Dropping a ball...

I've often struggled with striking a balance between focus and expansion. For most of this year I managed to juggle two genres, multiple instruments and a large number of songs, but in August I ran out of time to bring by Concertina songs up to speed which disrupted my plans for the Broadstairs Folk Festival where I like to perform in the Woodshed session.

I obviously needed to cut down by having fewer songs and repeating them more often, but I didn't want to drop a whole genre or instrument, at least for now. So I purged a few songs across the board, but deciding which and how many to push onto the back-burner is always a dilemma.

After some further thought, I realised the best option was to set a positive course by focusing on what I like best (songs with the Bouzouki) and allowing time to sort out the rest.

(Image by Freeimages.com.)

Review of 2023

Last folk club meeting of 2023

I carved out the time to practice regularly during this year, if only for 20 minutes a day, and this paid off. I should put more effort into learning new technique, but lack of time forces me to concentrate mainly on rehearsing songs for upcoming performance. 

My biggest achievement was reviving my Old Time repertoire with guitar. I hadn't played the guitar regularly since I was a teenager, and it wasn't something I'd used for regular public performance. I'd also not done the OT songs since 2019. But the songs came back and I learnt to play an alternating bass-strum Country Guitar pattern without too much trouble.

I also bought the Tenor Banjo and started doing my Irish tunes on it, which I can now play at least as well as I did on Mandolin. 

With the time spent on Guitar, I somewhat neglected the Irish Bouzouki but I am currently making up for that. 

Medieval Lute 2

My reproduction 4-course Medieval Lute, commissioned from luthier Jo Dusepo, arrived in March of last year. It was beautifully made and I was very pleased with it. 

Unfortunately, I’ve had more pressing Folk and Old Time projects which I had to bring up to speed. As those projects have now stabilised, I can finally give the Lute more attention.

The Lute has a very different feel from my other instruments, mainly because of the bowl back and lightness, but all my stringed instruments are held slightly differently and it's just a question of getting used to it. 

The tuners are friction as on a violin, not geared, and these take some getting used to. I broke one string tuning up, and one of the tied frets came off and had to be replaced. 

It produces a very reasonable volume which will be augmented by thickening up the melody. Melody will be absolutely central. I won't be using any post-Medieval triad chords with thirds. There's no point in having something like this and then treating it like a modern guitar. 

So my options will include doubling notes to create a more rhythmical pattern, strummed polyphonic and alternately picked drones. And then there are embellishments like slides and hammer-ons which seem to come naturally on stringed instruments. All these will be played with a Risha rather than fingers.

I've got a selection of melodies I want to play and these have been tabbed out in Musescore, so learning them is pretty straightforward. The rest is just fun and experiment.

Irish Tenor Banjo

Gold Tone AC-4 

Although I'll continue to play American Old Time fiddle tunes on Mandolin, I wanted a GDAE-tuned Tenor Banjo for Irish tunes. I've always liked the sound, and the resonance is more forgiving than trying to get a perfect tone on a mandolin. 

Besides choosing a specific make and model, the big questions were whether to go for 17 or 19 frets and an open or closed back. 17 frets is easier if you are used to the Mandolin, but there can apparently be intonation issues and a slack G-string problem in Irish (GDAE) tuning. So I decided to go for the longer scale if I could cope with the stretch and/or movement of hand position. This awaited actually trying a 19 which I finally managed in August. It was OK.

The closed back (with resonator) provides more volume but I don't expect to be throwing myself into dedicated Irish sessions and I found the resonator banjos very metallic. The open back ones have a sweeter tone.

I eventually decided on the Gold Tone AC-4 which has a two-way adjustable truss rod (lacking in some more expensive banjos) and is considered to be great value. It seemed proportionate to my beginner status and level of commitment shared, as it is, with so many other instruments. The included case is little more than a dust cover but I had a spare padded gig bag.

Transferring the Irish mandolin tunes to banjo was straightforward. Obviously I had to get use to the increased fret distances, but it essentially feels like playing the same instrument.

Old Time, new times

Reviving my Old Time String Band songs with guitar was intended as a side-line, but it’s worked out well and I’ve been encouraged to give it more priority.

