Nose To The Grindstone!

Well, I'm back for my first day at the office after spending three weeks recovering from shoulder surgery. And wouldn't you just know it, there were more than 700 emails to wade through. Other than my shoulder feeling better and my being rested after my time away, nothing much has changed at Dog Food Central.

I'm looking forward even more than usual to sitting down with the fiddle and relaxing with some tunes tonight!

You Need This!

Ozarks Fiddle Music by Drew Beisswenger and Gordon McCann

This book, published by Mel Bay Publications is really something. Transcriptions of more than three hundred fiddle tunes common to the Ozarks from some eighty fiddlers, some living and some passed on. It also comes with a CD of thirty-seven of he tunes so you can hear what they sound like and what the regional style is made up of. Many of the tunes, like "Fort Smith", "Sugar in the Coffee", and "Chinky Pin" will be familiar to those of us acquainted with Ozark tunes. Many of the titles in this book, like "Around the World on a Dime" and "Hold Old Bald While I Dance" though, were new to me and, I suspect will also be new to you.

The transcriptions of tunes seem clear and accurate. My reading of standard notation is hesitant and clunky at the best of times. But I was able to get through a few of these at a sitting and they all sounded right to me. But as good as the transcriptions seem to be, the accompanying text, attributed as mostly by Mr. Beisswenger, is equally valuable. Each tune has information about where it comes from, alternate titles, and most importantly, source recordings available commercially so those, like myself who are more comfortable learning tunes by ear can find them. Reading the text is almost as entertaining as playing the tunes!

Beisswenger and McCann have done a bang up job on this book. Thanks to Mel Bay Publications for getting it out to the public. Now find a copy of it for yourself and dig in!

Score One For Medical Science

Well, it's been a little over a week since the surgery to correct my frozen shoulder and I couldn't be happier about the whole thing. I went into the hospital last Friday, came home with three holes in my shoulder and considerably less damaged tissue on Saturday and was playing the fiddle relatively pain free by Tuesday. Since then, I've been keeping up with an amazingly (for me anyway) disciplined regimen of seven times daily exercises to keep the joint loose and to increase the range of motion even further and three-a-week visits to a physical therapy clinic to get even more stretching and strengthening under a watchful eye and a strong pair of hands.

Friday evening I spent a couple of hours at The Folk School pot luck and jam. Took my fiddle along and played tunes with folks for a couple of hours. By the end of it, I was feeling better about my bowing, after nearly a year away from it. Still needs work, but by the end of Friday's session I felt a lot more in control, more relaxed, and I was able to get some rhythm into my bowing, too. So, all in all, not a bad start.

Now, I just need to spend the next couple of weeks making sure that I keep to the program and I should be good as new!

"Old Joe" And Other "C" Tunes

I spent some enjoyable time playing tunes the other night with my friend Janet. She's a terrific fiddler and probably my favorite fiddler to play with. We have the same kind of sensibility about when to play off the beat and when to play straight on the beat. It comes from both of us having spent time being taught by the late Steve Mote. Or at least, that's what we decided over a couple of beers on Saturday. Unfortunately for my opportunities for playing with her, Janet is also a young mother of two young children, which cuts into her fiddling time pretty dramatically.

While playing Saturday evening, we hit all the usual G, D, and A tunes. And we both talked about how we neither of us really play any tunes out of C. Why is that? The C scale isn't all that much different from D or G. The finger positions aren't any tougher. I just haven't concentrated on playing anything much out of that key.

So, Sunday afternoon I spent some time with "Old Joe", a tune that's always kind of intimidated me before. This time, though, I think I've got it. And it's great fun to play. It rattles along like an old motor car on a rutted dirt road.

Up next: "Melinda" in C! And once I've nailed C, no key will be safe!