Blog Comments

great story.

Remember, Jeff, you can't take it with you. Besides, all of that spending you mentioned is good for the economy ... it enables others to earn their food and shelter. If it sounds like a lot of money, remember ... it's so much less expensive than boats or motorcycles!
Jim

Not sacrifice no.

The best musicians made a mark on the music. In some cases changed things for ever, in most cases changed things a little. The good musicians are at least attempting to leave a personal mark.

Being that I am not a musician, I feel no compunction to do anything original, but just to lay back in the music as it has been handed to me.

But what does this matter?--whether we impact it profoundly or not at all... Would you expect to impact the sea or the stars?

I believe we are too desensitized to apprehend the beauty and power before us, that is everywhere, but "subtle"--man's sensitivities are conditioned to not be moved by ordinary events...which are all prfound

Or is it the human artifice aspect you're more concerned with? Then, I can see your point

" We are the instruments: we assume tools and serve the music through our efforts-- no matter how "modest"--and thus serve and transform "the world" (and beyond) by virtue of our experiences. "

Well perhaps there is some truth to this. But as an engineer I have to apply significant digits, and the innacuracy that results from ignoring my impact on music is so small that, well, that it is too small to see when I take a step back and look for it.

"Music affects me. It does. The world to me is that much brighter and more wonderful for my participation in music.

At the end of the day, however, the musical world is unchanged for my participation in it. I am changed. Music - not so much. "


Jeff, these are contradictory statements. I encourage you to take a step back and look again

We are the instruments: we assume tools and serve the music through our efforts-- no matter how "modest"--and thus serve and transform "the world" (and beyond) by virtue of our experiences. It's a simple process yet shouldn't be underestimated for its profundity. "Logical positivism" does a disservice to the soul--it would have you believe that you are a but vessel devoid of value

Its funny, but yea its heard to figure out where someone is at with text alone.

Hi JeffD,
I still think it's funny that I thought you should go ahead and learn, (LOL!). You might have switched careers or hobbies and picked fruit for a living!
Rosemary

Dear Jeff,

You are a philosopher and a scholar of the mandolin.
I have just read three of your blogs and I can empathize
with all of them.

I am pretty much where you are at with the mandolin. I enjoy
the looks and sound of a mandolin. I have played it for thirty years.
I enjoy my LM-600 and Davy Stuart mandolins. I have a Mike Black
A4 mandolin on order to complement my range. I like to have
a range of mandolins to suit the genres of music I play.

The best part of playing a mandolin is the zen like moments I experience
when I am practicing something new and I get the general drift and feel of the
piece.

Thanks for your profound take in this blog.

Cheers Nic

Rosemary you are so right, the cost of not having a mandolin is gigantic.

Not to mention how stupid I would look spending four or five hours a week picking nothing.

Hi JeffD,
I just realized that you have a lot of posts on this cafe and you are well into your mandolin experience and very knowledgeable as well, so obviously I don't need to convince you to start playing!!

I appreciated your discussion about the cost to playing and had to chime in with the above thread, (and now this one). Here's another spin to your question---what is the cost of not having the mandolin in one's life?

Recently the mando brought some little miracles into my life including teaching me to sing and play at the same time which I couldn't do before. It also got me over my imagined but real fear of learning chords. So this is taking me out of myself and into bigger areas and I feel very happy that the mandolin came into my life. It brings me joy. I know that sounds corny, and there's no way around that sentiment, but it really is a great addition to my life and a soulful companion indeed!!

I look forward to reading more of your posts,
Rosemary

I use New Jersey mostly because thats where I am from, in case anyone gets their nose out of joint.

Once while traveling in Ireland, playing in pubs and on the street, I met a fellow from Sydney Australia. He was a courier, which probably doesn't happen any more. He would take different companies' documents and small packages, checked in with his own luggage, and take them to recipients all over the world, for hire. He got to travel everywhere, on other people's money.

I remember I asked him, over a beer or two, what it was like in Sydney Australia. I had romantic adventurous notions. Well his response cracked me up. He said that: "Its a lot like New Jersey, actually. You know - nothing over a couple of hundred years old, nothing you can't see in any city modern anywhere..."

Mind you, he did not as yet know where I was from. He just picked New Jersey himself! Probably says more about him than about his home town, or mine.


My hats off to anyone who composes. Its not just a skill and an art, its magical. I hope my comments were not taken as a disparagement of the activity. I am over awed by those who can compose effective tunes, and I have too much respect for it.

I don’t compose. I don’t write original tunes or songs. I suppose I could, but I don’t have any really interesting musical ideas, nothing to compare with J. P. Fraley or Astor Piazzolla, or Johann Sebastian Bach, or Georg Phillip Telemann, or Hank Williams, or Ira Louvin, or that wack job of a composer Anon.

