Don’t forget to visit the lesson page or click on the link below to view the lesson’s written material

Click Here To Download The Lesson PDF

And here is the lesson video for your enjoyment:

Thanks for watching and feel free to comment below,
Baron

Don’t forget to visit the lesson page or click on the link below to view the lesson’s written material

Click Here To Download The Lesson PDF

And here is the lesson video for your enjoyment:

Thanks for watching and feel free to comment below,
Baron

When I graduated from high school I was thoroughly engrossed in music and was fairly certain I wanted music to be a big part of my studies at college. I toyed with the idea of going to music school, but at that point I wasn’t really ready to go to any sort of college. I applied to some schools with the mindset “I guess I could go here, it looks pretty good”. Not the best attitude to have when you are spending a lot of money. I took a year to think before heading to college and tried to figure out what it was I really wanted. I looked at some other school that seemed a little more down my alley, and found one that looked pretty ideal. Hampshire College in Amherst, Massachusetts was the one school out of probably 20 total that really hit home with me. I still can’t explain exactly what it is, but I am as happy as I could have ever hoped to be.

The thing is, music was still a huge part of my life and I wanted to take full advantage of that. After a semester at Hampshire, I started thinking more and more about music school, mainly the New England Conservatory (as well as Berklee College Of Music). By the beginning of the spring semester I was seriously considering transferring.

Hampshire is unlike other liberal arts colleges in that, as a student, you are required to create a self directed concentration rather than choose from a list of majors. Students receive written evaluations rather than letter grades, and there is a strong emphasis on independent studies and collaborative efforts. As part of the Five Colleges, students are able to take classes at Smith, Mount Holyoke, Amherst College and UMASS Amherst fore free.

However, even for a liberal arts school, the music department is underwhelming. There are great musicians all over campus (as well as in the surrounding colleges and communities), but there is a certain lack of structure and emphasis to hold the academic community together. Classes are limited (though with the other 4 colleges and the option to create your own courses, that point can be argued), and in general Hampshire doesn’t have the “bells and whistles” that schools like NEC do.

Ultimately I decided to stay at Hampshire. I gave up the opportunities to further immerse myself in music and to have access to more resources in order to follow my preferred path of education in an environment that I found more agreeable. My friends and faculty at Hampshire played a big part in my decision to stay, and I wasn’t willing to give up the atmosphere that made Hampshire my first choice when I first apllied to colleges.

Anyone else gone through a similar process? As always, feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments section below.

Thanks.
Baron

It was my fourth year at the festival, which has been going for over 30 years. Every year has been the best year yet, and it is one of the very few summer engagements that have achieved permanent residency on my calendar year after year.

This year was no exception, and to top it all off there was a huge thunder storm on saturday night with some of the most spectacular lightning i have ever experienced. Take a look for yourself at some highlights for a few years back.

The weather was only a tiny part of it. This years festival was graced by acts like Tim O’Brien, Del McCoury, Sam Bush Band, David Grisman, Crooked Still, and many other top notch bands. 4 days of musical ecstasy, great food, great jamming, beautiful scenery, the list goes on.

Take a look around their website and see what you think. If you are nearby next summer, I highly suggest you make it out there. I drive 7 hours each way every year, and every second of that drive pays off.

Any grey fox folks out there? what were your personal highlights? comment below.

Keep Picking and thanks for reading,
Baron

Homespun Tapes boasts a wide range of mandolin lessons, including videos from such artists as:

Chris Thile
Bill Monroe
Sam Bush
Mike Marshall
Ronnie McCoury
David Grisman
Norman Blake

So take a look and see what you can find that interests you. Each is loaded with enough information to make you watch it many many times, and there is no better way than to learn from the masters.

Thanks,
Baron

According to his website, his new album Chicken & Egg will be released on July 13th.

Amazon has sound clips up on their website and from the samples it sounds like top quality stuff and I would expect nothing less from such a musician. Tim is a phenomenal musician and all around great guy. I highly recommend you check out his music and go see him live if he ever comes to a venue near you, you won’t be disappointed.

Thanks for stopping by,
Baron

Left and right hand technique have a lot to do with the sound you ultimately are able to get out of your instrument and the fluidity with which you are able to play. It is important to take each hand as a separate entity and focus on it exclusively while working on technique. Our minds can only process so much at one time and the more concentration we can put towards one task the better our outcome will be.

In the long run you are looking to have great independent technique in both your hands, as well as a seamless connection between the two. The seamlessness can, however, only come once the independent hands can function correctly and unconsciously.

So without further ado, here are lessons that will teach proper right and left and technique:

Thanks,
Baron

Every year I go to three of the above. I attend a friends private gathering in the deep eastern maine coastlands, which is a great place to catch up with friends, play some music (on stage at times), enjoy potluck dinners, and enjoy the natural beauty of the area. There are usually between 30 and 100 people there throughout the weekend, and is a very relaxed and happy environment.

I also attend the Blistered Fingers Bluegrass Festival in Litchfield, Maine (formerly in Sidney, Maine), which gets a substantially larger crowd, usually between 500 and 1000 attendees, a dozen or so bands play each day, and the festival usually brings in a couple reasonably well respected bands.

