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  1. Adding tunes...

    So, this year's goal of adding in some serious tunage, and the related technique required to play them, is well underway. I'm working Billy in the Low Ground and Salt Creek up to speed (topping out around 180 bpm before it all falls apart). Next up will be two more standards: Cherokee Shuffle and Blackberry Blossom. All from the Steve Kaufman book I bought from him after his Calgary workshop. Thanks again Steve!

    Meanwhile, the discussion I raised about having too many things to work on at once ...
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    Song projects
  2. Deleted

    Please delete.

    Updated Dec-29-2013 at 1:19pm by Ken Olmstead

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  3. Mandolins at NAMM

    I spent three days at NAMM paying attention to as much as possible, trying not to succumb to input overload. Discovered many things I liked and noted a lot that just seemed odd. But getting mandolin info was pretty easy. There were very few mandolins on hand. I have to admit that I skipped a few makers who have mandolin lines. So, what follows is --in alphabetical order-- an incomplete account of mandolins at NAMM.

    Tone was universally difficult to evaluate. The main floor was ...
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  4. Homer & Jethro on YouTube

    After a very long week of sad news about the passing of Butch Baldassari, an email popped into my inbox that made me smile, and I thought the only thing better than what the subject matter was, was a whole lot more of it.

    Thanks to Don Stiernberg for forwarding this newly discovered gem directly below on YouTube. The video is about 10 minutes long, and near the end is a terrific performance from Homer & Jethro. Great stuff:

    [YOUTUBE="gh8emmt6JFc"][/YOUTUBE]
    ...

    Updated Jan-25-2009 at 5:00pm by Scott Tichenor

    Categories
    General Mandolin Comments
  5. Butch Baldassari a great friend.

    I met Butch in 1996 when he had his last Workshop in Nashville. Pictures appeared in Bluegrass Unlimited with Bill Monroe, Ronnie McCoury, Roland White. We had a geat time nothing but mandolins. What a great guy and instructor. I still have all the originals from my Camcorder. Butch asked me to make a composite of the 4 days. I did and sent it to him. We hit it off great. He would ask me about musicians up in Virginia such as Earl Taylor who I knew well. What an empty feeling I have now. Losing ...
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  6. Anaheim in January

    Ahh, there's nothing like the annual lure of (no longer) Orange County Calif in January. The haze, the freeways, the concrete, the asthma attacks, NAMM.

    This year will be my first visit to the auditory and visual bombardment that is the convention of the National Association of Music Merchants. So I'll be attempting to take enough notes to post something coherent here. But maybe I'll settle for writing about how incoherent NAMM was.


    Only time will ...
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  7. Butch dealin' the tortoise shell picks

    My memory of Butch is of him selling all the kids tortoise shell picks back stage at festivals. I would lose my $20 dollar picks just like I lose my $100 dollar sunglasses, but I'm glad I was part of the covert operation.
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  8. Good-Bye, Butch

    No one likes losing a friend, and I lost one yesterday in Butch Baldassari. And it's not likely I'll ever forget where I was and how it happened.

    My family and I were at the tail end of a wonderful and much needed vacation in St. Martin in the Caribbean, just finishing our last meal together in the warmth of the sun in a small outdoor cafe with friends (both mandolin players!) we'd traveled with. It was one of the few times I've gone on vacation the past ten years without a laptop ...

    Updated Jan-12-2009 at 7:08pm by Scott Tichenor

    Categories
    General Mandolin Comments
  9. Called Up Yonder in Colorado

    Imagine a 20 X 30 room, 10 foot ceiling, hard tile floor, hard corkboard looking ceiling. No amplification of any type, echoes everywhere. 3 men with colds, 1 without. A crowd of about 30 people.

    Called Up Yonder played for the Southern Colorado Livestock Association annual meeting yesterday. We told them, "We work for a Stockman who is better known as a Shepherd." Our intent for a 10 song set of gospel songs was shortened by 1 after the 6th song when my voice pretty ...
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  10. First "paid" gig today

    In a few hours, Up Yonder will be wandering up yonder to Colorado to play our first "paid" gig. Probably gas money and a brisket dinner.

    I hope our voices can handle it. A couple of us are fighting off colds and the high harmony might be just a little bit of a stretch

    I'll update tonight.
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