To compose or not – that is maybe not the question. The creative process might be as deep (or deeper) “just” by playing. However, I think that we should not always compare us with the great masters, if we do, we will always end up in silence. We play to get closer to the music, to the experiences behind, to the beauty above. For me New Jersey is quite exotic, like Bergen of Norway probably is to you. And of course – our experiences are always unique. That is why we can have poetry. And I would love to hear your composing voice. I think all of us would.

For me, composing is another part of my playing. I compose and play my pieces. When I don’t compose, I don’t play either. No, it’s not Bach or Grieg, but when I play this music, people are listening to what I am sharing. That is my way to connect to this river you describe. And it makes me happier than anything. I have to compose.

As I said – to compose or not is not the question, to connect is. To connect to people, history – the beauty. And we must all find our way to this connection.

Thank you for sharing and expressing your feelings!

Thank you very much for expressing your feelings so accurately and honestly. I am so close to you in make up that we could almust be brothers. Add to all that, my sensitivity to music is so great that I can't keep a dry eye listening or performing truly beautiful music (beautiful to me, that is).

Thanks again for writing this article showing the quiet, music-loving person's side of non-performance.

It's ok to be unsure and question. I went through that for a long time with the mandolin, (should I or shouldn't I? I had to get over this hump in my mind if it was worth justifying the purchase or not), but am so happy to have made the purchase and take lessons. We all need something else in life, beyond the ordinary. A man can't live by bread alone! The truth is, we all have a need to express ourselves and be heard, and we all need something beyond the everyday life, too, and experience beautiful sounds. I find it pleasurable to hear the sweet chiming sound of the mandolin. It really makes me happy. Some people get a coffee every day (or two)--well, there's a cost to everything. What does that add up to everyday? There's a physical cost to drinking coffee everyday too. I think it's all about having priorities and striving for a balanced life. Who knows where the journey will take us? We can travel a thousand miles, but all journeys begin with one small step! Music really is a worthy investment, so I try not to see it in terms of dollars and cents. But I had to get past that way of thinking myself. I think of music as food, ie, essential. Music feeds your spirit and is an international language that goes beyond the here and now. I hope you get playing and really enjoying the whole journey. Not only do I love the sound of my mandolin, it gives me great satisfaction looking at the beauty of its construction. So curvy and I find it so much more comfortable to hold than my bulky neglected guitar!

Its true.

"The tradition in which I participate is that of countless hard working men and women who come home from a day of work that is soul draining and synthetic, and play music as a way to reconnect with my own humanity."

Bravo!

I actually spend a bit more on travel. It all depends on the car pooling. I am thinking something more than $1500 per year if I do all the driving.

Great post. Lots of good things in there.

You should know that one of the mandolins I am in love with is my Aspen II. The one to which I applied cowboy art. I bought an Aspen II after trying one at a party. I was in the market for a new mandolin, and I loved it and went right out and got one. More than never regretting it, the instrument has transcended its orginal purpose as my "second" and become my other "first".

I will never sell that mandolin.

Very interesting reading (although it would be great to have the thread link), then I clicked over to your last year's 'My Martian Neighbors'- hope you blog regularly.

I play in a contra dance band for the last 5 months and really like it the more I get used to it. The emphasis is certainly on having a good beat you can dance to. We have two mandolins but one of us usually switches to OM depending on the song. Sometimes we play together and I harmonize with the lead. Very pretty and the dancers love it.

I need to add a new item, based on a recent thread.

I am not a luthier - I don't fix, adjust, tweek, set up, or customize my instruments. I change the strings, and I wipe it down before I put it away. Everything else I pay someone to do.

Learning to do a set up is a wonderful thing. I would probably enjoy it. But there are many items on my list of things it might be fun to learn, and set ups are down the list. Right now I am learning how to make love stay. Afer that its learning to play Chinquapin Hunting in cross tuning. I will check in when I get down the list to set ups.

Ha, no, it's definitely emitting from TVs -- hard to not notice the increasing size and prominence of these in the darkened front rooms of so many homes http://www.bing.com/shopping/mitsubi...20tv&FORM=HURE

Some of that blue din might be security lights.

But I agree. You never see a television show about a bunch of people sitting around watching television. Why? Because it would be so boring nobody would watch it. No suprise, but curious that its a regular aspect of most peoples lives rarely reflected in the version of life shown us through television.

So I eliminate the middle man and have try and have a life that others would want to watch.

Sounds like our house ...although, we still have a TV (but all it gets is the local PBS channel)

When we walk around the neighborhood in the evening, I notice that most homes have that strange blue din enveloping their living rooms. That's living?...

I like how you say that ot tunes yearn for a B part - so true!

