On second thought...

After talking it over with the Swannanoa staff and re-reading the "Skill Levels" section of the Celtic Week catalog, I decided to change my afternoon class schedule from Intro to Celtic Fiddle to Intermediate Irish Fiddle (with Liz Knowles). According to a couple of folks at the Charlottesville session who had Liz last year, I am sufficiently experienced to handle the material in her class.

My favorite!

June is here once again and it's time for the Potomac Celtic Festival.

This event is centered on traditional music, poetry, and storytelling, rather than athletics and mundane/prosaic Celtic rock, the way the Richmond Scottish Games tend to.

Since 1997, I have attended this festival most years and look forward to it once again this time around. Sessioneers receive participant (close!) parking passes, free admission and two free beers for playing in either session, which are held on Saturday from 2-6pm and Sunday from 1-4pm.

Gathering pace

Sunday was a day of music for me.

It began with an open house at the Blue Ridge Irish Music School (BRIMS) in Charlottesville. Their ensemble performed for about an hour, incorporating instrumentals, vocals, and dance. This group has a lot of talented young folks and I really enjoyed myself. Afterwards, I chatted with the director. We agreed to create reciprocal links (with Richmond Folk Music) and to coordinate performer gigs, places to stay, etc.

After I left BRIMS, I drove to the pedestrian mall in Charlottesville and walked around for an hour or so, taking in the strollers, buskers, cafes, etc. I stopped in a couple of bookstores and picked up some used titles on Celtic music and chess. I came very close to purchasing an autographed set of Joseph Campbell's monumental, multi-volume Historical Atlas of World Mythology, but decided against it.

From 3:00-6:00pm, I attended the weekly session at The Shebeen, where I played more tunes than previously:

Captain Campbell, South Georgia Whaling Song, Connaughtman's Rambles, Kesh Jig, Road to Lisdoonvarna, Skye Boat Song, Mary Young and Fair, My Darling Asleep, Full Rigged Ship, Soldier's Joy, Red Haired Boy, Lochanside, Toss the Feathers, Harvest Home, Athole Highlanders, Cock of the North, Roslyn Castle, and Crossing to Ireland.

I was surprised and somewhat unnerved to receive applause from folks in the pub, twice, following Mary Young and Fair and Roslyn Castle. I am glad they liked the tunes, though. One regular sessioneer who plays the hammered dulcimer told me that I had a nice sound. As gratified as I was at her comment, I give full credit to a really high quality instrument and bow, rather than my novice technique.

At the end of the session, I followed a new acquaintance, Bernard, to a nearby contra dance in the countryside northwest of Charlottesville. When we arrived, he instructed me to follow him in through the back entrance of the building...the one used by musicians. I protested that I wasn't experienced enough to play at a dance, but Bern told me to be quiet and take a seat. I stayed only about 45 minutes, because I had pets to feed at home, but did manage to play four tunes before I left.

The title of this post was lifted from the Relativity CD by the same name. Johnny Cunningham is my all-time-favorite fiddler and he was a member of that band.

Doggone fiddle

A humorous observation: when I first began playing last year, my pets ran in terror if they saw me reaching for the fiddle case. They went to the furthest corners of the house until I was finished playing and then returned warily. These days, all three dogs routinely sleep at my feet while I practice. Even Sasha, a very high-strung and nervous little kitty, has stopped bolting at the sight of me putting bow to string. I must be doing something right, or perhaps they've all gone deaf (smile).

Bowing with the stars

I spent one and a half hours this evening playing my fiddle while sitting outside on my deck. It was dark and I could just see the outline of the trees around the house, moving lightly with the wind. It was an interesting experience to fiddle in the dark, relying on my fingers' memory. As I played tune after tune, I enjoyed the evening breeze and wondered how many of my ancestors had sat outdoors in the evening doing this very thing. At one point, I happened to glance up at the clear night sky. There above me was the Big Dipper, transformed through my musings into a stellar fiddle. If only I could hear and play that music....

Crossing borders

Lately, I have been really attracted to the fiddle music from Shetland and Brittany. Some Shetland tunes have a powerful, almost primieval character which is derived from their isolation and Nordic/Scottish maritime heritage. Tunes from Brittany often feature haunting melodies which feel very old, almost as old as humankind, but very familiar to me somehow. I may eventually choose one of these off-the-beaten-track idioms as my first love, but time will tell.

What if you had a session...

...and nobody came?

Actually, one other fiddler came to tonight's session at Rosie Connolly's. He and I both thought that a session was scheduled, but we were apparently off by a week. We took advantage of the time by trading tunes and chatting about different pieces of music, teachers, fiddle camps, comparing instruments/bows, etc. Anyway, more than a few passersby pulled up a chair and sat for a while enjoying the music.

Marty is more experienced than I am and taught me a lot about improvisation and music theory. I tried to compensate him by sharing as many tunes as I could, some of which he had never heard and really liked. I will return next week a better player for the experience.