BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: RWilhelm
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 11:59 AM

My wife and I have been performing together for about 12 years. If we ever figure out how to fuse jug band and ska our son may join us.

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 11:44 AM

Recently met up (after 40+ years in some cases) with my paternal cousins,of which I am the youngest (by a month). 8 of us survive out of 9. Discovered one at 67 is wearing a beard and pony tail and cowboy boots, is heavily into C&W and goes line dancing 3 times a week!
Don't think I'll be joining him!
RtS

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: pavane
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 11:38 AM

Sadly, although being surrounded by all kinds of music and dance since birth, none of our 4 kids have shown any inclination to sing with us. Two have tried learning instruments, my daughter has dabbled with Clog and Morris dance, but they all have other hobbies which are more interesting to them. A shame because my younger two (Daughter #1 and son #3) both have good voices, and on one occasion did sing a Welsh song at a club. Daughter is into horse riding (Gymkhana/mounted games) and all 3 sons are more into playing games on computers. We have to get by as a duo on the few occasions that we perform nowadays.

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: clansfolk
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 09:54 AM

We 3 do - Me, Eileen & son Simon have played together as Clansfolk for 10 years now - mainly at the local clubs/events/Festivals and the Falcon where the "clan" first performed, nowadays individual pressures of other groups and workloads mean that has become less over the last couple of years - but we still enjoy singing and playing together whether in public or just for fun.

Back in the 50's I sang with my two brothers folk and sea shanties (I was the youngest and they needed someone to sing high harmony!) and now whenever we get together we end up singing some of those "old" songs. Both my Father and Grandfather sang in groups and solo and I grew up with the sounds of music and families singing.

Singing with family is great fun - the voices always seem to fit together well and there's that intuition and natural timing that comes with the genes!!!

Pete

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Escamillo
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 06:14 AM

As some of you may know, my main musical activity is as a tenor at the Wagnerian Association Choir in Buenos Aires, plus some traditionals and spirituals as soloist (which brought me to this wonderful place). I tried to make music with my family, but my wife silently flew to the bathroom, one of my sons got a phone call, the others escaped to the street, and Giménez (dog officer) buried itself under its blanket. Neighbours shut doors and windows too, and the experience was rather lonely. I think I should try the bagpipe or similar.

Un abrazo - Andrés

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: BlueJay
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 03:31 AM

Well, since it's been refreshed, I will brag a little. Since my last post on this thread, we've added a really good female vocalist, Kris Nayert, and have played quite a few times locally, here in southern Colorado. As a result of our last gig- an artsy fartsy in the parksy thing, a blues club in a slightly larger city called us and booked us for a real paying gig in September. Wierd thing is, we don't even play any blues songs.

No matter. They seem to be willing to give us 350 bucks to play in their club. I think lots of the audience will be surprised, because theyknow me as a nurse, not as a musician.

But to me, the cool thing is related to this thread title. I am playing music with family: my daughter and son-in-law, as well as with a dear friend, (Kris). And we seem to be achieving some measure of success, at least in southern Colorado. Thanks, BlueJay

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: wysiwyg
Date: 24 Jul 01 - 02:35 AM

refresh

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Midchuck
Date: 12 May 01 - 08:09 AM

Interesting thoughts about performing with one's S. O. It hasn't been a problem for us for some years. A while ago, I finally admitted to myself that Kris just plain had a better ear than I do, so if we disagree, she's almost certainly right. So when we disagree on how to do a song, I fuss for a little while, then shut up and do it her way.

No, ladies, I don't have any unattached brothers. And the above applies only to music, in any event.

Peter.

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Luke
Date: 12 May 01 - 06:47 AM

I grew up singing with my 3 older brothers. Barbershop. Now i perform with my stepdaughter Chloe. It seems like the most right music I make.

Luke

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: FrankieB
Date: 12 May 01 - 04:34 AM

...and I accidentally hit submit before I finished that last thought, but I suppose that more or less covers it.

Yes, this is an interesting discussion. Thanks.

