Re: "Noodling" at Sessions
Noodling.
I had no idea there there were this many definitions/interpretations of the term. In the musical social circles I’ve passed through* it’s been almost universal that “noodling” means playing aimlessly, often oblivious to the jam and ignoring the others who are present. It may be just fine to do so, say, among friends; or it may be a real annoyance, as it is when the noodler is filling time while others in the jam are teaching one another about something in the previous tune, choosing the next tune, working out key, tempo, breaks, modulations, counting off, et al. It might also be mid-tune, walking all over somebody else’s break.
When you go to play in a jam you really ought to learn the etiquette of that jam or that group of people. It was sad, but I have seen good jam players pack up to leave when a full time thoughtless, noodling bull-in-a-china-shop walks in and opens a case.
* I need to get out more.
A couple years in, now, and still learning!
Ratliff F-style Country Boy
Eastman MDO-305 Octave Mandolin
Kentucky KM-272
I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.
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