Hometown Streetmosphere

Back in Fort Collins, I was playing my Friday night Streetmosphere gig on Mountain Ave by Enzio's restaurant (bless their wait staff for providing me with ice water in the 90°+ heat!)

My friend John Drege stopped by and took some photos.  Highlights:  a just-married couple stopped by to get some photos taken in front of the murals, a Grandma and Grandbaby enjoyed the music and several bicyclists stopped, too.

G-ma and grandbaby enjoy the acoustic tunes

dulci-bro is always good on a sweaty day!

what a mural!

The dulcimer even stops bicycles!

Back home after 4,500 miles, 9 states and 24 days....

My midwest, early summer tour is now completed and I am glad to be back home!  This was a much longer time away than I prefer, but that is how the festival season ended up.  Despite the cancellation of a festival in the middle due to extreme damage from April storms to the festival location, I was able to fill in the open days and even give a benefit concert with my buddy Kerry Patrick Clark at his church in Maumee, OH where we raised $1,700 for the survivors of the Oklahoma tornadoes.

Venues included:  festivals, house concerts, the Dayton Veterans Administration Hospital and Hospice unit, some churches, a live in-studio radio show, a couple of churches and some afternoon workshops.  Most were solo performances, but it all wrapped up with a hot time at the Americana Music Academy in Lawrence, KS with Erin and Amber Rogers of Scenic Roots, who had been spending the week teaching the Kids Camp.

Here are some views from some of the venues across the 9 states:

Kick-Off Barn Dance for Three Rivers Dulcimer Festival, LaCrosse, WI

Ohashi-Berg House Concert set up, Rochester, MN

With buddy Joe Jencks (of Brother Sun) at Lake Michigan, Evanston, IL

Kerry Patrick and Amy Clark with their sponsored Butterfly in Whitehouse, OH

Bluegrass Ensembles, KMW, Bardstown, KY

Kentucky Music Week Merchandise Table

Evans House Concert, Blacklick, OH

Emanuel Episcopal (Rick Thum, special guest) St. Louis, MO

Anderson-Little House Concert, St. Louis

Our Place on Park Place (Fowler, Wichita, KS)

Lawrence, KS

Kids Jam after the American Music Academy Concert with Scenic Roots (Erin Rogers, standing)

The Sound System Died...but the Music Lived On!

Near the end of the 2nd to last set in the concluding Saturday night concert at the Lagniappe Dulcimer Society's annual Fete in Port Allen (Baton Rouge), Lousiana, there was a loud pop(!) and the sound system stopped working.

Ken Bloom and his new friend, Charlie Patton of Mississippi, were playing a duet of bowed dulcimers on Klezmer Tunes and everything went suddenly....acoustic.

These were acoustic instruments, however, so the music didn't stop.

My set was the final one of the night and because it was clear that they high school gymnasium was going to be an unplugged venue, I launched into my set, reminding people that this is how Old Time Music was always played.  

The mountain dulcimer isn't a loud instrument, but it did just fine with She Thinks My Dulcimer's Sexy, and then the Dulci-bro (a resonator instrument that uses the first "amplification" technology of the twentieth century) sang out loud and clear.

Sharrie George's Taylor guitar did just fine with my fingerpicked version of Didn't Know I Was Lost (Until You Found Me), and Ken Bloom joined me for a Galax Dulcimer / Bowed Dulcimer duet on Miss McLeod's Reel, (thanks for the instrument loan, Bob Magowan!) and I ended the set with our planned trio:  me: hammered dulcimer (thanks Peggy Carter!), Ken and Charlie Patton on bowed dulcimers dancing up the fine Ragtime Annie tune.  (See photo on right.)

Reviews from those in attendance were that the sound was fine and well-balanced.

It is a little bit anachronistic that we players of old-time musical instruments have come to depend upon modern electronic sound systems, and we listeners of live music have come to expect that that amplified sounds are "better" for listening...when in this instance, those leaning in to listen had a fine experience without the electronic support!

