We’re starting off a couple of new Thursday night seisiuns here in San Diego, please come visit if you’re ever in town!
http://members.cox.net/eskin/acoustic_expressions.html
Cheers,
Michael
Hehe, that one made me laugh:
Non-traditional instruments (such as saxophone, recorder, or trumpet) are not allowed.
Is there anyone who ever showed up at an irish session with a trumpet? I think I’d get a heart attack.
Ah-ha! Another recorder-phobe! And how can you play slow airs without a saxaphone? Where’s Tomás Ó Canainn when you need him? 
djm
Funny recorder related story… Many years ago I was at a session where there was a new whistle player who was very precisely double tonguing through reels at full speed, like that’s how one plays them. I asked him if he was a baroque recorder player in his previous life… yes he was… had to re-edumacate him in the ways of the whistle…
Eskin,
I’m running my own semi-private session here in Montreal and many think I’m narrow minded abour irish music (has to be ITM, trad instrument, no hoggers, no sheet music, etc). I sent a few people a link to your session description, telling them I wasnt that bad after all, hehe!
The only thing that “turns me off” about your description is the fact that only you and your co-leader are “allowed” to start sets, that’s a little against what I stand for, the idea of sharing the music and all. I don’t like hoggers, but I would feel a little pretentious wanting that, and I’m not in a session to hear myself play all the time. It’s like, since your session works with invitations only, like mine, I assume those you invite are good enough to start their stuff. I’m personnaly very open to sit and listen to tunes I don’t know, if the player is worth listening to.
But since you’re anti-recorder/sheet music in a session, I’m on your side dude! 
Just want to clarify, the guidelines posted are only for the teaching seisiun, not for the later “real” seisiun. The early seisiun will be run pretty much as a class for really new players to the tradition, students taking lessons at the store, and other beginners. That’s why, for example, we don’t want to muddy up the sound with bodhrans and guitars. For many its their first exposure to seisiun playing, so we want to create and control the environment for these early players so that they have a positive experience and a controlled environment to learn some tunes. I’d never try to impose those rules on accomplished players… 
The later seisiun is a closed seisiun that we’re hoping will attract some of the best players in town who we already play with in other venues and may like the idea of having some control over who they play with…
Ah! Thanks for the clarification, it’s cool then, and it seems like a nice effort to allow beginners to play and learn. I couldnt do that with mine since it’s in a pub and we sure don’t want customers to get scared hehe…
Last question: a less than two hours session (the advanced one) isnt a little short?
PS: I just find it interesting to talk about sessions, I’m not trying to be a pain
Hi Azalin,
I appreciate the feedback… we went through 5 drafts of these guidelines trying to figure out how to create a workable situation without upsetting anyone too much.
I agree, wish we had more time. It may end up that the slow seisiun will continue later while the other seisiun starts in another area of the store. We’ll just have to see how it goes and who shows up. Its great to finally have a non-pub venue that is very supportive of the music, particularly for the younger players in town.
Michael
Well, good luck with your session. I just realized that in Montreal they don’t allow people under 18 in bars/pubs, at whatever time of the day. At least, the pub where I’m at doesnt have the license. That might be a problem if there’s some good young players showing up. Thus the advantage of having a session outside a pub.
No pints??? What kind of a session is that?
Corin
I know, hard to imagine a seisiun without pints… I asked the owner if we could bring our own, but she nixed that idea immediately. Looks like we’re stuck with just sodas…
Maybe if you shook your cola up really hard you could pretend it was porter.
djm
Yep. Happened at O’Gara’s some years back. We were mystified enough to let him have a go (it was one of those nights; what can I say), but although he was a decent player for what it was worth, he could only play one tune at a time. Sheet music, you know. Imagine that.
I think he was aware enough about how he fit in…he never came back, and we weren’t hard on him!
Yeah, I understand. It’s the type of situation where it’s so unbelievable that you don’t even think about getting angry or saying something. Anyway, if there’s a recorder player or pipe player that annoys you, there’s always the trumpet to set the record straight.
I’m getting slagged pretty badly on the Uilleann board about the session guidelines… oh well…
I guess we’re super lucky at my session here. It’s very high quality, respectful newbies, a great bodhran player, a good zouk player with nary a guitar strummer in sight, top notch piper anchoring, a nice variety of tunes, not too fast, not too slow, etc., etc. A fellow musician was talking with me and mentioned that he’d been to many sessions in Ireland and said ours was closest out of any he’d been to for quality. The interesting thing is that we’ve never had to lay down rules or take anybody aside. Everybody is laid back and friendly, and things just go well, call it sheer luck or what ever, but I hope it never changes. Oh, and I’ve never seen sheet music once! The pub is good too. Personally, if it takes having posted rules or whatnot to have one’s session be enjoyable, what’s the fault in that?
Corin
Hi Corin, I got your email from the session.org. (this is my first post on C&F BTW). I think the session.org is down. I’m not able to access it here at work today.
I wanted to say that our session here in Burlington, VT is pretty much the opposite of what you just described. Unfortunately, it’s the only session we have up in this area that’s in a public place. It’s on its last legs and might be done by the time you get up to VT this summer. We do have some really good musicians up here, but they show up very sporadically. A few nights the session didn’t even happen…
I’m very interested in your session up in Portland ME. My husband and I are working on re-locating to the southern NH area. It could take a year to do it but it will be worth it. I don’t think Portland is too far from Portsmouth NH. Maybe this summer we could take a weekend trip up to Portland and visit your session. I really love the Maine coast!
Anyway if I can ever get back into the session.org, I’ll shoot you an email.
Cheers,
Joyce
I think the whole idea of Bar sessions is a waste of time.
The trending and garaging of them was bound to happen sooner or later; who wants to fill an thankless Bar owner’s pockets and be made pay a dollar for a soda?
I wanted to start a kitchen session here but alas the finacial interests are worried about beer sales.. ahem. Well I’ll not be going to THEIR sessions anymore. Instead I’ll continue playing off key on a home made flute or scrawbing Coleman settings out of a fiddle at home with the dog and the family throwing things at me to see if I can be distracted.
:0)
Around here, the problem with pub-centric sessions is the smokers… In California, the bars are supposed to be non-smoking, but the smokers just stand outside the doors, the ventilation system pulls in the toxic cloud. I won’t even try to play flute at the pub session I co-host, its just too hard on my lungs, and the smoke keeps most of the other flute players away, as well as the good fiddlers, box players, and pretty much anyone who is disgusted by cigarette smoke. At least The Field session on Sundays is in a restaurant/pub, and is big enough that the smokers are a long distance away from the music. I think the ventilation must also not pull outside air into the building from the smoking area in front.
M
Hi Michael,
Not “slagged pretty badly” if you ask me, but more “met with a reasonably degree of scepticism given the huge number of session rules and regulations”. I can certainly understand why you would want to regulate your meetings somehow - especially given the possible state of unregulated sessions in your area (as you describe them) - but at first glance the guidelines do come across as rather intimidating. Plus, between the beginners’ slow session and the invitation-only “pro session” it doesn’t seem like there’s much of an opportunity for a real session, if you get my drift…
Cheers,
Jens