by interest or skill and go from there. If two excellent playes want to wander off to work up a tune, for example, we have space.

How much printed material do you use? It varies. We always have stuff on hand if needed, but if it's working fine without, we don't bring them out. If we are in song circle mode people can use a stand and sheets if they like, or not. (Our idea is that people will play without these when they are ready, and that's up to them, see?) Printed stuff can be songbooks (we have a million single copies, and a few duplicates, and some songsheets in bulk. We can always go to the gospel binder I use for some of our service music if things are lagging. It's full of pieces that are easy and recognizable and newbie players often like these as a starting point. In past years we always warmed everyone up with "On Top of Spaghetti."

What styles of music do you teach? (We concentrate on accessible but traditional folk music staying away from the more contemporary or pop-oriented stuff). We do too, and I described this earlier, but I think I forgot to mention blues-- all kinds, old and electric.

What sources do you use for song material? Big absorbent ears, eclectic interests.

How do you approach musical "improvisation"? Let it rip when it happens, answer questions about it if they come up. Not a skill area for us, yet.

When you jam with others, do you encounter music that you don't like? If so, how do you deal with that? We try it and if it's playable with our instruments and skills, we might find we like it... we at least find we have things to learn. One guy always brings stuff we can't play, and we just let him showcase it and anyone who wants to can play it with him. We encourage him to re-arrange things so we could play them, but he's not a great arranger so this is yet to happen. Some of our folks can play with him, and they get together with him sometimes just for that.

Do you get your students to play music together or is this more one on one? They are jammers first and students second... they start as people who do play together. So if we spot something that would work well in a small group mode, we might invite that subgroup for an evening to work on stuff in common. We set a date that works for that group and then let others know it's happening if they want to come too.

I would imagine that you would be truthful. How much does this reflect your own interests (say as different from theirs)? Well here is one of the checks and balances on my time availability. I have lots of time, but that's because I am rehabbing physically, and not working.... if it's not fun for me, it's not something I will put in time to do, and that's that. I'll try anything on a jam night but past that, it has to interest me or I am the wrong one for them to work with.

You use the term mentor rather than teacher. I would assume that the conventional way of teaching runs antithetical to the way you work with students. You might not even want to call them students, right? I call them folks, friends, and fellow musicians, except when I am talking about the part of knowing them that involves them trying to learn something specific.

I see what you do as an important part of the folk process. It's similar to the way traditional folk singers and players act within their subculture. They learn from their parents, relatives, friends in somewhat the same way. For example, Jean Ritchie's family from the Cumberlands taught her in kind of this way I would suppose. Maybe not formally but by modeling as you have pointed out. This is a high compliment, since we are flatlanders who moved to an area not terribly unlike Jean's. We just decided never to do it in such a way that it wasn't fun for everyone. Seen too many people harmed by formal music "education." Having to degoof that with people who insist they can't play or sing, cuz someone told them so when they were little.

I used to think (maybe still do) that you can't really teach anyone anything but you can present the information in an interesting an involved way. Maybe this is teaching in a real sense. So much of what we call "education" is about lecturing and spoon-feeding in a hierarchical manner. The teacher is god (master) and the student is neophyte (slave). That's not real education to me. It may be for other subjects, but IMO it's not compatible enough to work in terms of playing music. I think MTed has a structured approach that DOES work, but he should describe that himself. (PM him?) He did describe it once in a thread about guitar skills.

