Festival concert sets are interesting. Because there are so many talented teacher-performers, each of us get 7 minutes (=to 2 songs with some story set-up) to showcase our abilities, intrigue people in our recordings, fit the mood/theme of the gathering and fill the role of our slot in the program.
An opener’s job is to pull the crowd together into a cohesive group that will celebrate and enjoy the evening’s music. The one who ends a set (whether before an intermission or the end of the night), needs to send everyone out on a high energy wave of enthusiasm, difficult after a 3.5 hour concert, to be sure!
My slot was mid-way through the first set, so I chose “First Snow” on the hammered dulcimer to help the audience cool down from the oppressive heat of a Kentucky summer; and also play Jobim’s “Girl from Ipanema” a bossa nova piece on mountain dulcimer which has come to symbolize summers from my youth. Playing this in a new tuning (1-3-5, or F-A-C) provides for some rich chord possibilities! Both tunes were enthusiastically received.
Today, (arghh!) is Pirate Day, which puts me into a great mood for challenging my students to grow in their abilities and threaten to make them walk the plank for not practicing their homework from yestarrrrday! But when I get to my Blues/Jazz Mountain Dulcimer class, one of the students has left for another, more-compatible class, another one confesses that she was almost in tears (!) after yesterday’s class because it was so challenging to her. But, she bravely showed up and did a marvelous job!
Was able, finally, to meet Marcy Prochaska at lunch, and talk with Bruce Ford (from www.everythingdulcimer.com) who was my vending table neighbor.
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