FrankieB

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: FrankieB
Date: 12 May 01 - 04:32 AM

Kat--

I think you put your finger on it-- two strong and stubborn personalities, and I guess we are close enough that we feel we can snipe at each other's mistakes rather than diplomatically holding our tongues. The instrumental side of things isn't too much of a problem-- he plays mandolin or tenor banjo and I accompany him on guitar. Singing is harder. When we try to give each other "constructive" criticism about phrasing, about harmonies, or just about anything else, we both have the bad habit of taking it as some kind of personal attack-- which usually ends in one or the other of us putting our instrument down and going away. The suggestion may be taken on board later, though-- somewhat sheepishly.

I sing with a band at the moment-- five women and we are all close friends--and we somehow have the knack of working together democratically and with a minimum of arguments.

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: katlaughing
Date: 12 May 01 - 12:22 AM

FrankieB, I've never performed with my SO because he just doesn't do music, except as an avid listener. I grew up singing with my parents and sisters and, sometimes my brother. At those times, I think, because we learned it from birth, there was never a problem about getting along.

Over the past 20 odd years, though, I've also promoted and performed with my brother, who is a classical composer (tempermental, too!) It has not been easy. There is a lot of ego involved, both for him as the composer and me, as the performer and person who knows a lot more about marketing than he ever will!

For us, it came down to our love of the music itself being the most important thing. Second it was that I deferred to him, as it was his original music; only he, at the time, knew the way it was supposed to sound and I had to work with that.

We worked with two other singers, at different times, which wound up being really interesting. One was professionally trained and made her living giving voice lessons and performing. She felt the same way I did about the music and followed the composer's lead.

The other singer was mostly self-taught like me, only she'd been in choruses and had some formal training in school, while I'd been in orchestra and not trained my voice as much. When we were rehearsing she kept getting a certain song's phrasing wrong. My brother was trying to be very diplomatic about it. I finally lost my temper and told her off, stomped off of the stage and sat down in one of the seats. After some coaxing form my brother, she and I talked it out. She finally understood the phrasing and we got it right. She and I had been best friends before that. After, we grew even closer and attributed some of that to our "having it out."

My SO sometimes knows everything!**BG** So, we get into it. We usually agree to disagree and end up assuring one another that we know more than the other. This is not just about music, but many things in general. We are both strong personalities and knowledgable in some things, so...we have opinions!

The best advice I could say from those various experiences is the love of the music making the difference. What is it that sets you two off? The interpretation? Who does harmony and does lead? If you can share a bit more with us, I'll bet there are others here who will be of more help than me. You've posed an interesting question, I think, one worthy of more discussion. Thanks,

kat

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Troll
Date: 11 May 01 - 08:18 PM

Memsahib and I have performed together since before we even started dating (some 20 years ago) and our son Martin has performed with us since he was 5.
In fact, Martin is my favorite partner. We always seem to know what the other is going to do. We are in 3 different bands together and the raport is always there.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: FrankieB
Date: 11 May 01 - 04:53 PM

There are two things my husband and I are almost guaranteed to fall out over-- those are my driving and our attempts to play music together. Music is what brought us together-- we met at a session we both regularly attended and I found out later that all the soppy love songs he used to trot out were for me... aw...

We share a love of anything Celtic or Old Time or Bluegrass-- and ideally would like to do it together in a band. But whenever we play together, we become Mr. and Mrs. Bickerson. So does anybody who does perform with spouse have any advice on how to do so successfully?

FrankieB

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Biskit
Date: 11 May 01 - 04:52 PM

My three sisters and I used to sing together in special events at church, We musta sounded pretty good,..they kept havin' us back. ~Biskit~

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: katlaughing
Date: 11 May 01 - 04:37 PM

Kristi! Nice to hear from you and to hear how Upsala is doing!

Welcome to the Mudcat, Beth/folkemer and Pdumu.

Nice to hear from so many on this. Nothing prettier than blending voices, eh?! And, instruments, too!

kat

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: GUEST,Pdubu
Date: 11 May 01 - 02:31 AM

My wife and her sister play fiddle, Wife's other sister and I play mandolin, Wife's brothers play banjo and guitar, Nephew plays guitar and we all take turns on the bass. All sing, pretty good harmony. There's nothing like it.

