I've been hoping to meet some old-time music people where I live here in Flint, MI.  Well, tonight there's a bluegrass jam at a local school.  I'm just gonna show up with my string bass and see what happens.

http://www.michiganbluegrass.com/mb-special.html

I'm not exactly a bluegrasser, but I can play bass in just about any context.  Maybe I'll meet a fiddler who wants to do some old-time stuff.

I'll add to this post when I get home.  Man, it's been a long time.

10:48 PM

Well, I'm home.  That was fun.  The amazing thing is that this event is HUGE now.  I took my Reiter and the bass.  I walked around the school until I found a room with no bass player.  I played bass with a group of folks singing old bluegrass songs (no banjo).  It was fun.

I actually got the banjo out, and people love to hear that "frailin' banja," which was pretty cool.  I sang harmony backup on a few tunes, and tried to do "Lonesome Valley."  Forgot most of the words.

There were nice old guys there: Ernie, Don, Vern, and a guy name Razorback.  They were glad I showed up.  I was too.  I'll go next month.

I put out a flier called "got fiddle?" to try to meet someone to do old-time music with.  The flier said:

My name is Steve, and I'm looking for a fiddler in the Flint/Genesee County area.  I am hoping to find someone who is interested in working on old-time/pre-bluegrass fiddle duets.  I play clawhammer banjo (fretted and fretless), as well as flatpick guitar and string bass.  I'd like to work up country fiddle tunes and songs along the lines of the 1920s and 1930s "old-time" and "hillbilly" recordings by The Skillet Lickers, The Carter Family, Uncle Dave Macon, Earl Johnson, The Stripling Bros, etc.

If you play the fiddle and you're interested in doing some duets with banjo and guitar, this could be fun.  If we work up enough tunes we could play a coffeehouse or two. 

I think I'll just show up there once a month, play bass, and put out that flier.  Maybe I can get some old-time folks to come.  We could have an "old-time" room there.

These nice fellas kept wanting me to sing and call tunes.  We tried to do some fiddle tunes in D, but it really didn't work.  Soldier's Joy, Old Joe Clark.  They mostly play those as songs--1/4/5 kinda things. I can do that on bass all day long, but it's new for me on banjo.

They really did like the frailing, so I ended up playing a fair amount of banjo in G, D, and A.  It was fun.