Mel Bay Publications has three new instructional books that will be of interest to any of our readers who study the mandolin or fiddle.

The Mel Bay Mandolin Scales Chart is a simple 4 page folded chart which displays common and important scales using fretboard diagrams.

Major, minor, pentatonic, harmonic minor and dorian patterns are included, with examples starting on the 2nd, 3rd and 4th strings. The chart sells for $4.95.

Getting Into Jazz Mandolin by Ted Eschliman is designed for mandolinists who have an interest in exploring jazz on their chosen instrument.

Eschliman takes you through some basics on using modes and then introduces a number of fretboard patterns that can be used as a basis for the sorts of deviations required by jazz harmony.

An audio CD is included with play-along tracks to accustom the student to common jazz chord changes, and drills are provided to help develop finger strength and control, as well as fretboard knowledge and a broader tonal centers on the mandolin.

The book runs to 112 pages and sells for $19.95.

Ozarks Fiddle Music by Drew Beisswenger and Gordon McCann contains transcriptions for 308 tunes which highlight the playing of 80 influential fiddlers who play in what historians of American folk fiddling describe as the Ozark style.

Each of these fiddlers is profiled with photos and bio, with 30 especially notable players covered in some detail. An audio CD with 37 tunes (many as field recordings) helps demonstrate the nuances of this style, which is considered as a evolutionary link between old time/square dance fiddling and more modern bluegrass and contest style playing.

Ozarks Fiddle Music runs 220 pages, selling for $29.95.

All three will be available wherever Mel Bay products are sold.

Our friend Tim May has put together a new workshop/camp for guitarists, aimed at providing more personalized, higher level instruction than normally available at camps and workshops. The intention is for intermediate to advanced players to come get three days of intense, personal instruction on skills such improvising, rhythm playing, feeling the time, projection and tone. Instructors will spend time helping students develop learning and practice strategies to take home with them. They will also help students develop a working repertoire of songs in any given style.

Instructors for the workshop are Tim May, Pat Flynn, and Stefan Papasoff. You can find more information about each of these men on the Nashville Guitar Academy website.

The Nashville Guitar Academy will take place Thursday, October 23rd, 2008 through Saturday, October 25, 2008 at the Fiddle & Pick building in Pegram, TN.

Mel Bay Publications has released the latest in its FAQ book series, Fiddle Care And Setup, by Michael Hoffheimer.

This 80 page book covers the basics of proper care and maintenance for your fiddle, a well as many details about adjusting it to play and sound the way you prefer. It also looks at questions that occur when buying a fiddle, finding a repairman, and how to understand valuation for both buying and selling.

Techniques of violin construction are also presented to help you understand how it works in your hands, plus a glossary of common technical terms.

Topics include:

• essential accessories
• changing string
• adjusting the bridge
• replacing fine tuners
• stuck/slipping tuning pegs
• when to rehair your bow
• dealing with buzzes and rattles
• finding good dealers and repair people

Look for the book wherever Mel Bay’s instructional items are sold.

BluegrassCollege.org is now offering a series of free playing tips from their prestigious faculty, updated daily on the front page of their web site.

First up are two posts on warm-up tips for flatpickers from Tyler Grant and one for mandolinists from Matt Flinner. Next week tips are coming from Luke Bulla on fiddle, and Brad Talley on resonator guitar.

BluegrassCollege.org is a subscription-based online database of bluegrass music instruction. Members can join for less than $10 monthly, or purchase individual video lessons for a flat fee. Instructors include top bluegrass artists like Rob Ickes, Ron Stewart, Chris Eldridge, Jesse Cobb and many others.

Eric Schlange, who manages the very popular BanjoHangout web site, has recently launched a similar site for resonator guitar enthusiasts.

ResoHangout.com hosts an active discussion forum plus a tab archive, online video lessons, product reviews, chat rooms and myHangout home pages for registered users. There are already more than 450 users on the site since it went live earlier this month.

To celebrate the new launch, ResoHangout will be giving away a Paul Beard model Gold Tone guitar. Entries can be submitted online prior to 11/02/08 and one entry per day is permitted.