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: GUEST,Kristi
Date: 10 May 01 - 10:40 PM

Our group is five friends that go back for over 25 years. I listened for about five years and decided to play along about five years ago and joined the band Upsala when it began. We also play with Andy's daughter and she recently opened up for Upsala, with me singing harmonies with her, her dad and best friend backing up. Our 6 year old considers the whole band family and keeps threatening to get up on stage with us. She remembers the big stage at White Springs, Florida and fully intends to perform there with us this year(so if you are at the Florida Folk Festival this year on Friday afternoon, you can see Drew's debut with the band). Playing with the family is one ofthe best parts of music to me. Kristi

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: bfolkemer
Date: 10 May 01 - 10:23 PM

My husband, our elder son (age 16) and our daughter (14) have been joining with friends to perform and lead music for the past two summer at "Candlelight at Christ Church: Songs and Stories of a Civil War Hospital." This year our younger son (age 11) is going to join us, singing and playing lap dulcimer on 'Old Dan Tucker." I'm hoping that he'll get more involved as time goes by. The eldest 4 of us and friends also did traditional stuff as a segment of this year's local "First Night:" celebration. We're also looking into going to some local open mic sessions, to do Am. and British Isles traditional music. It's my heritage an in my blood.

For years I've sung in my husband's "Schola Cantorum of Gettysburg" choir. Last fall the older boy joined. It really is a great thing to make music together.

Beth

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: GUEST,emily-o
Date: 10 May 01 - 05:44 PM

there were green alligators, and long necked geese...oh, gee, thank you so much, now i'm gonna be singing that for three weeks...it's the most contagious song in the world, i swaer...one tiny mention of unicorns or noah's ark or anything vaguely related and i start singing it again...green alligators, and long necked geese, humpy backed camels and some chimpanzees...

hmm...perform together, no, but on the rare occasion that we're both at home an not both insanely busy at the same time, dad and me do sing together. sometimes when he has a gig at the yellow canoe or something, i come see him, but he has this weird habit of always having gigs on the nights i have shows, or big rehearsals...silly goon.

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Jack The Lad
Date: 10 May 01 - 04:11 PM

We don't actually perform together as a family- but run our folk festival together. Me- producer/director wife- director/producer daughter- office staff and t-shirt marketing son-in-law- security older son- site electrician younger son stalls and work detail grandaughter (four months) center of attraction. Jack The Lad

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Ruthie A
Date: 10 May 01 - 03:14 PM

Me Da sings and plays guitar. I sing and play flute, fiddle and piano. We have some interesting combinations on the go, especially when he finds a double bass and I can blackmail an innocent passer-by into giving me a bassoon... My mother and sibling run off and pretend not to know us. Hehehe.

Ruthie

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: tar_heel
Date: 10 May 01 - 09:31 AM

i performed with my mom and dad when i was 12 years old as THE HEMRICK FAMILY SINGERS!i played the $12.00guitar i got for christmas,and we sang the old CHUCK WAGON GANG,gospel songs...we did this until i grew up ,got married and left home....then for about 32 years my guitar stayed in a closet somewhere....one day in MAY of 1992,i got out my guitar,began playing and singing the old carter family song,"bury me 'neath the willow",and then my wife started singing with me,then my daughter came over and joined in with us...and the rest is history...A REVIVAL OF THE HEMRICK FAMILY SINGERS ,WAS BORN!...my son now plays and sings with us too! you can get one of our cd's(18 old-time/bluegrass songs) $12.00,plus $3.00 s&h total=$15.00 HEMRICK FAMILY SINGERS...390 college street...rural hall,n.c. 27045...... regards.. chuck hemrick...aka TAR_HEEL

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: John P
Date: 10 May 01 - 08:11 AM

My wife Anna and I met when she joined an amateur band I was part of. We left to go pro as a duo (Telynor) and have been performing together for 18 years now. One advantage is that we tend to have the same social calendar, so date conflicts don't happen much. A disadvantage is that when we go on tour there isn't anyone left at home to take care of the cats, so we have to hire someone. We had to slowly learn the hard way to keep marital discord out of the music, and musical disagreements out of the marraige.