Great post! I've never really agreed with the "good enough" reason for getting a better instrument. I think it's all about how much you play and how serious you are about playing. And of course what you can afford. I bought a great mandolin because I considered the mandolin be my main instrument, and that I wanted to keep on playing it, and playing it a lot. I still don't think I play well, but I play a lot, so I need a good instrument, regardless of skills.

Well said, sir.

Like this. Well stated, as I happen to be in a similar mindset.

I'm with Jim here. In our contradance pick up nights, if there is one mandolin already (and there usually is), I'll play something else. I think one is adequate.

My Dad had a Martin concert ukulele that he treasured. He would spend as much time playing it as he did wiping it off and putting it lovingly back in its case.

He wouldn't let us kids touch his ukulele, or even open the case, because we were "not quite old enough". Same with his fly rods. He demanded respect for these inanimate objects, and a reverence for their history and stories, that in part explains my addiction to the mandolin.

Very very much enjoyed. My father, an old guy when I last knew him, would've really liked it, as did I.

FWIW, Dad was a stamp collector, and once a year, his stamp club had their annual exhibition. The last thing he prepared was a collection of postcards depicting things of his childhood in Fort Erie, Ontario, Canada. He titled it "Where I Be From".

Excellent writing, Jeff. You have some very valuable perspective here.

Fantastic article - just realized that I must be an old guy too.

Nice post.

I would have loved to have been there with my Morris A5 for those 150 minutes! Thanks for the wonderful article.

Reading through your blog i was reminded of an interview with the English folk guitarist, Martin Carthy.

The gist of the thing is that he was asked what he thought of his development as a musician, in reply he said that as he has grown older he has learned to have more respect for the essential beauty of the traditional tunes and melodies he plays.

He pointed to his early recordings, and shaking his head, lamented the profusion of ornamentation to which he treated each tune,and said that it was this was a young man's mistake to place technique/virtuosity above the tune its self.

Now days he said that he much is much humbler with respect for the tunes saying that he now realises the power and beauty such music must have to endure as long as it has and that now his approach is to strip back the superfluous in an effort to allow the tunes essential beauty to emerge.

One thing I have learned about contra-dancers - they are not listening to the music the way concert attendees might. Musicality and dancability overlap, but are not identical. How ever beautiful the tune is, there needs to be that emphasis at the end of each playing that reminds everyone to start over with the next couple. And the B part needs to be as long as the A part, or twice as long and only play it once, and no speed changes for musical drama, or any other reason, etc., etc.

I tend to love those tunes the best, that won't allow for alternative notes, because they just intrude on perfection.

In our band we have a running argument about speed. Some tunes I just can't stand playing fast because the melodies can't breath corectly. La Bastringue comes to mind. Or the very sophisticated Swinging on a Gate. Other tunes want to be pushed until they explode into another dimension. Pays de' Haut is a good example.

Everyone disagrees of course, which keeps us all on our toes.

I thought i was the only one played Kitchen Girl on mandolin. I have a very special regard for playing a group of repetitive mixolydian tunes that steam forward at a mile a minute. Sandy Boys, Cluck Old Hen. Those two sound so much like a boogie by John Lee Hooker. Kitchen Girl seems to be the most complex melody of this well-defined mixolydian genre. You may think this is heresy, but try playing the A part as if it was the riff of a 12 bar delta blues, start in D, repeat in G, back to D, then in A.

good writing. sound like the start of a book about old time music in the year 2009.

I'm of a different persuasion than you. I vastly prefer a small group, no more than 3 or 4 people on mandolin, fiddle, bass, and...either guitar or concertina. That way, we get to be as musical as we can, and not feel like hoboes jumping on a freight train that keeps moving whether we make it or not.

Theres a lot of them.

I don't know where the tune comes from, but Wild Rose of the Mountain comes to mind as a very good example. There is not one note of that tune whose alteration would improve the tune. It aught to be a Class D Felony to play that tune fast.

Seneca Square Dance is an example of a very simple straight ahead tune whose A part yearns for its B part.

Hunting the Buffalo is another.

I am trying to think of tunes that most folks would be familiar with.

Here is another. Over the Waterfall. It starts out kind of like nothingburger tune, till you get that suprise C chord in the last phrase of the A part. Because of that the B part makes so much sense you want to go back and see what just happened.

Nice post - I wonder what would be a good example of a Southern Appalachian tune you are thinking of?

Now that's a contradance orchestra more than a band, I'd say. Way out in the vast expanses of the midwest on the Midwest Coast of the U.S. along the banks of the Mississippi there's never that many instruments gather for a contra or barn dance. We're lucky to have a 10th of that many musicians show! I should move to Vermont or Oneonta, NY where there's more musicians per block than we have per 100 square miles! Good reading.