Schlange has also developed a Hangout site for fiddlers, FiddleHangout.com, and is hard at work on one for flatpickers as well. More details on that site will be announced soon.

Kenny Hall has been a notable musician in the old time music world since the release of his album, Kenny Hall and the Sweet Mills String Band in 1972. Of course, he had been playing since 1937, on mandolin, fiddle and guitar, but it wasn’t until this LP came out that music fans outside of California heard much about his music.

Hall was born blind, and educated at the California School For the Blind where music was a major part of the curriculum. Piano lessons started for Kenny when he was only 6 (in 1929) but he never really took to music until the mid-1930s when he was introduced to traditional American fiddle music, and his lifelong fascination with the music, and the string instruments which played them, was born.

The one aspect of his musicianship most remarked-upon by his peers has been his repertoire, with estimates ranging over 1,000 tunes at his command - many of them obscure, or featuring distinctive Hall twists.

A book of tunes was published by Mel Bay in 2000, Kenny Hall’s Music Book, which featured a variety of tunes from that library, along with anecdotes from Kenny about how and where he learned the tunes, and interesting insights into the community of blind musicians where he served his apprenticeship in the 1940s.

After being unavailable for a while, Mel Bay has recently re-issued the book, which is available wherever old time and bluegrass instructional materials are sold.

The book was co-authored by Vykki Mende Gray, and you can read her lengthy reminiscences about working with Kenny in a piece she published in The Old Time Herald upon the book’s initial publication.

Kenny tells his stories in the characteristic manner of that world–describing what people say rather than what they do. And he doesn’t necessarily tell the whole story at once–sometimes it takes hearing about an event several times before Kenny lets us figure out that it wasn’t as innocent as he led us to believe at first, or before aspects of the story that appear perfectly clearly to the blind story teller suddenly are revealed to the sighted listener!

And Kenny warns those of us who would like to follow in his footsteps and learn 1,100 pieces of music: “I never pushed myself to learn all those tunes. I learned ‘em slowly–havin’ fun at learning. It took me 40 years, I guess, to learn them 1,100 tunes. But I know more now, I don’t know how many, ’cause, of course, I didn’t stop learning tunes back then when he [Terry Barrett] counted ‘em.”

Kenny Hall’s Music Book runs to 284 pages and is presented in standard notation for $35.00.

With the annual IBMA World Of Bluegrass convention coming up (9/29-10/2), a number of instructional workshops have been scheduled in Nashville during that same time frame. Students of bluegrass instruments can take advantage of these opportunities during their visit, especially those who will travel some distance to Nashville for IBMA.

The week just prior to the IBMA events will see a workshop offered by FiddleStar Camps. It will run September 25-28 just outside of Nashville and will feature instruction from several renowned bluegrass artists.

This one includes 6 time National Fiddle Champion Megan B. Lynch, Lonesome River Band bassist and harmony singer Mike Anglin, Sam Bush guitarist and singer Stephen Mougin, former Sunny Mountain Boy bassist and harmony singer Kip Martin, and Lonesome River Band mandolin player and high lead singer Andy Ball. There will be formal instrument classes, jams and jam classes, Nashville field trips, band scrambles, many more activities, and tons of fun!!

Full details can be found on the FiddleStar site.

During IBMA week, both Herschel Sizemore and Roland White will offer mandolin workshops at Big Joe’s Guitarworks in Nashville. Roland’s workshop will be on October 2 running from 10:00 a.m. until 1:00 p.m., and Herschel’s on October 3 will offer two sessions, 10:00-1:00 and 2:00-4:00 p.m.

Registration to these mandolin workshops is limited to 20 students each, so interested participants are urged to contact Big Joe right away to secure a spot.

Renowned fiddle instructor Brian Wicklund and Canadian fiddle master April Verch have joined forces to bring a new instructional book/CD to market, American Fiddle Method: Canadian Fiddle Styles.

The book and CD set will introduce the student to the Canadian fiddle style. The instruction is geared toward those who are of an intermediate level and wish to expand their playing by adding this dynamic style to their repertoire. Canadian styles covered in the book include the traditions of Old Time Canadian, French Canadian, Cape Breton and Métis.