Artist Interview for Concerts in Your Home

Here is a link to an interview that was conducted while I was on the road in Kansas early last summer.

The interview was conducted by Fran Snyder of Concerts In Your Home for the artist's directory of this network which gets performing musicians connected with people who like to host concerts in their living rooms!(which, incidentally, is one of my favorite places to play.)

http://lrnblog.posterous.com/renewal-interview-steve-eulberg (This link has been removed, so please look below!)

Some interesting questions led me to some interesting answers.

Please let me know what you think!

Act Name: Steve Eulberg

Member of CIYH since: 2008-06-19

1. Describe your most memorable house concert experience.

Anytime someone who is leaning away begins to move toward live acoustic music:

For Example:

My teenaged godson's girlfriend was brought by him to one of my house concerts.  She related to his dad on the way home, "When I heard this was going to be a Folk concert, I was pretty scared.  But this was a great concert!"  

When people from different parts of my life show up in the same place and begin (or discover) connections with each other! The crooked lines make the straightest paths to relationship phenomena!

For example:

A friend from college agrees to host a house concert at her parents' home in central Ohio.  One of my on-line JamPlay students, who has hosted a house concert for me before, comes with his wife and one of my far-flung students from southern California flies into town for a continuing education event, but convinces her daughter that they must both come to my concert before she goes to her daughter's home.   Turns out that the daughter and my college friend have some connection that they hadn't realized before.  And here we all are, filling a living room with song!

2. What's your best opening line? (from one of your songs, or one of your favorites) 

Can't choose just one!

Growing Up in an uneasy time, blue stars on the windows.... (from "war is sweet" on "a piece of it all")

or 

Mailman's come and gone, brought a letter from my old mom, still singin the same old song....(from "porch swingin' " on "a piece of it all")

You and I agree, we should live apart.... (from "sad" from "a piece of it all")

Rippling Wave of a bounding squirrel, jumping rope of a knee-socked little girl... (from "beauty in the world" from "a piece of it all")

3. What song is most likely to make you cry? (if you were the crying kind)

My name is Sam, I'm the family dog.... (Berkley-Hart on Crow)

4. How many miles did you drive last year?

oy, The car now has almost 230,000 miles on it...but I couldn't tell for sure about last year.  Several flying miles, too.

5. What is your favorite thing about house concerts?

The personal connection and the ability to interact with an audience.

6. If you could no longer sell your music on CD, what would you do differently?

Use the digital downloading process I've got set up.

7. When is the last time someone critiqued your song, suggested a way to make it better, and you agreed?

I was saying "I Said Nothing" too many times in that song and someone suggested that I say it less, and let the actually "nothing" say it.  Tremendous advice!

8. Have you ever watched yourself do a full concert on video? If so, what did you learn?

Yes.  Recently released one on DVD.  I should wear taller socks or longer pants!  Lighting design can make a big difference....sometimes I go with the flow and the flow takes me where I shouldn't go...Could use more tightness in my between song banter when I have full sets.  I can certainly craft that for the showcase or festival sets, but have to continue working on that wrinkle.

9. Is there anyone you like to go to for songwriting help or advice? If so, who?

Russ Hopkins, Kiva Records.

10. What is the best stage name of all time?

Slim Pickens.

11. Car you drive vs the car you'd most like to drive. 

I'm renting a Prius for this tour and so, at the moment, it fits both categories!

12. What percentage of your songs are about love relationships?

30%

13. You can bring back any dead artist, and be their apprentice for a month, who do you choose?

Jim Croce, hands down.  That dude could tell a vivid story!

14. You can recruit anyone in the world to manage your artistic career, who is it?

Holly Near.

15. You can work with any living record producer. Who do you choose for your next project?

Ken Whiteley, Pyramid Records in Toronto.

