Is there a role for the amateur session enthusiast?

Poststructural Pub
1

Is there any common ground between the worldwide non-native Irish amateur enthusiast player community and the “keepers of the faith”?

There are a lot of us who do this just because we love playing and love the tunes, and even if our motives are doubted, have great respect for the music. We want to expand the tent to bring in new players, if nothing else to insure the continued survival of our local session scene.

I really don’t think the “keepers” really care if the music lives or dies outside of Ireland. After all, we really don’t have a right to play it in the first place.

For every “keeper” there are probably a hundred session players and promoters like me dealing with a hobby that requires constant new players, tunes, and leadership to keep things alive and thriving in our local scene, and whether or not what we do or how we promote it meets a bar for “traditional”.

That’s the reality at least for me, its a constant challenge just to get capable and pleasant warm bodies in the seats, there just aren’t that many players locally. Anything I can do to bring more players up to speed, the better. Its hard work playing for 3 or 4 hours with only 3 players where two of us are the ones who really know the tunes and can start the sets.

Because of my websites, people know I’m the go-to guy for sessions in San Diego. We’ve had many visitors over the years, with many wonderful evenings. If I had to make one suggestion to other session leaders is make sure its easy for visiting musicians to find your sessions and up-to-date schedules and contact info on the web.

Can’t we have some venue where we can help support and encourage each other in dealing with invigorating our local session scene, bring up new players, sharing and promoting the hobby, without every discussion being derailed?


Michael

2

I appreciate your efforts and given a few more years, you’ll have another San Diegan to join in on some sessions. Too n00biesh at the moment though. Just glad to have a great local resource.

3

Steamwalker, if you’re already here in San Diego, even if you’re a completely new player, please come to our local sessions at the Ould Sod and Thornton’s if nothing else to record and hear our sets.

If the issue is that you’re not yet 21, the session at Thornton’s on Thursdays is in a restaurant so anyone can attend. Its one of the reasons we started the session there, there really wasn’t place in town where minors can play in a session, and we have some good young talent in town.

We have many players who don’t know that many tunes and are still actively contributing members of the local session scene!

Let me know if you need to know the addresses and times.

Cheers,

Michael

4

There are a select few who cannot stand to see appreciation of anyone other than their own favorites, and don’t consider anyone outside their own short list of ‘those who do it right’ viewed as viable guides. They are right as rain on some points and nit-picky impossible to please on others.

Although I honor Peter Laban as a highly talented and knowledgable person on the topic of ITM, I have been around the mulberry bush with ballbats with him on this particular issue numerous times. We are likely never to come to full agreement. I have bought (at full price) his Cd and highly recommend it. That doesn’t mean that I now only accept his opinion, or that of his closest followers, about what is of value to me and my own musical pursuits… nor does it mean that he is a money grubbing advantage taker. It just means that I like his music and value his input.

I maintain that it is possible to learn something worthwhile from just about anybody, even, as I have said before, if it is how not to do something.

The act of respecting someone enough to allow them to be human, and therefore not ‘perfect’ goes a very long way to making things peacable and reasonable. As one finds oneself growing in knowledge and abilities, one naturally seeks more expertise, and higher levels of competence in one’s guides. That does not negate the value of anything else that helped you get that far.

People do not all spring to being in the ideal places for their eventual interests, and they are not, thankfully, limited to only finding joy in that which immediately surrounds them. We each have the freedom to seek out those aspects of our interests that call most to us. If we are lucky, we find someone close by who has more knowledge and experience in it than we do and we apprentice to them. (If we are exceptionally lucky, we can afford to move to where the target experts are located) If we are not that lucky, we take what we can get and are grateful for it. Either way, we can often share with those a step or more behind us. If we are honest, we know that we will never be ‘perfect’ and will never be the only one who knows something, and we will not be selfish enough to hold back knowledge from others.