In this 80 page book and 60 minute CD, Brian and April teach the simple melodies to 18 Canadian fiddle tunes, and then go on to demonstrate variations using ornaments and bowing patterns common to Canadian fiddle styles. The instruction is presented in a clear and accessible manner, bringing these more advanced techniques within grasp for all intermediate level players.

The CD includes “play along” tracks for the students continued practice.

This instructional book/CD package is available for $24.95 directly from Brian, or you should be able to find it anywhere Mel Bay products are sold.

Homespun has released mandolin transcription books to match two recent CDs from Butch Baldassari, Mandolin Hyms and Appalachian Mandolin & Dulcimer. Each book contains complete mandolin transcriptions in both tablature and standard notation, plus a copy of the original CD.

Mandolin Hymns contains 15 popular hymns and sacred songs including I Am A Pilgrim, Amazing Grace, Simple Gifts and What A Friend We Have In Jesus.

The book offers 37 pages of mandolin transcriptions and the accompany CD has the songs performed in instrumental arrangements in a string band style with Butch on mandolin. Other players include Aubrey Haynie and Andrea Zonn on fiddle, Robert Bowlin on guitar, Stuart Duncan on banjo, and Dennis Crouch and Mike Bub on bass.

The Appalachian Mandolin book includes the CD Appalachian Mandolin & Dulcimer, which featured duets between Butch and the late dulcimer legend David Schnaufer, along with mandolin transcriptions for the 14 traditional tunes they recorded.

Fans of Appalachian fiddle music will recognize the tunes, with favorites like June Apple, Sandy River Belle, Black Mountain Rag, Flop Eared Mule, Cold Frosty Morn and 9 others included.

Our regular readers will recall that Butch has been battling a pernicious brain tumor this past year. A great many of his friends and students in the mandolin world have been very generous in their support, and picking up these two new Homespun book/CD sets would be a fine way to champion Butch and all he has contributed to our music, while you pick up some fine music and mandolin arrangements at the same time.

We are delighted to pass along that Butch is currently in a clinical trial at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, and is in good spirits according to his wife, Sinclair.

AcuTab Publications has news of several new bluegrass instructional DVDs due during the summer and fall of 2008.

Just completed shooting is a fiddle project with Mountain Heart’s Jim Van Cleve which will go into editing shortly. Jim covered a number of his own compositions (#6 Barn Dance, Nature Of The Beast, Devil’s Courthouse) plus spent considerable time describing how to add rhythmically in a band setting, and how to find solos and backup in different keys.

Due to be shot next week is a banjo DVD featuring Ron Block and a mandolin video with Sierra Hull. Both will focus on these two stellar players and their individual styles. More details about these should be forthcoming soon.

A JD Crowe banjo DVD is also scheduled to be shot later this year.

If you would like to be notified by email when these new titles are released, you can make that request on the AcuTab site.

AcuTab is also pleased to note the reissue of two popular titles that have been unavailable for some time. JD Crowe - AcuTab transcriptions includes banjo tablature for all the songs on two classic albums by JD Crowe & The New South, and Kenny Smith - Tunes and Techniques offers 3 hours with this flatpicking master on two DVDs.

For all you mandolin pickers out there, here’s an opportunity to learn from one of the best.

Jesse McReynolds is hosting a mandolin camp at his Pick Inn next month, July 11-12, 2008. The two day event begins with a reception and meal on Friday evening, followed by a jam session in the pavilion. Saturday consists of four sessions, a morning workshop, afternoon workshop, an evening concert, and a late night jam session with Jesse and students.

The workshop fee is $500, and attendance is limited. The fee does not include accommodations. Some accommodations are available at the Pick Inn, but they will be reserved on a first-come first-serve basis. There is a state park across the street, available for camping. Gallatin, TN is a short 10 minute drive away if you prefer the comforts of a hotel.

I’ll be teaching crosspicking, split-string style playing, and much more. Call my wife Joy at (615)452-7321 for more information and to make your reservation. Hope to see you there!

Last week, Brance had a wonderful story about Joel Sidney, a recent University of California at Berkeley graduate, whose honors thesis was entitled Innovation and Tradition in Bay Area Bluegrass: Historical Review and Analysis of Distinctive Regional Features.

