For the past six months or so, I've had the good fortune of spending a few mornings and afternoons with the young patients and their families and medical professionals at Children's Memorial Hospital and Comer Children's Hospital at the University of Chicago.

All this talk about playing music and learning about music and the history of music and it's funny how, when it all comes down to it, music is so simple.

If you can sing the ABCs song, you have a good chance of getting a smile from a very young lady who is living a life with some very big challenges. 

If you can sing it again, when she asks, you'll never see such a big smile in all your life. 

“A melody is just a melody.  The cultural information is in the details.”

-David Greely at The Fiddle Club of the World, February 24, 2012

I’ve been thinking about this quote a lot this week.  David was talking about learning to play cajun fiddle of one of the masters. 

I'm trying to do something similar. 

I’m taking Chicago Blues Harp III with the legendary Joe Filisko at the Old Town School of Folk Music.  This is my third session taking the class and it’s challenging me as a player in ways I thought was not possible in a group class setting.  

I’ve been thing about the David Greely quote because I believe that hearing, and then re-creating the details is one of the most challenging things a student can aim for.  

I listen and listen and listen to the recordings from class.  I know that I sound different from Joe, but why?  Is it my breath?  Is it how I’m holding the harmonica?  Am I doing something different with my tongue.  Of course the answer is YES TO ALL, but I’m not sure what to change.  It can be quite frustrating.  How do I practice efficiently?  What is the important cultural information that Joe is trying to pass along to me? When will I sound like that?

I’m sure that in time, I’ll know.  But for now, I’ll keep trying to be cool and not get too frustrated. And I’ll just keep working; developing my ear and my music.

Here is a short sample of what I’m aiming for.  The piece I’m working on is called Chicago Blues Solo - 7.  The focus of the piece is the "shuffle vamp".  The first track is Joe playing a bit of it.  The second track is me playing it after about a week of practice.  We’ll see how close I can get by next week. 

Hey!
Did you hear that? I'm learning to speak French! 

I'd write about that in French, but, the thing is, I don't have the time at the moment to learn how to write French. I'm going to concentrate on speaking it.

To learn I'm listening to the Coffee Break French podcasts.  I think these are great.  Before I went to México in 2006 I listened to Coffee Break Español, and I think it was very helpful in the first days I was there.

To that end, Judy composed this wonderful song for me.  It's called Bonjour Ami.  It's designed in a way that, as my vocabulary grows, I'll be able to add or change it to reflect my new words.  So cool!

Do you speak French?  Or do you speak another language?  Are there songs that you've learned to help with your vocabulary?  Make a simple recording and send it my way and I'll post it on my blog.  

On Sunday, February 19th, my folk band of young musicians, The Young Stracke All-Stars, had a surprise guest.  Because of a scheduling oversight, guitarist Leni Stern was at the Old Town School with nothing to do but wait until her cab came to take her to the airport.

I overheard a conversation she was having about the schedule, and thought, “Ah ha!”  I introduced myself and told her that the Young Stracke All-Stars had practice in twenty minutes.  If she felt inclined, she would be more than welcome to stop by and show us some of her music or just hang out with us.

She said she’d love to, and I nervously organized a practice schedule.  I knew it would be fun, but I never dreamed that we’d have the experience that we did.

But before we go on, a little background.  First, you can find an more in-depth biography on her web site, but here is a little bit about her.  She was born in Germany and her first instrument was the piano.  Then at age 11 she picked up the guitar.  Later she moved to New York City to play jazz.

Here’s a video of her jazz group.

I’m not sure when she started playing African music.  That’ll have to be a question for next time.  But, yes, much of the music Leni makes now is based on African styles and the group she brought to the Old Town School are called The Masters of African Percussion.  

Here’s is a video of her playing in that group.  This was not taken at the Old Town School of Folk Music. 

Leni, and the bass player from the group Mamadou Koné, came into our practice room and right away they were so happy to meet the All-Stars.  We all got our instruments out and got tuned up.  Leni asked us if we’d play a song so we dove into some Black Eyed Suzie.  We were a little rusty at first, but by the third time through we were really cookin’.  Leni said such nice, specific, things about our music; noticing our rhythm, our intonation and our dynamics.  I took note of this because good musicians and good teachers notice these things.    

When we were done with Black Eyed Suzie, Leni asked us some questions about our instruments and the classes at the Old Town School of Folk Music.  It was great to answer her questions first, and created a space were a lot of give and take could happen. 

Then, Leni, who was born in Germany, and Mamadou, who was born in Senegal, demonstrated their music and their instruments.  Mamadou plays electric bass, which many of us were already familiar with.   Leni plays electric guitar, but this afternoon played an instrument called an n’goni if you live in Mali, or an xalam (pronounced "zah-LAHM") if you live in Senegal, where Mamadou is from.

