It's been many years since I partipated in an open acoustic-instrument jam, and in fact I've *never* been in on a regularly-scheduled meeting like so many of you enjoy.

My memories of the very loose, one-up jams that I recall from the "sixties" (actually about 66-72) do not include a constant conflict between pickers and singers. I considered myself able to do both, and figured everyone else did too, to different extents. (Now I consider myself a much better singer than instrumentalist, since my guitar playng is limited to a fairly narrow spectrum of styles, while I can sing pretty decently on a lot of stuff I couldn't possibly play.)

A very clear memory that just came back to me was a comment from a non-singing instumentalist type, who told me the first time we met (after playing for hours) "I really enjoyed playing with you, because you're willng to keep playing the same thing over for a while; some of these [so-and-so's] wanna sing two-three verses, then stop and start something else just when I'm starting to get into it." (Or words to that effect -- I remember it *fairly* clearly, because he was making such an interesting point, but of course not exact words.)

Is that part of the conflict you guys find between players and songsters -- that the singers want to quit and start another tune when the pickers are just starting to groove? A simple solution that I always liked was to alternate singing a verse and playing a verse, or even to have each individual take a verse (one sung followed by *several* played, one each by each instrument that can appropriately solo, before cycling back to a singer for another sung verse).