16. You must personally destroy every instrument you own, except one. Which do you keep? Which do you destroy first/last, and why?

My voice is the one I keep. 

I refuse to destroy the instruments, I'll give them away...or if I must appear to destroy them, I'll disassemble them, distribute the parts and instructions on rebuilding them to people across the world.

17. Cat, dog, or goldfish?

Dog.

18. Writing retreat. You can go anywhere in the world for 2 weeks, where do you go? One instrument, one suitcase - what do you bring?

Nova Scotia--never been there and I'd love to see what it brings out of me.

Guitar, my pillow and my slippers.

19. Plan B, or no Plan B?

Plan B is work Plan A harder, or adapt it and work it smarter.

1BlueString.com

Today I did it.  I put a blue string on my guitar.  One of my colleagues in my Union Local, Karen Brandow, had told me about the 1in6.org campaign called 1BlueString.org

For 19 years my spouse had worked in the field of sexual and domestic violence. Throughout that time the published statistic was that 1 in 3 women would be assaulted in her lifetime and 1 in 7 boys would be a victim of sexual abuse.

Recent statistics reveal that despite an ongoing campaign to uncover and reduce this statistic, it has grown:  now 1 in 6 boys will be a victim of sexual abuse.

I am close to too many families and loved ones where this pain is being dealt with for a lifetime not to add my small effort to raise awareness.  

So I've joined the campaign.

And you can too at 1BlueString.org

Albuquerque, here I come!

Whiskey Before Breakfast kicks off the Faculty Concert on Friday night (L-R:  Ken Kolodner, Gretchen van Houten, Steve Eulberg, Neal Hellman, Janita Backer, Irma Reeder and Scott Reeder )

I was honored to be part of an amazing staff and faculty for the 3rd Annual New Mexico Dulcimer Festival in Albuquerque in the middle of October.

Hosted by Hope in the Desert Episcopal Church with mind-tickling views to the east:

(A controlled burn...we always hope!)

and the sunset to the west (looking out the front doors of the church each night:

The glories of the American Southwest on stunning display

were inspiration to the many students who gathered from across the region and the country.  Students were present from California, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, Kansas, Texas, Oklahoma and parts east.

Bluegrass on Mountain Dulcimer was a very popular class!

I was able to teach with some of my mentors and now friends!

Neal Hellman's ChordBook finally opened the mountain
dulcimer forme nearly 30 years ago.

Janita Baker:  her Blues and Ragtime book
expanded the dulcimer for me!

And I was tickled to have Ken Kolodner fiddle away with me on Mississippi Sawyer, Liberty and Ragtime Annie:

Fiddling master Ken Kolodner

and Miss McLeod's/Have You Gone to Meeting, Uncle Joe? for which I played Galax style:

Backstage warm-up

And, of course, everyone was glad to know that "She Thinks My Dulcimer's Sexy":

Best played on Baritone

Scott and Irma Reeder and their compadres put on an amazing event that helps to anchor both kinds of dulcimers in the Rocky Mountains!  

Next up?  The Colorado Dulcimer Festival, Feb 1-2, 2013 in Fort Collins!

Special thanks to Peter Eshrick for sharing these photos.  View his entire photo album here

Back in the Studio

Friday, October 5, 2012, Vi Wickam and I stepped into Aaron Youngberg's Swingfingers Studio to begin recording tracks for our debut CD, Old School OldTime as FiddleWhamdiddle.  Here are some photos from our 1st session:

My first mountain dulcimer in its dulcimer "cubbie"

Hammered Dulcimer Set-up

Brent Hawley adding mandolin and guitar

Engineer Aaron Youngberg at the controls

Vi "tuning up"

Another view of the dulcimer cubbie, with McSpadden Special

My Ben Seymour Galax dulcimer ready to go 

Vi in the fiddle booth as we get ready to go...

Our CD release party is set for Friday, December 14th at Avogadro's Number in Fort Collins.