Washington Post Mandolin Content

[Killian King]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifest...0ce_story.html

This quote from someone in the article is awesome.

“The talent here is ridiculous,” said one local. “I can’t even listen as good as they play.”

[journeybear]

That's a good 'on. So's this:

“I’ve been playing for 50 years,” she said. “I’m jammed out.”

Gets like that, sometimes. There is such a thing as too much fun.

Great article. BTW, the next festival is coming up, first weekend of November.

[Killian King]

I also liked the way the author set the tone by saying,

For more than a decade, I have owned — note the distinction from “played” — a mandolin.

[Jim Taylor]

Was kind of neat, it was neat to have 'foreigners' in town. Hope she comes back this year and picks with us! You'all come too, it's really a fun time!

[Londy]

Sounds like a great experience. Thanks for posting this.

[OldSausage]

I enjoyed her story's sense of being utterly perplexed, yet somehow just on the edge of understanding, that I think characterizes the entire old time/bluegrass experience for many.

[Astro]

I enjoyed her story's sense of being utterly perplexed, yet somehow just on the edge of understanding, that I think characterizes the entire old time/bluegrass experience for many.

Huh ?...Ohh, ...Huh?

[Mike Arakelian]

Great article...thanks for posting. I love the comment about not being able to listen as well as they play!!!

[Randi Gormley]

Nicely done and kudos for both the writer for writing and the paper for printing it.

[DHopkins]

The South is also peppered with little "Opry" houses that are a great source of enjoyment. The first one that comes to mind is the Hollonville Opry in Pike County, GA. Every Saturday night, they have country, gospel and bluegrass music in (I think) an old converted barn. It's well-furnished with theater-style seating and they have a fantastic sound system. If I remember correctly, it has a 32-channel Grass Valley board. They have refreshments (Coke, coffee, cakes, sandwiches, etc.) and there is no charge for admission. It depends on donations from fans who show up every week. Performers come from all over Georgia to perform free of charge. For anyone who lives within a hundred miles of the Hollonville community, it's well worth the trip.

[JeffD]

I enjoyed her story's sense of being utterly perplexed, yet somehow just on the edge of understanding, that I think characterizes the entire old time/bluegrass experience for many.

That was captured well, I agree.

[journeybear]

What do you think of this passage? (Funny how this came up in the article. The author could be a member, the way this topic gets discussed here so frequently.)

“Bluegrass came out of old-time,” said Shay Pool, the music store’s co-owner and an accomplished fiddler. But, she added, the two genres differ in style and arrangement.

A quick breakdown:

Bluegrass: Fast and fancy, with riffs.

Old-time: Rhythmic and pulsing.

Bluegrass: Makes you want to listen.

Old-time: Makes you want to dance.

Bluegrass: Competitive. One person takes the lead.

Old-time: The more the merrier. Great jam parties.

[OldSausage]

I think the emptiness or inadequacy of the distinctions described is revealed by the writer's subsequent inability to use them to differentiate the genres in performance.

[journeybear]

OK, I guess I wasn't clear; I was addressing JeffD, knowing that he plays a lot of old-timey music and I believe bluegrass as well. But sure, it's an open forum, anyone can ring in.

I'm no expert on either tradition, more familiar with bluegrass than old-timey, I suppose. I think this is a fair attempt at a thumbnail sketch of the distinctions between the two. It's not clear how much of this is coming from the author or the person she was talking with. I suspect the latter, as the author admits to being not well versed in these genres, and this was her introduction to them. Perhaps she was trying to distill what she had learned into a few succinct phrases. Whatever the process, I think the distinctions offered are pretty straightforward and, while obviously not all-encompassing, are easy enough to understand. I just can't tell how accurate they are.

I hope this doesn't lead to a tangent consisting of another long debate about which is which and what's what. If so, I apologize in advance.

[allenhopkins]

I think the main distinction between bluegrass and old-time -- at the root -- is that bluegrass is a style developed for bands to perform for an audience, and old-time is a style developed largely as "social music" for dances, and less formal music venues, not necessarily a stage show.

Of course, there are many informal bluegrass jams, and many old-timey bands that perform for audiences, so the lines have blurred quite a bit, but the carryovers remain in the looser, more extended, more "communal" old-timey approach, and the crisp, arranged, individual-soloist bluegrass approach.

There are also variants of instrumental technique characteristic of each style -- which I would go into in more depth if I didn't have a music job at St. Ann's Home here in Rochester in 25 minutes. Into the car and off to "work!"

[OldSausage]

OK, I guess I wasn't clear; I was addressing JeffD, knowing that he plays a lot of old-timey music and I believe bluegrass as well. But sure, it's an open forum, anyone can ring in.

I'm no expert on either tradition, more familiar with bluegrass than old-timey, I suppose. I think this is a fair attempt at a thumbnail sketch of the distinctions between the two. It's not clear how much of this is coming from the author or the person she was talking with. I suspect the latter, as the author admits to being not well versed in these genres, and this was her introduction to them. Perhaps she was trying to distill what she had learned into a few succinct phrases. Whatever the process, I think the distinctions offered are pretty straightforward and, while obviously not all-encompassing, are easy enough to understand. I just can't tell how accurate they are.

I hope this doesn't lead to a tangent consisting of another long debate about which is which and what's what. If so, I apologize in advance.