John Peekstok

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: KingBrilliant
Date: 10 May 01 - 06:36 AM

Hammerite (10 - daughter) & I (38 - mother) sing together. I play guitar (almost) and she is currently drumming (djembe). We go to singarounds & pub sessions etc & anywhere else we think we can get away with it (including walking through town the other day [what were we thinking of?]).
Our voices are quite similar & work really well together - but do we ever have artistic differences sometimes!!! Neither of us can stand being criticised, but both of us feel the need to express our critisisms.
She's just starting to do ad-hoc harmonies which is lovely, and the more we sing together the better we sound. She's very good at thinking up new ways to do things, and has pretty good judgement (she's always had more sense than me).
Hamm & I are taking singing lessons together now (we've had 4 lessons so far). That is helping a lot & is doing our confidence no end of good.
Last year my dad started singing at singarounds & so we've had a few 3-generation collaborations. Sadly not as many as we'd like, because we don't sing together regularly enough to get really properly integrated. Dad's style is quite different from ours & our voices tend to fight a bit at the moment. Fat B****rd's post has filled me with good intentions again though, & so I resolve here & now to make more time to sing with Dad. Unfortunately he has decided that he is not by nature a performer and has backed off from the singarounds a bit. It's a real shame because he sings in a very traditional style that harks back to his youth in a rural part of Berkshire, and I love listening to it.
It is wonderful fun to sing with family, especially when the voices are similar - and I hope that Hamm & I will always sing together (as well as solo).
It seems to embarasss the hell out of some family members though. My brother & wife & kids can not even bring themselves to look at us when Dad & Hamm & I sing at family occasions. They don't mind themselves singing along to pop songs on their CD-walkmans, but they sat stony-faced when we sang some home-brewed trad.
Hmph!

Kris

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 10 May 01 - 05:53 AM

I was brought up in a family that always sang at parties, both my parents had lots of siblings and I had lots of cousins so my imperfections were masked in the crowd and I learned a lot of songs.
I still have some reel-to-reel tapes of me singing to the pianola with my parents that I'm offering the Government as the ultimate deterrent to scare off invaders.
Herself is even more modest about her singing than I am (and I have a lot to be modest about!) and doesn't even join in when I'm making a fool of myself in a Greek taverna,(usually her cue to decide to go to bed!) though we sing together a lot in the car. Her participation in Greek dancing, however,is much in demand whereas I have thio podia aristera (but at least I've never danced on the bar top as I often reminder her).
R-ZtS

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: fat B****rd
Date: 10 May 01 - 03:25 AM

I would advise anybody who has the slightest urge to sing/play music with family to do so. My late father and I only ever sang together once (Goodnight Irene). Recently my mother gave me a box of my father's old cassettes. On one of them he'd recorded himself singing at their Golden wedding party. It was "their tune" "Let the rest of the world go by". It broke my heart that I'd never taken the trouble to get him to join in with me when I was much younger. If you have the chance do it, no matter what the content or occasion.

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: wysiwyg
Date: 09 May 01 - 09:16 PM

Great thread. More please!

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Melani
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 10:16 PM

I keep asking my daughter to sing with me, but she prefers to pretend we don't know each other.

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Bill in Alabama
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 09:33 PM

As I have said in the Mudcat resources, I had the privilege of performing with my wife, daughter, son, and, eventually, son-in-law, for nearly twenty years as a weekend road band, averaging 40-45 weekends a year. We worked regularly and widely, and created some fantastic memories before retiring the group in 1995. Before that, I worked professionally with my brother; after the retirement, Anne (wife) and I began performing as a duo. I enjoy working with other musicians, but there's something really special about family harmony. We still get together once a year for the big Homecoming at the Museum of Appalachia in October, where Anne and I work Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, and Sunday, and son & daughter join us for a family show on Saturday.

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: GUEST
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 09:01 PM

You mean you've had that site for a while and were just waiting for the right time to spring it? Tooooo much!,br. Memsahib and I have performed together for about 20 years. When Maritn was two he broke up the band we were in by escaping the baby sitter and coming up on stage to sing. He knew all our songs. When he was 4 1/2, he started playing a little fiddle and by the time he was 9, he was the full-time fiddler and I switched to mandolin.
At 13, when we formed the klezmer band, Memsahib went to singer and front-person, I went to tenor banjo and guitar and Martin stayed with fiddle. Thats the situation today except that he and I also do Irish music and he plays bass in a 20's&30's danceband called Stardust where I am the vocalist and guitarist.
We all do other stuff musically as well but this is the extent of the family music.

troll

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: catspaw49
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 08:00 PM

I have no idea Amos....just doing some searching and surfing one time and that popped up. I tell you what was really scary was yesterday!!! I tripped onto a Slim Whitman Fan Page........completely bizarre!