We are a community, and as such, have our share of generous natures, curmudgeons and the occaisional shifty-eyed ne’er-do-wells. I prefer it when the whole neighborhood comes together for occaisional carry-ins as opposed to only letting a few selct folk into my yard. If we watch out for one another, we will prosper as a community. If we begin to accept the stereotyping and segregation of folks based on the opinions of a few, we will lose a lot.

5

That was absolutely gorgeous. Thank you!

6

I heard that. :wink:

Seriously, though, good post, Annie.

7

I might suggest this thought could be holding things at bay. It’s very nature is that of restriction… I get your reverence to the “faith”, but even one faith is practiced differently in different parts of the world.

Allow this to grow… San Diego style. :slight_smile:

Music is organic, it must evolve and adapt in order to thrive.

You “keep Faith” plenty well.-- go tend to your flock, Michael.

8

I don’t completely understand what your question/concern is. Are you complaining that you can’t get enough people to come to the session, that you get people to come once but they don’t attend regularly, or that they just seem to be avoiding you?

Also, I don’t understand the bit about how you need to keep bringing more people in. Its a session. You seem to make it sound like you’re marketing this stuff to make a living off it. Thats not a session anymore. That’s a business. There’s not the sharing/caring when its a business compared to something more communally organic like a session.

Perhaps I’m not understanding you correctly. Is so, please clarify for me.

djm

9

Hi DJM,

We have been experiencing a declining number of session players and sessions in the SoCal area over the past few years, and its getting to be something to worry about.

There aren’t venues for young people to play, more sessions are becoming more like closed performances, and in general, there seems to be fewer and fewer players coming out to the sessions. Some of it is just normal cyclicality, people move away, new players arrive, but while there used to be 10 or 15 people at a session, now there are only 4 or 5, with occasional larger session, but the overall pool of musicians seems to be declining.

Some of it is a survival reaction to the usual too-many bodhrans and guitars and other bad-behaviour issue that seems to be ubiquitous everywhere, sessions would rather become closed events than deal with this issue. Really, though, the more concerning problem is that there just aren’t that many melody players around here who can keep up in a session.

We’ve had some success in starting tune classes, beginner’s sessions, etc. but while the classes are well attended, the resulting spillover into the session scene is very low, on the order of 10% or less. If we can only recruit a new player or two every year, that’s not going to sustain the scene.

So, yes, its sort of a “marketing” issue, but one I think we need to take seriously around these parts, at least. I’m curious if other parts of the country have had similar issues and were able to turn things around. Just today, I got an email from a C&F member who can’t find a session in her area, it died and was replaced with a band, the story seems to be repeating itself in various forms over time.

10

Thank goodness for the “keepers of the flame”, for without them many great traditions would be lost.

That said, my experience is that sessions that are rigidly traditional will seldom grow and prosper. (I’m not only talking about ITM here). The atmosphere becomes tense and judgemental, egos get bruised, and newcomers are intimidated. On the other hand, if the session-leaders loosen up and tolerate diversity and innovation, the music is often compromised. It can get pretty silly no matter which course the session takes.

Of course, this has been discussed endlessly, and no one has a solution that works for everyone. That’s why “good, public, traditional music session” is so nearly an oxymoron.

11

If I may, I would like to just suggest the possibility of finding other venues than a public bar/tavern. I have heard of people having problems finding a place to play even in Ireland, especially if there are younger musicians involved. Some possibilities are: a local church basement, someone’s house or social club, a local CCÉ if one exists in your area.

