Mike Marshall Workshop

[Brad Weiss]

Yesterday I got to attend a workshop with Mike Marshall as a prelude to his concert here w/ Darol Anger. There were just 6 of us, and Mike is about as pleasant and supportive a person as you can imagine. We had two hours, and he kept going for a good 30 minutes afterwards - we covered a huge range of stuff, starting with really basic but essential points about how to hold your instrument to maximize your right hand attack, simple right hand technique, and then moved into improvization, bluegrass, and Bach. # He really broke down a fiddle tune and showed how to build it up into a simple but substantial break. And he went over a range of arpeggios to demonstrate how to blow through the changes of a jazz standard. Of course we mostly just sat and listened to some amazing sounds, but we got to jam along through some chord changes, too

The personal highlight for me was when he swapped mandos with me to check out the T-I strngs on my Kentucky, and I got to play his Loar a bit. #Holy smokes.... My poor little Kentucky is probably miserable now that it knows it will never sound that good again.

Anyone else had this experience? I'm sure those of you going to the Symposium are going to have a blast!!

[mandomood]

what were some of his comments regarding right hand and holding the mando to get the most out of your playing etc?...

can you elaborate?....I'm just curious

[Brad Weiss]

Essentially the idea is to keep the mandolin balnaced so that the neck is elevated and your left hand is not supporting the neck in any way. He had us all keep our left foot up on our cases and cradle the mandolin with our legs and right forearm so the neck was completely independent of the left hand, As for attack, the iedea is to keep your pick at a slight angle to the strings (not parallel, but slightly askew) and to achieve the angle, not by rotating your right arm or wrist, but by lifting the neck until the pick was attacking at the appropriate angle. The little right hand exercise he gave us just emphasized creating a kind of figure eight motion as you picked down and up, producing the same volume in both directions,

None of this was earth shattering, but it was really precise and thoughful.

I wish I could understand half of what he said (or did really) playing arpeggios in jazz soloing; it wa phenomenal ot hear, and will only take me a few decades to reproduce...

[John Rosett]

i've been to two workshops with mike over the years, and he is a great teacher, as well as just an all around great guy to be around. any body that has a chance to attend any event with mike should go.
john

[Rich]

He once told me, "Find what's hard to do and sounds good, then keep doing till it's easy, then move on." I've done that ever since and it's good advice.

[Rich]

Oh yeh, Mike told us all how to hold the pick and mandolin to get the best sound and speed, then Ronnie McCoury came over and told us everything just the oposite! That was a trip. I guess you just have to decide what's best for your playing!

[mandomiss]

Mike's the man! I've never been to a workshop of his, but I've met him and he's the greatest. While I was talking to him at RockyGrass he asked me what I played and when I told him that I play the mando he said, "So do I!" Really? http://www.mandolincafe.net/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif I just hope that I can make it to Santa Cruz in August.

[Flowerpot]

"Oh yeh, Mike told us all how to hold the pick and mandolin to get the best sound and speed, then Ronnie McCoury came over and told us everything just the oposite! That was a trip. I guess you just have to decide what's best for your playing..."

To me, Mike and Ronnie's styles are about as different as you can get, like comparing a mercedes sedan with a monster truck. Both excellent at what they do, but nobody would ever confuse their playing! So if you want to sound more like Mike, follow his advice; if you want to sound more like Ronnie, listen to him.

[Rich]

Oh, I agree completely! Ronnie and Mike have completely different sounds. I guess one could consider trying to learn both types of playing techniques to make available both types of sounds in their playing... food for thought.

[AlanN]

That's the beauty of our little wooden thingy - there ain't no one way to do it. If you analyze the top recording mando pickers, and there are dozens, you'll come up with that many different styles...."It all sounds alike, but different".