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Amos
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 07:49 PM

Spaw, that's whacky!! It's an Arabic oud or whatever its called, electrified, being played just the way you would pick it up an an AM channel on the cheap side of Rabat or Tangiers, but the words are in Swedish!!! Wodda crackup. What I want to know is, how the hell did you trip across that????

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: bigchuck
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 07:16 PM

Midchuck's scurrilous post notwithstanding, I perform with my family when I can, and I greatly enjoy it. It gets harder as they are doing pretty carefully arranged stuff now, and I'm definitely more of a "wing-it" kind of guy or maybe just lazy. Perhaps I can spend my declining years (no commentary needed here, Peter) doing backup guitar for the Wicked Children.
Sandy

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Jeri
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 12:26 PM

They originally adopted me as a cat toy. ;-)

Seriously, I don't have any biological family left. I sure have a great adoptive one, though!

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: GUEST,JohnB
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 12:26 PM

I perform with my wife and a few, 1 to 6 friends. We are all consenting adults after all, so it's not illegal. There again, we do do it in public too, we have never once been arrested though.

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Bat Goddess
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 12:22 PM

Curmudgeon and I perform together, sometimes just the two of us, mostly with The Great Bay Company and sometimes with Jeri, who is family even if she's not related to us.

Bat Goddess

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: BlueJay
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 12:04 PM

Spaw, that's a riot! Some people obviously have way too much time on their hands. You have to admit, though, it is catchy. My wife and daughter walked in the front door as this piece of work was ending, and I was forced to play it again. Where do you find this stuff, Spaw?

Back to the subject at hand: I'm lucky enough to be playing with my daughter, (flute), and son-in-law, (guitar and mando). I've ended up playing bass, which is really kind of fun after just playing guitar all these years.

It doesn't even matter to me what style of music we play. Playing with family members is the greatest. We have a blast whether it's at home or at the local art gallery. Annie and David played a restaurant last week, but I had to work. They said they really missed the bass, but people were still enthusiastic about the music. You don't see guitar and flute that often in rural Colorado.

Thanks for a cool thread, Kat! BlueJay

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: GUEST,Miss Metronome on the road
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 11:21 AM

Way too funny Catspaw. I figure they wrote that song for their dear auntie who knits those hats and gives them out to all the family members as Christmas gifts every year.

Little BonAmie

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Pseudolus
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 11:17 AM

One of the places I play regularly is O'Friel's Irish Pub in Wilmington Delaware. It's the most "kid-friendly" place I play so whenever I'm booked for a weekend, one of the nights my kids will come by. My oldest helps me set up. She knows where all the cables go and setting up, although not a lot faster, is a lot more fun. My youngest likes the Unicorn Song and knows all of the motions to it so when the time comes (I only play it when requested or when my daughter is there!!), I get her up on stage to "help out". She loves it. One night after I joked about paying her for every person in the bar who joined in with her, she got aroung $15 in tips!!

The other family event is this. My Dad is in a nursing home and every Christmas we go to the home and sing. all my dad's brothers and sisters and his kids (my brothers and sisters) are there. It's one of the highlights of the season for me.

Other that that, I usually go solo..... :(

Frank

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: katlaughing
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 11:14 AM

Interesting FX's, Spaw! Wow! I even liked the music, but the video or whatever it is, is a little demented. I was doing okay with it until they came up with a tube of I don't-know-what-comes-in-yellow-tubes and made like they were putting it on a something that looked like a chunk of pork...ewww!

Did enjoy the music, though...I like ethnic stuff like that.

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Lady McMoo
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 11:13 AM

Hey 'Spaw that's the best smile I've had all week!

mcmoo

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: catspaw49
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 11:02 AM

Say folks, Here's an interesting family band.........or something.

Wait for it to load..........Man, its amazing the stuff on the net!!! Like, who the hell would bother doing this???........whatever it is..............and I have no idea...............

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: catspaw49
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 10:42 AM

Well Bonnie, you could go for Dancing Bear.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: GUEST,Miss Metronome on the road
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 10:26 AM

I've observed families performing together and I would say I am missing out on something magical.
Guess I'll have to seek a musical mate.
Oy, I've really limiting the pickings now - a musical mate who likes canoeing in the wilderness.

