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Double Bass Well, THAT was fun!

E

Ed S

Nov 14, 2019
1,983
3,032
#1
My go-to jam used to be 4-5 hrs on Sat a.m., at a farmers market in warm weather, a coffee shop in cold. These guys really challenged me to work on my chops when I started picking w/ them. Now - 8 yrs later or so, I feel I can actually hold my own w/ them and bring a little something of my own.

But I often sorta deprecated what I brought to to group. I mean, there are some really impressive pickers and fiddlers - plenty of folk to show off. My job was to be "Steady Eddy"! Which I did, and which we all appreciated.

Well, w/ Covid, I haven't played w/ these folk since March. I've been playing quite a bit - but I've been working on classical small group stuff to work on my bowing and fingering. And with my 3-piece string band, where we stray awfully far from BG. And, I've been working hard on my clawhammer.

Well, 4 of my favorite pickers from the regular jam started meeting, and asked me to join them. Today was my first time.

Boy, was that fun! But boy, did it give me an appreciation for what is involved in driving a steady beat. Felt like exercising a muscle you haven't used in a while. What had been unthinking second nature, no longer was! Gonna have to put in some time w/ a metronome this upcoming week.

Sure is more fun than golf (which I've been using to fill my Sat mornings.)
 
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#2
Sounds great! I'm waiting for my day of reckoning. I haven't had a call to play the upright since Covid let to all the shutdowns around here in March. I do have a steady project playing outdoors on bass guitar. But the upright gigs or sessions have not yet materialized.
 
#3
Forgot to mention - we were playing across the street from the CTA elevated tracks. ALMOST like The Blues Brothers! Every 5-10 minutes, a train would rumble by for 5-7 measures. Became a neat exercise, to go into a brief period of not being able to hear each other, and then see if we came out in time at the other end! :D
 
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#4
All right, another fun Sat section. But a tad different this week. I had put some effort in and was feeling solid and strong. Even brought my banjo in case another bassist showed up (ill spouse) and wanted to sit in for a song or 2. Well, the other folk started off wanting to hear me play banjo. Which went well enough, but I'm not really very good at banjo (YET!)

So then we started picking. DAMN - these guys (and one gal - freaking performance major violinist turned fiddler!) are good! Most of the time, the jams are big enough that I have to concentrate on herding the cats - keeping the chaos in SOME semblance of order. And I've played w/ most of these guys on gigs - but then we had agreed upon setlists, and usually a practice or 2.

This time, it was just one person after another calling out songs - most of which I'd HEARD before, but many I'd never played - or at least not in a long time. Held my own, but I expect better of myself. Well - this is the way to get better... Sat between 2 guitars - 1 is my favorite rhythm player, and the other is my favorite lead. Damn - I'm STILL grinning.
 
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#5
We just got called for an outdoor covidly-correct gig this coming Saturday night. Our band's bassist can't make it; I suspect I'll be playing banjo or mandolin, but we're still working on the set list so I might get to play DB too. Whatever the case, I'm glad for the chance to play. I've been keeping up my mando chops with jamming online every day, and have been practicing DB and banjo, but it's not like a live gig or even a face-to-face jam, so I've got some butterflies. Looking forward to it though.
 

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