Had a great time at the fiddlers convention today. Very nice venue at the junior college. I got there in time to hear the finals of the junior fiddle, mandolin and banjo competitions. It was great to see youngsters playing something beside their phone... All of them were good enough for a competition, they could play.
Then I went back in the hallways and found the jam sessions. Found one group of old guys like me. Picked with them for a couple hours. How this works… Jam sessions will last all day. Pickers show up one or two at the time, one of two will leave. It’s a revolving session. Don’t like what you hear, wait an hour or so, there’ll be a new people there.
When I arrived there was already 4 guitars in this group. I was going to wait for a while but a guy I knew insisted I go ahead and join in. After a few songs the mandolin and banjo pickers kept motioning for me to play louder. But I had a bass playing right in my ear and he was playing a lot of bad notes. Kept messing me up!!!
5th pic… thats how close the bass was to me. He was a nice old guy. I think I know him from long ago. Also, the mandolin picker with the cowboy hat, invited me to a festival in May north of Birmingham.
Anyway, had a great time picking. Then I went back out and listened to the adult mandolin finals. There was a kid who came down from Missouri, that kid could play!!! He was real good. (kid, lol, probably 25)
Last pic, saw Mr. R. Haven’t seen him in a couple years. We had a nice talk, catching up on family news. Funny, first time I ever played for a big crowd of strangers, he owned the stage. I was a kid. Mr. R played and had a band There’d be 4 or 5 bands on the 1st Saturday night each month. We’d play until the wee hours of the morning behind the building when we weren’t on stage. Having the time of my life...