What I meant was that when faced with some performances after she's been told this, the author tries to use what she has learned to tell what she's listening to, but it seems like she still isn't sure. I think the distinctions only seem straightforward if you already understand them, and I think that's part of what the writer was trying to say. I wasn't faulting her for not knowing. I can tell you that JeffD will have loved that list.

But there are many situations where they are not true, and as a beginner you're almost more likely to encounter the exceptions than the rules, because the music is still alive and in constant flux.

[JeffD]

Every newspaper article seems learned and knowledgeable, unless it is about something you personally know something about, at which point it seems shallow where its correct, and egregious where it is not.

I learned this a long time ago when I make the local paper as a kid volunteering to help hurricane victims. It was the first time I had a newspaper article in one hand, and objective reality in the other, and saw the differences between them. A lesson learned.

The article is good though, better than I would have expected, and for most folks probably learned and knowledgeable, in a youthful exuberant way.

The author is making her way best she can with knew found knowledge, trying to tow the line between sounding like an intrepid reporter uncovering unique secret knowledge in her first encountering an alien species, and relating to an audience of folks who don't care about this music, like she didn't.

OS is right, I kind of like the distinction she made between BG and OT. Shallow as it is, it is much more on target than I would have expected.

[journeybear]

Oh, OK. Yes, she seems to have found that she jumped into a pond she had never swum in before, had gotten in over her head, and was flailing about a bit - and still had to file a story. I thought she did all right at conveying what she had encountered, given that this was all very new to her. Even though she had had a mandolin for ten years, she was more interested in pop and rock, so to find herself totally immersed in uncharted waters must have been disorienting. Imagine what would have happened if she had gone to a really big festival! But for someone who (by the time of her deadline) knew a little about all this trying to explain it to people who know very little or anything about it, I think she did all right.

I wouldn't expect much deep analysis from anyone in such a situation, with as little experience with it as she had. But I think she was honest in her telling of her encounters. It's as good a starting point as any. And it may be a useful introduction to absolute beginners, inspiring some to venture out of familiar territory and explore the hitherto unknown. For that I am grateful. The more people who come to understand music as a participatory endeavor rather than a passive indulgence or just something to have on in the background while doing something else, the better.

[OldSausage]

I probably didn't express it well myself, but I thought she did very well too. I think she's even perhaps deliberately trying to reveal the ambiguities - rather than becoming a victim of them.

[Killian King]

I don't really think that any sort of deep analysis was the point of her article. After all, it was in the travel section of WaPo.

I found it very entertaining and am sure it provided a glimpse into a world most people who read the post have never imagined before.

[JeffD]

it provided a glimpse into a world most people who read the post have never imagined before.

Yes, and that is what the travel section is for. What may feel irksome is that we (collectively) are a territory most people have never imagined before. We are exotic, like Tanganyika, "Is that a lake, or a country or something, yea I heard about it. Wait, it was on Jeopardy wasn't it?"

I share JB's high hopes, but I expect absolutely nothing. "Donald, look at the strange clothing these people wear. In this article here, will you look at that." "Yea, wow. When does the game start?"

[Tobin]

Every newspaper article seems learned and knowledgeable, unless it is about something you personally know something about, at which point it seems shallow where its correct, and egregious where it is not.

Man, you got that right! Every single time I see or read a media piece about a subject which I am knowledgeable, I cringe at how they either get the facts flat-out wrong, or they fail to sufficiently explain it. It's surprising that people place so much faith in what they see from the media, but even I'm guilty of it.

This article was nice, but it was a fluff piece. It wasn't really about the music at all. Writers these days have to make it a human-interest story just to keep readers interested. Hence all the character descriptions and words devoted to children. And the way she made it her own personal voyage of musical discovery, it seems more appropriate on a personal blog page, not the travel section of a major newspaper.

But it was still a pleasant read.

[journeybear]

Believe me, any high hopes I expressed are tempered with the surety that the probability anyone reading the article will be moved to get more involved with music, even to participating rather than just listening, is between slim and none, likely closer to the latter. Still, I keep hoping for the return to popularity of learning about and playing music, as was the custom a hundred years ago. I'm well aware that is unlikely to happen, with the prevalence of mass media and its ease of access, as well as reductions in school arts programs. But any attempts to move against this slide, are appreciated. If even a few readers get roused from complacency it will have been successful. On a very small scale, but even so, something in the right direction.

But yeah, it's a pretty light read about a subject most of their readers have little or no interest in or exposure to. Still, gotta start somewhere.

[journeybear]

Every single time I see or read a media piece about a subject which I am knowledgeable, I cringe at how they either get the facts flat-out wrong ...

Me, too. The soundtrack to them is nails on a blackboard. This is way off topic but .. Lat week I was watching "Around The Horn" on ESPN, and the moderator, Tony Reali, who is fond of working in pop culture references, made a comment early in the show about something being "automatic, like a U2 album." Now, I know very well that "Automatic" is an album by REM, not U2. I took it upon myself to see if I could get word to him or someone at the show so he could correct himself on air. (It's worth noting that if this had been on "Pardon The Interruption," which he used to produce and also had an on-air bit at the end in which he corrected errors by the panelists, and one of the panelists had made this gaffe, he would have said something in that segment.) This included composing a well-written tersely voiced message and registering and logging in so I could send it. Nothing happened, of course, though some intern sent me a standard email reply two days later. But I tried. OK, so my middle name is Quixote, but I tried.

[Eric C.]

The "Automatic" was a reference to the fact that the new U2 album was automatically downloaded to Apple products in the last OS upgrade.