The sixth meeting of the local guitar enthusiasts began with a bit of random exploration and sharing of chording employed in the play...nothing serious was attempted or accomplished, yet it was entertaining and fun... *smile*
Once our esteemed leader made his entrance, however, the humor began in earnest, with the Communications Director (moi) being satirically roasted for the delay in posting last weeks meeting notes. The excuse of being out of town to attend a Hoot (i.e. a Hootenany) of old time American Folk music (with a concommitant description of the entertaining and sometimes ribald eclectic assortment of guitarists in attendance) was only held in minor derision--as the Hoot may have been a fun and educational event (and it was!) but remained a paltry excuse for posting delays.
All such sh*t-giving aside, however, tonight's musical fare was varied and strayed from one style to the next without as much as "how do you do" to the previous style--yet within each song time was taken to talk about the specifics of the chords being used and the notes being played, with everyone joining in trying out the fingering of each of the chords. This was just fabulous! Throughout the entire evening the focus was as much of a workshop as it was a chance to jam a little with a number of very different songs and styles played--an erstwhile rendition of Tom Leher's "National Brotherhood Week" was followed on with a more modern somewhat wide-ranging jazz-ish song by Sunrise that walked through a number of scales and keys without slowing down a bit...even when he slowed it down and stepped in through it still made for some interesting (and difficult) progressions!
This bit of fascinating complexity was followed on by flamenco styled melodies from Rick, with fingerings and strumming styles that baffle the mortal mind (ok, so at least this author's mortal mind was baffled!). Never-you-mind the mythical ability to bend his wrist and to strum/pluck the strings in multiple directions at once, Rick walked us through the process, leaving us all attempting (with only a little success) to replicate his flamenco strumming technique.
During this workshop/jam session extravaganza, a variety of songs were shared, including a new instrumental piece Doug is developing, as well as several alluring original works by Jerry Ledke.
This sort of round robin switching between guitarist, style, song, and technique continued throughout the evening, and with each new song played further discussion on the specific chording and progression techniques followed.
Earlier in the evening we discussed a change in the "featured performer" scheduling, with only the last Wednesday of each month having a featured performer, and the first Wednesday of each month being more focused on sharing songs, techniques, progressions, and other information of interest.
There was a brief discussion of WAGS hosting a house concert at the Inn at Lucky Mud with regional artists and other acts of interest. Look to this web site for postings of such upcoming events!
Overall, the evening was immensely educational and gratifying, providing each person with multiple opportunities to review techniques and styles used by the other guitarists.
While this was a wonderful evening, light on structure, but replete with tips, tricks, techniques, progressions, and yes, even a bit of theory (gasp), we all have the singing strings and vocal stylings of Sunrise Fletcher to look forward to at the end of the month (Sept 27th). See y'all there!
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