Then there is the Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival. Grey Fox is a large bluegrass festival in Oak Hill, New York. The first time I attended Grey Fox I knew it was an event that I wouldn’t miss again. It will be my fourth year this July, and I am just as excited as ever.

Grey Fox is a chance to see many of the greatest bluegrass bands of our time in one small time frame. In the four official days of the festival, festival goers will get a chance to see (list from gretfoxbluegrass.com):

DRY BRANCH FIRE SQUAD (host band all four days)
SAM BUSH BAND (Sat)
TIM O’BRIEN BAND (Sat)
KATHY MATTEA BAND (Sat)
DEL McCOURY BAND (Fri)
DAVID GRISMAN BLUEGRASS EXPERIENCE (Fri)
DOYLE LAWSON AND QUICKSILVER (Thu)
THE GIBSON BROTHERS (Sat)
RAILROAD EARTH (Fri
THE GREENCARDS (Fri/Sat)
GREENSKY BLUEGRASS (Thu)
DONNA THE BUFFALO (Thu/Fri)
CROOKED STILL (Thu/Fri)
THE WILDERS (Fri/Sat)
SPECIAL CONSENSUS (Sat/Sun)
SARAH JAROSZ (Fri/Sat)
JOSH WILLIAMS BAND (Thu/Fri)
DELLA MAE (Thu/Fri/Sat)
ROCKIN’ ACOUSTIC CIRCUS (Thu/Fri/Sat)
THE HILLBENDERS (Thu/Fri)
BUDDY MERRIAM AND BACKROADS (Thu)
BILL KEITH (Fri/Sat)
THE PROFESSORS OF BLUEGRASS (Sat/Sun)
THE SWEETBACK SISTERS (Fri)

Pretty incredible, right? If this looks like something you would enjoy, I suggest looking around and seeing what is in your area. Some major festivals include:

Telluride Bluegrass Festival
Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival
Bean Blossom Bluegrass Festival
Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival – Free!

Thats all for now, but there is much more to come, including some of the best parts of bluegrass festivals for us musicians.

Have a favorite festival? let me know about it and I may add it to the list. Comment below!

Thanks
Baron

If you haven’t yet read Episode One, click here

One of the most important things to keep in mind when approaching practice is that variety is key. If you sat in your room and practiced 24/7 for 10 years, you may come out sounding fantastic, but you would probably loathe the instrument and never want to play again. In order to maintain interest in your music, you music spend some time doing unrelated activities.

Now you may be thinking “But I love playing music and I all I want to do is practice practice practice!” That is great, and you will likely go far with your musical career. However, you should keep in mind that there is more to life than concentrating your efforts on one single interest. By diversifying your day to day schedule, you will maintain peak interest in the things you love to do, rather than overdoing it and burning out, never wanting to play again.

So make a list (it can be a mental list) of your interests, hobbies, and what you wish to accomplish in the long term, and make sure that you don’t abandon them simply by feeling the need to be practicing for all of your waking hours. For me, I love music, food, spending time outdoors, working on this website and blog, going to college, spending time with friends, etc. If I were to disregard all of these things I love except music, I would be leading a far less rich life.

You still may be thinking “Yes, but I really want to be maximizing my musical abilities and feel like I spend too much time not doing music.” Fair enough, I have thought the same. What is important is to remember that to maximize your musical life and ability, you can’t shut out everything else. There are ways of conducting your life in a balanced, holistic manor that still keep your focus on what you love to do most. Here are a few ways I can keep myself in check to make sure I am living a balanced life and still concentrating on my music:

I Connect My Other Interests To Music

Exercise is an important aspect of staying healthy, but I am poor at remembering to exercise often. Recently, by putting exercise into the context of musicianship, I have been able to keep a more healthy and rewarding exercise routine. Music is ultimately a physical activity as much as it is a mental and creative activity, and exercise is a great way to avoid many of the injuries common among musicians (see The Importance Of Staying Relaxed). By keeping my body in a healthy physical condition, I am simultaneously keeping my physical ability on my instrument at its peak.

The same can be said for spiritual health and wellness. By keeping your mind at ease through religious practice, devotion, and/or meditation, you can allow your music to be played with that same ease. Check out my post on the book Effortless Mastery by Kenny Werner, which is a great introduction to the mental game of music without being pigeonholed into a particular religion or set of religious beliefs.

Other ways I conduct my life to maximize my goals and musicality include:

Keeping a socially active lifestyle. Music isn’t music unless there are people to enjoy it or to enjoy playing it with you.

Avoiding television at all costs. Television can take countless hours away from time that you could be practicing. If everyone devoted half of the time they spend in front of a television to learning a musical instrument, the world would be a very different place.

Listening to the music of others. Without inspiration, there would be no music. Music is an auditory timeline of the history of human life and culture, and each kind of music out there is created through the influence and inspiration of musicians through time and space.

Thoughts? Comments? Additions? Let us hear about them in the comments below.

Thanks for your time and interest,
Baron