I think that the folkies growing up in the Revival tended to be inconoclasts and the idea of learning anything formally would not be appealing. OTOH musicians like Doc Watson tell us on his "Legacy" recording that he thought that what he did wasn't interesting to others. He was surprised when there was so much interest in what he does. He learned to play different kinds of music to play at dances and in bands. Much of the accoustic single-string fiddle tune styles he learned from playing electric guitar. I don't think he'd be resistant to learning anything from anyone. I find that the best musicians that I've known are eager to learn anything anyway anytime. However, the focus in what they do is pretty consistent. (Being a good picker or singer or etc.) Yes, they decide they want to learn something and that offers an entry point for a structured way of teaching that particular thing they want to learn. (Free will is a great thing when it's engaged.) It's part of teaching, I think, and sometimes people think that's ALL teaching should be... maybe people teach in the way they best can, and don't realize that they might get better results by having a partner who works differently. Example: My husband was totally a note reader and had been trained in classical piano, and I'm nearly all ear, so we balance each other well now that we've stopped arguing which is best! :~)

How do you handle someone who is ambivalent about wanting to learn? Love 'em to death... they will play when they want to, and learn what they have fallen in love with.

There are so many books, CD's, videos etc. to learn from on an individual level. Less is said about learning to jam. What do your jams consist of? Picking and singing? Learning the same songs? How do you conduct a jam? I think I've covered this, let me know if I have not.

Do you ever get to a point when you tell the student that they don't need you now and suggest where else to go to continue their learning? Oh yes, sometimes we START with that!   

(to mooman) You teach then primarily by ear. Do you encourage the use of tape recorders? I wish they would use them! We give them URLs to sites where they can practice with an online sound file, too, and one time we used these sound files right in the jam when the material was new to my husband and I as well.

If keeping track of the progress is their responsibility (which it is), do you kind of know what's been happening from week to week in their development or do you just take it as they present it and go from there? I assign homework, and if they did it that tells me where they are, mostly... they tell me how it went or what they did instead. I write it down, and they have to remember to bring the paper back the next time. So far I have not had so many wanting to work with me in the same time period that I have forgotten what we did or how it went. Maybe my limit is there, more than on how many I could reach in a group setting-- I can mentor four or five people now, with the limited resources I have physically. That includes people in our regular jam even if they do not come privately. I most enjoy working with people who, for whatever internal reasons, are just ready to pop and driven to play at home because it feels so good to do it. I don't like to do uphill work. I like to work with people who are as engaged in thinking about it all, as they are in the doing of it.

If you see them and they've sped ahead of where you thought they were when you last worked with them then you probably have a good idea of where they are in their level? I don't think in terms of levels. It's more like, "Are they playing the music they love, in such a way that they love it even more and that I love to play it with them."

If the assignment was say to accompany a song with their own arrangement, then they bring in four or five songs doing this, you would then remember that? (A kind of mental documenting) If they did that I would up the ante and assign something even more involving. I recently told someone, "Forget getting used to what you think I want. As soon as I feel like you have achieved a plateau, I'll go back to expecting more than you feel like you can do, at a higher level."

Do you keep track of the songs they want to learn from week to week or do they refresh your memory by bringing them in to remind you that this is what they've worked on? It's on their homework page. This includes notes on anything we tried that did or did not work, and why it might not have worked-- key, speed, whatever, if they want to try it again on their own.

Have you catalogued what these "blocks" are so that the information from one student can be transferred to another? Suppose a person has a problem with rhythmic tempo and has a block about it. When you work with this, can that information be used for another student? I tend to integrate whatever I experience, so I am sure I would draw on this if it was needed, but I don't intentionally keep track of it. (I would if I had staff.) On the other hand, I don't throw away paper, and I often re-find notes I made long ago that come in handy on new occasions.

Do you find that when you jam with them that your own playing increases and becomes better? Oh yes, I am on a totally new pevel as a player when I am leading or "teaching," because I pay attention to THEM and this lets my own new learnings pop out. They stretch me, because to play and talk at the same time really pushes me to just play without thinking, and that's good for me.

How do you know when the student that you teach becomes ready to play in the band? Or is this just a feeling that it's right? They are always ready musically long before they feel ready, and I think they know this, so I think I am just good at spotting when to push them, when to pull them, when to leave them where they are.

How would you define musicianship? Here's what I think it is. An ability to take the musical knowledge and incorporate it into a jam to make music together. I think something like this for me takes place even in a solo or duo performance before and audience. I think this is what Pete Seeger had in mind when he developed the "hootenanny" concept. I think I am still defining what I think about this....