Here’s another encouraging story about bluegrass on the college campus, this time at UCLA.

Thomas Stanton is a young banjo player, also looking at a June 2008 graduation. He has put together a group, the Bluegrass & Old-Time String Band Ensemble, as an official student band in the Ethnomusicology department where he is pursuing his degree. Stanton has been directing, arranging material, and teaching the group’s members throughout the year as an unofficial senior project, with the blessing of the department.

“The group was just started this school year, in September 2007. I basically reestablished an ensemble in the department because I really wanted to play bluegrass and effectively make use of my talents and knowledge in my senior year as an undergraduate in the Ethnomusicology department at UCLA.

I’ve been very lucky to find all of the musicians that are currently involved in the group: none of them have really played bluegrass before, and a few of them are particularly extraordinary musicians who naturally fit in the setting and are picking up the music and its feel very quickly. I still can’t believe that I was able to create this opportunity to play bluegrass at the University (I would have never thought it possible in my freshmen year), but it’s thanks to the support of my mentor in the department, Professor Anthony Seeger.”

With graduation looming, Thomas will perform in a free concert with the group on the UCLA campus on Thursday, May 29th at 7 PM in Schoenberg Hall.

More details about the group and the concert, including video clips, can be found on their web site.

J. D. Crowe and Charlie Cushman join Sonny Osborne, Alan Munde, Ned Luberecki, Bill Evans and Frank Neat to round out the teaching staff for the 8th Annual NashCamp Banjo Retreat, October 17-19th at the Hachland Hills Vineyard in Joelton, Tennessee - about 15 miles north of Nashville.

This event is hosted by noted banjo players Sonny Osborne and Bill Evans, along with Cindy Sinclair. They welcome beginning through advanced bluegrass banjo players for a weekend of small group instruction, jamming for all ability levels, a faculty concert and much more.

Evans shares a few thoughts about NashCamp…

“While folks come to learn banjo, the emphasis is also on making friends, hanging out with your banjo heros, having fun and eating lots of great food. We’ve had young and old attend each year, men and women - people from all parts of the United States and even Japan. I’m especially proud of the fact that we have a great group of women who attend each year - and that number grows with each camp. Sonny has been our guiding light with this event - his positive energy and enthusiasm along with his interest to stay involved with others who love the banjo inspires everyone around him. This camp has a great spirit. This is the camp to attend if you’d like comfortable surroundings, great food and tremendous fellowship in the company of some of the best banjo players and teachers in the world.

And with Sonny and J. D. in one place, who knows what will happen?”

Students are grouped according to ability level - from beginners with one year of playing experience to the most advanced players. Small group instruction is mixed with full group interactive sessions and the Friday night jam features some of the best Nashville musicians sitting in with students. (more…)

Our friend Dave Hollender gave us a nice report last month after Chris Thile and Punch Brothers offered a clinic at the Berklee College of Music in Boston on April 7. Dave shared some photos and a nice run down of the event.

This morning (5/5), Berklee has posted a brief account of the clinic on the news section of their web site. The story by Danielle Dreilinger (Berklee’s Office of Communications) is entitled Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes and can be read online.

Dreilinger includes a few additional photos from the clinic, plus a number of brief excerpts from the band’s interaction with the students.

Though the songs were sad, the band seemed relaxed, joking about playing so early in the morning. (The clinic started at 2:00 p.m.) Pikelny asked for the Cubs score; Thile snagged a bottle of water from an audience member.

The attitude spilled over. One fan called out, “How do you get your hair so pretty? Is that just bed head?”

As Thile started to explain, Pikelny interrupted: “You just assume that he’s asking you.”

“How do you get your hair so pretty?” Thile countered.

Pikelny folded his hands. “It’s a gift,” he said.

Was the same true of the band’s spectacularly nimble playing? Pikelny’s fingers barely seemed to move. Still, when an audience member asked about picking technique, the band members self-deprecatingly presented themselves as works in progress.

“I can’t get good tone and play fast, which is something I’m working on,” Eldridge said. “Pick angle is important and so is staying loose, but I can only do it at slow speeds for a bluegrass guy.”

