Are there instruments that people bring to sessions that you think ABSOLUTELY do not belong?
For instance, I personally can’t stand a keyboard player (electric). I don’t care for acoustic piano in Irish or Scottish traditional music but an “electric piano” just bothers me. Some people don’t like box players or bodhrains, but at least they fit the genre somewhat (I think?).
Thoughts?
I’d have to say that I’d MUCH prefer an electric piano/keyboard to an out-of-tune upright, which is what you tend to get in pubs… Everything is relative! I don’t have any major instrument dislikes. Of course, players’ styles are another thing… 
D
metal spoons belong in the kitchen 
Piano accordion. (I like button boxes, though).
J.
Some days I hate flutes.
I have to say that there aren’t a lot of instruments that irk me. I guess a trumpet at a session would. I’ve played successfully with a piano accordion player. He had a small instrument that wasn’t overly loud. He played it very well. I play regularly with a guy who plays a digital piano. It sounds OK and he keeps good time and it adds bounce to the tunes. Some pretty good recordings have used piano. Even spoons and bones are OK but not all the time. Once a guy brought a home made hurdy gurdy to a session. That was bad. When he cranked it up, I decided I needed to go use the facilities. The worst though, was at a festival. There were several little groups playing fairly close to each other. Not too far from our group was one featuring a musical saw. Whew!
Steve
Well, so far, the worst I’ve seen is some crazy drunk guy who “played” harmonica. He decided to join in one night and he couldn’t even play the instrument (or if he could, he couldn’t manage it while drunk). It was a complete nightmare. Luckily, his friends dragged him away after only a couple tunes.
I guess I can’t really think of an instrument that it would truly irk me to have at session. The one thing that has irked me is people who play their instrument far too loudly (which, on some instruments, can obviously affect both tone quality and raise the pitch rather severely). I love the bodrhan when it’s played well…it’s a beautiful instrument. But I’ve found there’s nothing worse for a session than someone who pounds the crap out of it. I’d imagine spoons could be like that too (and there’s a great song about an annoying spoons player at a session…darned if I can remember what it’s called now!).
~Crysania
I was playing a nice session last night with some old timers, and in walks this guy with what looks like part of the missing Beagle 2 Mars probe. Turns out it’s a homemade rub board/crash cymbal/cowbells percussion kit for Old Time or Cajun Music. And we start a set of reels and Jesus he’s beating the thing loud enough to rattle the windows, and what’s worse he’s not steady at all and before long one of the flute players just has to stop and laugh. And then afterward the owner of this godawful contraption says “Am I too loud?” And of course one of the old timers chimes in, “No, I can barely hear you at all” just to get a rise out of the rest of us.
And then the proud owner of this contraption begins to prattle on about how he made it himself, how he’s just learning to play it…
There oughta be a law.
I can’t stand jimbee (spelled ok?). It’s an instrument that need to be played quite loud to be nice and it’s definitly too loud for a session.
Leo
Speak and enter
Oh my God, I just remembered playing once at a session with HIGHLAND PIPES. The locals told me the guy was a regular there. I, uh, never went back.
J.
Hmm…was that at a session around the Bay Area by any chance?
I think you mean djembe. No, they don’t have to be played loudly to be played well. As with bodhran, you can get different sounds and tones hitting it in different places and in different ways, but you can’t really dampen it in quite the same way. As for percussion in general, once in a while in the right place on the right tune and you get lift. But play the same instrument on every tune and, unless you are a virtuoso, you’ll likely spoil the session.
OK, now for my vote: tuba.
I showed up at a local sesion to find an electric guitar player camped out in our usual corner, complete with amplifier! And, yes, he was loud!
We recently had a bluegrass mandolin player show up, but he didn’t a have a CLUE about the music. Just strummed random chords.
Aaaaaaargh!
Trust me, I learned this the hard way: Bluegrass mandolin and guitar players have NO business playing in irish sessions - unless, of course, they at least temporarily abandon bluegrass style and apply themselves wholeheartedly to irish music in a genuine and humble manner. But if you walk in thinking, well, this stuff is simple, they play so slow, etc. and play the way a bluegrass mandolin or guitarist would, you will wreck the session. Utterly wreck it. You will be fortunate if everyone else present is too nice to take you out back and kick your ass.
THANK you!
Mixed sessions are one thing, but if a player comes to an ITM session from a different style, s/he should just sit and listen. Sometimes they eventually get it; then again, I’ve heard complaints voiced about the inegalitarian tyrrany of groups wanting ITM sessions to remain ITM sessions. Imagine that! :roll:
We had this character show up several times with a “TRIANGLE” to play along with. He was serious about using it, we were serious to, we left the pub and found another place to play. He finally got the hint.
MarkB
Thanks for the hint, Mark. Now I know what to bring with me the next time I come down to Windsor. You’d probably like my washboard playing too.
Steve
There’s a guy who plays fiddle (absolutely amazing… been at it a very long time I guess), who will also play a (full-size) piano accordian.
The thing is that it too is really good. Not too loud, not too much chords.
The thing that makes me appreciate it the most is that I played with another chracter who we nicknamed the polka king. He was brutal. Loud, not an amazing rhythm, and very bossy.
I don’t get it, either, nano. I’m an elitist because I refuse to let an irish session become a venue for compulsive attention seeking behavior that has nothing to do with ITM?
YES. 
Up the elitists!!!