... receiving such joy. It's so important because it builds the audience for folk music by participation. The appreciation for it grows as people begin to own it and it's not just another "spectator sport". YES. That's why our greatest joy is songleading or jamming and jam leading-- it's all growth, in all directions.

How do you edit your [own] playing so that when you are in a larger ensemble jamming you fit in with what you're doing? I just listen for what I am not hearing, and play it, I think. Not my analysis, just by taking part. I love it when this happens because I do not get enough opportunities to just lay back and plink in a very few needed spots. I like leading but it's not too often I can NOT lead, and be totally stretched to keep up in new areas. BTW I hammer my autoharp as well and in the larger group performance mode I can really focus in that. I have been the main songleader now for too long as well, and now we have a male sionger who can spell me on about half our material, so this is allowing me to do hamronies and play sparingly.

One of the things that might frustrate a "teacher" is to not complete a passage of music but to stop and go over it for the student. Do you deal with this or do you just have the student go through the whole piece and then talk about it? In classical music, many teachers isolate a passage that gives the student problems and just go over it again and again. It's one of the things that drives me nuts about that style of teaching. I get so bored. Sometimes in practicing I can do this for myself but I find it difficult to concentrate for too long a time. There are some musicians who find the process fascinating and can spend hours learning a single lick. I enjoy however the process of learning songs and don't mind going over and over the lyrics. If it's boring, just make it the homework part! We have a young lady working on fiddle tunes, and sometimes my husband also is challenged by the rhythm of a transcription he is trying to learn. It's usually based on a rhythm problem, causing an intractable fingering or bowing problem. I will degoof their problem spots for myself, using my baroque rhythm experience, and then make them take that patch out and fix it before going back to the piece at hand at tempo. My husband will often put that into his practice time and instead fo focusing on it when we play together we'll work on stuff that doesn't have those hitches. This is also our approach when we spend about an hour before the weekly service running through the music I have chosen for that night-- I pick 6 or 7 and we do the 3 or 4 that were working. The others work into the mix in their own time, or they just aren't ours to play. If it's a piece we ought to do, the players will work on it on their own, ofgen, and it's in better shape next time we try it. By using this approach, the entire mental association with playing together is a series of great memories of well played fun. Why create misery to record in the mind???

On a related note, IMO often the problem someone is having with their instrument is that they are playing the wrong instrument-- years of suffering to play what they think they ought to want to play, only to find that someone hands them another kind of instrument to hold at a jam, and they find themselves being able to make music on it, easily. I've seen this happen a number of times, and we also hit on a trick I think you use-- in the beginner hour we try each other's instruments sometimes, or play the one we are just learning on. So many guitar players are not guitar players! I thought I was a hammer dulcimer player but nope, I am an autoharper, not the usual sort but that's my game nonetheless. MY theory is that everyone has an instrument, but so many have been told they can never be a musicain. I tell them they just have not found their instrument yet. Eventually they come around and try some out and find one that they love more than their fear, their discomfort, and thier sore fingers.

And that's it, really, I'm certain of it. To be so driven by the love of it that you have to go forward no matter what, and you do, and you are more in love than ever when you go forward and discover the new songs, the new instruments the new ways to play. I have about 5,000 gospel sound files on this computer (of course there is some duplication with songs being done in six or more styles), and if I could I would play and sing every damn one of them, while also working on songs from Barry Taylor's Canadian Tunebook.


I often dream that I am wandering through a second hand store that goes on for miles and miles of rooms within rooms, and on every wall and shelf, and in every corner, there are instruments that have never been invented or made, and I play some of them, and I can hear how they would sound. And I would play them all if they were built. Sometimes I find out later that something similar to one I played in my dream DOES exist, but to play them all I would have to live forever and have an all-expenses-paid Winnebago.

When I get that, I'll come down to Atlanta, Frank, and we can go for a little ride.

~Susan