Little Neo

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Kim C
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 09:21 AM

It's just me and Mister.

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Lady McMoo
Date: 09 Mar 01 - 08:54 AM

I sometimes perform with Lady McMoo but not as much as I'd like to because she's nervous about doing it in public so I perform more often now with a female friend nearby who's a professional.

mcmoo

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Sorcha
Date: 08 Mar 01 - 08:49 PM

I guess the answer is, once in a great while. Hubby plays (?) bodhran with us when his schedule permits, and he could sing if he would learn the words........sadly, his schedule seldom permits. Daughter Kate can SING, but even more seldom than Himself will she actually sing with or for us......(she's 16 after all, and Family is beneath her just now.....)

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: wysiwyg
Date: 08 Mar 01 - 07:20 PM

LOL Wes!

My husband (known here as Hardiman the Fiddler) and I are the usual lead members of a group that has various other members at various times, including our daughter when she's available to sing with me. We have an old-timey sound, although executed somewhat differently than you might expect-- different instrumentation, etc.

I play autoharp (electric, chordally) and he fiddles and mandolineates, as well as providing some banjification. Often in the lineup there will be our friend Fast Fingers Steve Brown, who used to play guitar in various styles quite a bit but now just jams with us, Mike Vetter on guitar, his dad Ed on tenor banjo or tenor guitar, and now we also have Francis who plays electric guitar in a kind of bluegrass mandolin fashion. Young David Allen used to help with rhythm and was learning some fiddle, but puberty seems to have taken him from us.

Various others sit in at various times.

We play for free, for the experience and fun, at local community events and nursing homes, and some of the gang backs me up on Saturday nights for the good old hymns at church, for what has come to be called our "Come as You Are" communion service.

We are known as the Good News-Goodtime Band, and our music is usually the sort that lifts one up, cheers the heart, sets toes tapping. It is not exclusively gospel music, though there is a good bit of that in our set list usually. But there are also blues, traditional folk, and stuff you'd find in Rise Up Singing.

And now Hardi is teaching the others to strum along on material from the Fiddler's Fake Book. He and I, in fact, have a little gig planned at a local nursing home for St. Patrick's, to do some fiddle tunes for them with autoharp backup.

Our main difference though is that we do not see ourselves at all as concert performers-- we are songleaders. Actually, the bulk of our band is the people you'd usually think of as the audience, and we have boxes full of rhythm instruments we pass out that people will play, if they don't care to sing.

In that vein, Hardiman and I just started a new venture with a local flea market that is changing over to be a used bookstore with musical instruments and strings, etc. for sale. They sell nearly at cost, to get people started.

We dropped in over there a few weeks ago with axes and songbooks at the ready and set up an impromptu jam, to show the owner what we had in mind, with the teens that were hanging around trying out guitars-- they were really good players, and we ended up doing most of the stretching. Another local college prof turned up as well, who I have been wanting to play with since running into him at a coffeehouse that just started including music-- he is very shy, but fell into our little jam and revealed a WONDERFUL bluesy lovesong ballad he'd made up, and we all played like bandits.

This was most excellent because this is a nearly all-white area, and the prof is a new guy to the area brought in to work with and support the African American students that come here for the teacher ed program and find, to their dismay, that racism of the old-fashioned sort is all too alive and well here on the streets of our pretty little town. I've done some diversity work myself, and I'd been wanting to hook up with him--it was a good contact to make. But more importantly he found out there were a couple of white folk here who have half a clue about being themselves when a black man walks into a place. We hope he will start jamming with us more and more.

Right now I am extracting some basic folk lyrics off the DT for songsheets to start a monthly players' jam there, which I will lead and Hardi will help when he can. The owner is heavily into boy scouting, so there will be that as well. No one has taught these boys any camp songs yet-- they are all too poor for uniforms, much less camp, and their leader professes to be nonmusical. (Hah!) But they are willing to let me practice on them, and I am looking forward to it. The rest of our group will join in, or not-- it's pretty fluid, usually, with us, unless we have a big event to rehearse for.

~S~

Subject: RE: BS: How Many of Us Perform With Family?
From: Wesley S
Date: 08 Mar 01 - 05:52 PM

Brendan hasn't quite grasped the concept of harmony yet. So he always sings lead.