Pikelny warned against letting one-upmanship damage technique. When musicians start trying to outdo each other, “you’re just going to be overplaying.”

Read the full article at berklee.edu.

Bluegrass fiddle player and teacher Brian Wicklund has a brand new website for fiddle players at FiddlePal.com. Brian is the author the best-selling fiddle books, The American Fiddle Method. He is also a member of the acoustic power trio, Brother Mule, and the founder of the on-line lesson site Bluegrass College.

The site in nicely laid out, featuring a lot of content, and promising even more to come in the future. Features include all the usual content one would expect from a musicians website, including Brian’s tour schedule, and a store with all his various recordings, books and DVDs for sale.

In addition, Brian has started a blog where he’ll be posting news and answering all your fiddle related questions. And the home page is sporting a free fiddle tune of the month feature. This month the tune is an intermediate version of Blackberry Blossom. The fiddle music for the tune is provided in standard notation via a downloadable PDF.

The site also promises the imminent availability of free lessons for both fiddle and mandolin. The lessons are scheduled for publication on the site in May (mandolin) and June (fiddle). These lessons will be designed to get you started from scratch and prepare you for further instruction.

If you’re a fiddle player, FiddlePal.com just may become one of your best friends.

When looking for a higher education in the area of bluegrass music, there are limited choices. The one I chose was South Plains College in Levelland, TX. One of the things I loved about the school was the close association of the music program with recording program.

East Tennessee State University (ETSU) has a similar program of bluegrass music studies, the Center for Appalachian Studies and Services. Beginning with the fall semester, the students at ETSU will have access to a new recording facility. Plans have been in place for the recording lab since a building on campus was vacated in 1999. Those plans are coming to completion during the 25th anniversary of the bluegrass program.

Associate professor Raymond McLain commented on the new learning opportunities this would present for the students.

From a musician stand point, it will be a good opportunity to learn in a recording environment. It is hard to learn to play the guitar with out a guitar, and it is hard to learn how to record music without a recording lab.

Plans are for one recording class to be taught this coming fall, but the University is still looking for the right person to manage the lab and teach the class (job info). And they are still working to complete the construction phase of the lab. The ceiling has been completed, the sheetrock work is underway but currently on hold so wiring can be completed. School officials predict the overall cost for construction to be somewhere between $400,000 and $500,000. These expenses have largely been paid for by funds raised via the student technology access fee.

Speaking from my own personal experience, those students who are dedicated to earning a living in and around bluegrass music will benefit greatly from this resource. I encourage them to take advantage of the opportunity to learn about the technical side of making music.

Pete Frostic, mandolinist with Old School Freight Train, has published an instructional book that he feels will benefit students of the mandolin at any level.

Mandolin Technique and Theory For All Levels is an 80 page spiral bound book written in both tablature and standard notation. It includes an audio CD that contains recordings of all the exercises and tunes covered in the book.

Pete has been teaching mandolin privately for the past ten years and carries an impressive load of 50 students. He has started a mandolin program at the University of Virginia, and at the College of William and Mary, where he also leads an Appalachian Music Ensemble.

We asked Pete to describe the book, how he came to write it, and what mandolinists can expect to find therein.

“I wanted to write this book for two reasons. First, I wanted an organized approach for my own students. I wanted them to have it all in one place and not forget what I tell them week to week. Second, I want to help people I don’t work with privately to be able to get to the ‘next level.’ Whether it’s going from beginning to playing tunes… 0r playing tunes to improvising… or improvising bluegrass to more jazz theory. I provide helpful exercises for all of these steps.

People can expect to find exercises and words of wisdom to help at all levels. The book starts at how to hold the pick and where to begin, so that is great for the novice. Many exercises are aimed at getting the player more knowledgeable about soloing. I developed what I call the ‘bluegrass scale,’ which is a great way to improvise over fiddle tunes and vocal melodies. This will help ‘parking lot pickers’ become more confident in their playing. The book also has new approaches to rhythm playing.

Lastly, the book will help advanced players. Many people have gotten to that point where they’d like to play jazz but don’t know how it applies to the mandolin. My book helps puts jazz theory on the mandolin, and breaks it down into manageable concepts.