I’m sure others here might have even better ideas, but what I think needs to change first and foremost is the idea that ITM must be associated with boozing it up. It is unfortunate that Irish culture in the past has been so closely wrapped up in alcoholism, but that is changing today. Also, a session is not supposed to be about public performance, so getting out of a public environment would also get you away from sessions that turn into gigs. And having a session on private premises allows you the weight to turf the ungodly. :wink:

There is still the issue where sessions at private homes turn into secret cliques or kabals. Sometimes it is understandable where more advanced players want an opportunity to play with people of their own calibre, but as you have noted, you still need a venue that would welcome beginners. If you have already got people coming to classes, why not ask them to provide their own session venues? That would take some pressure off of you. I know that the local branch of CCÉ started by going from one person’s house to the next for the first while until they settled at one person’s house. They later moved to a bar and soon afterwards fell apart. There’s a lesson to be learned there, I think.

djm

12

The problem is more than just lack of venues for the players, its lack of players!

We’ve talked about starting a CCE chapter here, but not having been involved with CCE, I’d be very interested in hearing how its gone with the local playing scene in towns with active chapters.

13

We have an open session in the Celtic and Old Time traditions, held at a local pizza joint each week. Sometimes the crowd outnumbers the musicians, and often the other way round. We have seasoned rock and rollers, brand new to the idea amateurs, closet players, ex-bluegrassers, and those who will jump at any excuse to play. There is a core who are willing to do more, and they are as varied as you could ask. It is fun, usually for all, and we encourage new folk and try to remember to name the tunes before we start them (I am notorious for not being able to) and to keep the pace below State-trooper interest. It has survived some serious challenges and is a living growing thing in its own right. Yes, there is room for such a mixture, and it doesn’t have to involve booze (though I did enjoy a beer last night).

14

Our session is hosted Sunday nights in a pub that is usually pretty empty by the time we come in. We fluctuate a lot but recently there have been as few as four or five pretty consistently. There was a time when we had over a dozen and could barely find enough chairs. I’d say that maybe 20% of the players ever buy drinks. I’ve never seen anyone pressured to drink. We have a couple of minors who show up now and then, their parents bring them down and read a book for a few hours while they play. That’s good parenting :smiley:
I enjoy a drink once in a while when I’m down there but I have a 45 minute drive home afterwards so I never have more than a couple pints, and rarely even that. The downside for me though, is that I feel obligated to tip the bar staff very well since the pub is so dead those nights. Even if I just ask for a water I usually drop a dollar on the bar for the barman.
Seems to me that the folks who do drink regularly are the ones who would show up to a house session with a six pack anyways.

15

That’s pretty amazing that the pub allows minors in, even with their parents. Here, they’d get their license pulled in an instant. We had a very fine fiddler in our session for a while who I didn’t realize was only 20, the local alcohol control board started beefing up enforcement, and we had to tell him the bad news that he’d have to wait and come back after he turned 21, which luckily was only after a few months.

16

In Texas, minors are allowed in bars, provided they don’t drink. However, they can’t enter a liquor store without a parent/guardian. Bars, in an effort to protect themselves, may disallow those under 21 if they so choose.

If they have a parent or guardian under immediate supervision, and the parent/guardian allows it, someone under 21 can even have alcohol. That kind of sucks if you’re 18, and your mom allows you to drink, but then you turn 19, and move out…and you still gotta take your mom to the bars :laughing:

As for the rest, I’m going to keep doing the best I can, playing music I like, and if some crusty old fart in Ireland with a burr in his saddle looks down his nose at me, I could give a flying fart. :wink:

17

I cannot see the relevance of your nomination of Peter Laban in your point to “keepers of the faith” being native to Ireland as per eskin’s initiating post

Is he a native Irish keeper of the faith?

18

Nope. He just happened to be in on a rather heated digression from another thread that lead to the beginning of this one. A “Keeper of the Faith”, I would say, yes, at least the sept he subscribes to … native to Ireland, no. And, I might add, that doesn’t negate his value as a player or fount of knowledge therein. :wink:

19

Hmmm… my soon to be 19yo would like that… I wouldn’t mind him paying for the occaisional stout, mind you… and he’s getting quite good on the guitar… hmmm… Texas… a bit too far, I’m afraid.

20

And (forgive me for having my head so much buried in East Coast sand) which topic might that be?