So, that super-exciting thing I was promising!!!

[Tony Hardie-Bick]

Dave S wrote:
> Only on Saturday night, I had an *incredible* first-time jam with a little 
> fivesome of Nottingham folks: me on bass, my friends John on guitar, Matt on 
> tenor sax, Ney on percussion and vocals, and the icing on the cake (and this 
> really was a special thing), a Gambian guy called Sura who played the Kora.

Damn. Now you make me jealous. One other african instrument I really 
want to play with is djembe - someone really trained in the classical 
african tradition (like, really serious sh*t).

> What an incredible instrument!!!!!  The incredible player helped, admittedly - 
> this guy's thumbs moved faster than... well, faster than speeding thumbs 
> should be able to move!

The training for Kora, Djembe (and other drums) and the various 
marimba-like instruments is staggering. Like, they practice for months 
on one time sig, then months on another, then, a year or so later, start 
playing one in each hand at the same time. Then, there's melody...

> For me, this idea of a jam session of (relatively!) skilled musicians, playing 
> together for an audience, but without always knowing what to play... that's 
> pretty much the pinnacle of what I want to aim for musically these days.  
> (Though that's not saying I won't continue to do other things too.)

My aim has always been to construct on-the-fly. Certain combinations of 
instrument work better than others. Three is a good number, with only 
one of those playing any kind of chords. I'm also intrigued about 
sufficient variation, and there's a balance between constructability and 
variance that can be achieved, that I think is much higher than one 
imagines, when approaching such a project at the beginning.

> So, the only remaining question is: where do we go from here?  :-)

Go with the flow. If you're willing to give out, the universe gives 
back. If there seems no outlet, then practice, practice, practice. About 
a year ago I asked myself how many hours a day I spent at a computer, 
programming, email, whatever, and how many I spent practicing. I swapped 
the two numbers around. We'll see if music can pay the rent as well as 
programming (even Free Music ;) )

Tony (HB)