It also includes a discussion on how to read notation, which many tab-dependent people might want.”

The book/CD set sells for $20 and can be ordered online.

This post (and photos) is a contribution from David Hollender, Professor at the Berklee College of Music in Boston. Dave has been a member of the ensemble department for several years, and teaching upright bass. He also teaches banjo for students following the Acoustic String Principal, where banjo, mandolin, acoustic guitar or fiddle players can pursue a degree at Berklee.

The Punch Brothers made a return visit to Berklee College of Music last week (4/7) when they were in Boston to play at The Museum of Fine Arts. About 150 students filled David Friend Recital Hall at Berklee to greet Chris Thile, Chris “Critter” Eldridge, Greg Garrison, Noam Pikelny, Gabe Witcher on their second visit to Berklee during the past twelve months. The acoustics and size of the room allowed the band to play completely acoustically once again. This put the detail and delicacy of the band’s sound in a setting that I wish everyone could experience. Hearing these guys’ 100% pure acoustic tone in a small room is something special.

The band opened things up right away for requests. Along with music from their albums, Punch and How To Grow A Woman From The Ground, they played unrehearsed bluegrass standards – Sittin’ On Top Of The World, Ninety-nine Years, Sled Riding – and tunes from Chris’ solo albums – Song For A Young Queen and Jessamyn’s Reel.

The students asked great questions about the compositional and creative process that went into the recent album and heard highly articulate answers that gave them a good sense of how much careful thought and preparation went into the music the band is playing these days. Other questions focused on instrumental sound and technique. It was amazing and inspiring to hear a player like Chris, who most people would say possesses about the most fluid and musical sound of any mandolin player to have lived, speak in terms that suggest that he still considers his instrumental technique to still be a work-in-progress. Noam and Critter echoed this with their thoughts about tone, volume, speed, etc.

It all added up to a concentrated dose of education and inspiration from a group that is breaking new ground and setting new standards of musicianship for bluegrass-rooted players and composers. I’d like to personally express my appreciation to Chris, Noam, Critter, Gabe and Greg for the generosity they showed by spending their free time visiting Berklee again.

        

        

Terry McGill, who plays banjo with New Jersey-based Straight Drive, has written a new banjo book, recently published by Mel Bay.

The book is Alternate Tunings for Five-string Banjo Played Bluegrass Style, and is described as the first three-finger style banjo instruction
book written specifically for the bluegrass banjoist wishing to explore alternate tunings. It is written using banjo tablature and covers G modal, Standard C, Open C, Bb, D modal, Open D and E tunings.

An audio CD is included with the book, which contains fast and slow versions of each song taught in the book. 21 songs are presented, including favorites like Cumberland Gap, Shady Grove, Kansas City Railroad Blues and Pretty Polly - each arranged in other than the familiar G tuning.

The book should be available wherever banjo instructional materials are sold.

As the International Bluegrass Music Association is at pains to remind us, bluegrass music is a truly worldwide phenomenon. Though the IBMA is based in the US, and the largest part of the membership resides here, no small part of their focus is on the furtherance of the music outside of this country.

The continued growth of the Eurpean Bluegrass Music Association is but one example of those efforts bearing fruit. As is, in a smaller way, this story we received from Sharon Lombardi in France about a recent workshop in Belgium.

This year, between 24th and 29th March 2008, the Acoustic Music International Workshop stood in Virton (Belgium) for the 23rd year.

As usual, this workshop was entirely devoted to acoustic instruments, such as guitar, fiddle, double-bass and harmonica. As far as the bluegrass part was concerned, we came close to a full bluegrass band. Not only could you attend Roberto Dalla Vecchia’s guitar workshop, Jean-Marie Redon’s banjo workshop or Jesper Rübner-Petersen’s mandolin workshop, but also the brand-new resophonic guitar workshop, taught by Henrich Novak.

Almost one hundred and thirty students came from all over Europe and even the United States and spent a week attending workshops, concerts and even jamming.

It was the seventh year that Jean-Marie Redon led the banjo workshop. It was so popular that it was full only a few days after registration had started.

The next workshop is scheduled for the first week of April 2009 and you can register from January 2009.