The n’goni has seven strings that are fingered like a violin and four string that are there for sympathetic resonance or to strum like a harp. I can’t remember what kind of wood the neck is made out of, but the body is carved out ebony.  That’s a cow skin on the top.  On a banjo the top is called a head.  Leni added the guitar tuners herself.  Traditionally, a series of knots are used to keep the n’gonis in tune.  

After some chatting and some more music, Leni and Mamadou wanted to teach us a song.  They explained that in African music there are thousands of named rhythms that people all know.  Knowing rhythms in their culture is equivalent to knowing songs in our culture.   Mamadou taught us the rhythm called Takamba.  Here’s a recording of us clapping it.

Mamadou stressed that in African culture, musicians don’t count beats like we do in American culture.  He explained, "The reason why I'm not counting is because, over there [in Africa], no one really counts.  You have to feel the music inside.  And then when the music comes, your going to feel where it is."   I found this very fascinating.  This is how I learn all my music, as an adult, but as a young person I was first taught to read standard notation, and to count.  Personally, I find more value in the African method.   

He also talked about the collective memory of music in Africa.  In the culture that Takamba comes from, there are whole families called griots who’s whole job is to be the memory of all the music.  The rhythms are not written down as they would be in our culture.  People pass the rhythms to each other only by playing the rhythms. 

Leni was eager to share how one would write it down, though, and you can see that on the blackboard in the above picture.  

Now that we knew the takamba rhythm, Leni and Mamadou added their instruments.  Here’s a recording of the All-Stars clapping Takamba, with Leni and Mamadou accompanying us on n’goni and bass.

All right!  By now we were all feeling great and were ready for the next challenge.  Leni and Mamadou showed us how we could play the Takamba rhythm on our instruments using just open E and A strings, or E and A notes anywhere on our instruments.  It sounded wonderful!  As we played Leni slipped into one of her songs called Show Me Your Face.  Here’s a recording.

And the musical fun went on from there.  We continued to chat about music in Africa and the world.  We talked about writing our own songs.  Leni passed around the n’goni and everyone got to play it.  The n’goni was awesome to play.  It was the first time I had ever played one, but the tune Cluck Old Hen came right out of my hand before I even knew what to do.  That made me feel great and I was so proud that all the All-Stars could sing along with me.

At the end of practice, Leni pulled out a bag full of different kinds of shakers and silver bells that’s she’s collected from around the world.  Many of them are designed to be worn on one’s ankles or wrists.  That’s what we’re doing in this picture; shaking things and tying things to our legs and noticing all the different bells and shells and dried nuts and other materials.  There was even a shaker made of goat toenails!

After practice, I had lunch with Leni and Mamadou.  Leni shared with me some stories and information about a school that she works with called the International Center for Arts and Music in Ouidah, which is in Benin on the western coast of Africa.  Hopefully the Young Stracke All-Stars can share some music with the young students at this school through technology like Skype.  Here is a wonderful video about the school.

If you’re reading this, Leni and Mamadou, thank you so much.  Your visit was such an inspiration.  

To everyone else, I want to share one more thing.  You’ve probably heard me say this before.  Please, never hide your music.  You never know who’s going to sit down next to you and maybe, because of your music, you’ll make a new friend (as we did on Sunday) who can share with you so many wonderful things about the world.  I wonder who you’re going to meet as you sit in the halls of the Old Town School of Folk Music, or on the park benches and front porches of your town or neighborhood.  After you do meet them, please write to tell me what tunes you played, what songs your shared or what cultures you learned about. 

Merci á tous,
Jason

P.S.
 The Young Stracke All-Stars would like to thank Jimmy Tomasello, Guitar Program Manager at the Old Town School of Folk Music, for helping to make this happen.

My co-teacher and very good friend, Maria McCullough and I visited Newcastle, England last April.  We took part in The Hexham Gathering, which is a festival of young musicians from all over England, hosted by Folkworks at Sage at Gateshead.  You can read about all of our adventures here.

As I had heard, that was a very big sound.  Two guitars, two drum sets on many songs.  Two violins.  Two keyboard/pianos.

But not much in the way of melody or interesting arrangement of all those instruments.

Except this song.  This tune is truly awesome.
Sprawl II
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0L6ZFhZVOx0

Even in this video someone (whoever the main guy) sings over this lady's voice. 

But, I was glad that I was there with my very good friend, John.  It's great to go to a show with a fellow critical ear.

Last night Ariel and I went dancing at The Atlantic. The Polkaholics were playing and they're always great.  Just a little loud.  I'm nervous that my ears may never recover.

It was great to dance.  I don't know why more people aren't brave enough.  So much fun!

When I was a kid, middle school age, I wanted to build roller coasters and I always got a thrill thinking about other people riding the coasters that I would build.  Up, down, left, right, fast and slow, round and round, anticipation and action.

I ended up being a musician and it dawned on me on Thursday night that it's pretty much the same thing.  And, I still love the thrills.