I'm not entirely sure why, but I feel more relaxed performing the American material and can pack more punch into it. This makes for a better performance and more engagement with (noisy) pub audiences, the milieu I often find myself in and most enjoy. The approach, and material, may be less appropriate for some folk clubs and festivals, where I will continue to focus on the trad folk repertoire.

Reviving my Old Time String Band songs with Guitar

I went from trad folk to Americana and back again, never feeling comfortable about pursuing both genres concurrently. But a chance to participate in a new session finally inspired me to revive my American Old Time String Band repertoire alongside my mostly English and Irish folk songs. 

Rather than use the Mandolin, I'm relearning the songs with Guitar as this is more appropriate as a solo instrument. I’ve had Guitars since I was a teenager. I’m not a complete beginner, but I’ve rarely played Guitar in public. 

Right: My Gretsch Jim Dandy parlour Guitar. I originally bought this for Delta Blues but that is another story...

2023

Time for some tunes

Although my collection of songs is never static and although there is always room for developing technique, I’ve now essentially rebuilt my trad folk repertoire. I’ve got 26 songs with Irish Bouzouki, 17 with Crane Duet Concertina and 24 unaccompanied. Although I intend to spend just as much time practising, the race to rebuild a performable repertoire is over.

As a floor singer in a typical folk club evening you usually get a couple of songs, and in singing sessions perhaps four or more. My current plan is to do one Zouk song and one Crane song per session, and then to fill in with acapella songs. This means balancing practice time between the Zouk and Crane. The unaccompanied songs look after themselves.

One area I do need to develop is tune playing. My folk club and the session I go to are both interspersed with English tunes drawn from the Lewes Favourites. They’re not exclusively English, of course, but they’re common in English sessions.

I did manage to learn a number of these on Concertina years ago but I find some melodies difficult to absorb or tricky to play at speed on the Crane, so I want to experiment with just chordal accompaniment, either on the Concertina or Zouk or maybe both.

Hora Concert Irish Bouzouki

Accompanying my singing with Irish Bouzouki has now become my main focus so I decided to upgrade to the Hora 'Concert' Irish Bouzouki. I wasn't unhappy with the basic Hora model, but the improved version is larger, has much better tuners and is more mellow and resonant. This makes the droning arpeggio style more convincing and easier to pull off.

I've now learnt a core repertoire of about 20 songs with the Bouzouki, so can spend more time on developing technique. This year I went to two very useful Irish Bouzouki workshops, one given by Daori Farrell and the other by Jon Doran, two of my favourite performers.

Medieval Lute

 

I fell in love with the handcrafted instrument in the video, a reconstruction of a 4-course Medieval Lute made and played by Jo Dusepo, so I have commissioned one from her. They take about two months to make but there is an eight month waiting list.

The Lute originated from the Middle Eastern Oud to which chromatic frets were later added, but many believe that a quite Eastern approach persisted. This has been a huge area of debate, as indicated here. Nobody  knows for certain how mediaeval instruments were played, so there is a lot of room for interpretation. Styles vary from Fine Art to Folky, and from foursquare European to Silk Road fusion.

Medieval music was modal and harmonised with Unisons, Octaves, Fourths and Fifths but Thirds were considered discordant so I won't be playing any modern triad chords. After a lot of discussion I've decided to have it tuned DADG, a drone tuning which Jo suggested. There is obviously a coincidence here with DADGAD guitar tuning and the Zouk (GDAD).

Irish Bouzouki

I bought a Hora Irish Bouzouki from Romania with the idea of transferring my mandolin skills to an instrument that would be better  for song accompaniment. 

It's really good quality and fantastic value and I'm very pleased with it, but it's quite a bit different from playing the mandolin.

I've enrolled with the Online Academy of Irish Music which not only provides Zouk lessons but includes access to all its singing and instrument courses.

My musical activities have now settled into four main areas:

Singing with Concertina
Sea and other English songs. These are being re-engineered in a more chordal style.

Unaccompanied singing
Sea and other English songs, Irish songs. The mainstay of my participation as a folkclub floor singer.

Singing with Zouk
Predominantly Irish songs. This is a work in progress but I am optimistic.

Mandolin
Essentially Irish tunes. For private enjoyment.