It seems so long ago already, but was just last Wednesday.  That morning I skipped my morning Spanish classes to play some music with these young men.  They go to a school called Communidad de Niños, which is just a couple blocks from where I've been staying.  It's a school where all the kids only have on parent.  Nicholas, who is one of the people that run the school, and I met at Mario's taco stand the week before.  I volunteered to come in and share my music.  Nicholas and I made plans using my broken español and a lot of smiles.  I didn't know what to expect, but I really wanted to visit a school and share my music.

It was great to be there.  The kids, who's ages range from 4 to 10, were all very excited to have a visitor.  The room we were in just happened to have a giant picture book style atlas.  So we looked at the map and found Chicago, and then found Cuernavaca.  The older kids, particularly Brian and Irving, where very curious about learning words in English, and they were very understanding and helped a when I didn't know a word in Spanish. 

So, we sang in íngles y español and learned about the banjo. One of my proudest moments of the trip was being able to share Jump Jim Joe, which is a dance that my students and I do all the time in Chicago.  First you find a partner and tomen sus manos (hold h.  Then it goes,

Jump, jump, jump Jim Joe.
Shake your head and nod your head
and tap your toe.
Round, round, round you go
Then you find another partner and you
Jump Jim Joe!
                       and then it starts again.

This is a picture of the cheat sheet I used.  I was so nervous to try it, but I'm very glad I did!  And of course, like everybody who jumps Jim Joe, there was so much laughter and smiles and hugging, we could have Jumped Jim Joe all morning.

This was a great experience and in it's own way similar to the experience Shana and I had in Morelia. What if there was a way for me to do this all the time?  Hum . . . . .

After school, I went home, dropped my stuff off, and when back downtown to Cafe Gringo to meet up with Erensto.  Cafe Gringo is awesome.  It's beautiful inside.  The building that it is in is 200 years old.

Like a lot of places in el Centro, it doesn't look very big from the outside, but when you walk in you find that there's a pretty good sized garden area.  So Ernesto and I played some improvised music pieces, which was great.  And then some of his friends showed up.  I took a break from playing with Oscar (on keyboard), Richardo (on guitar) and Ernesto, played some post-bop standards.  One this I learned yesterday was that there is a lot of young people in Cuernavaca that like post-bop and fusion music.  Who knew?

After we were done at Cafe Gringo, we went over to El Manojo, one of my favorite spots in Cuernavaca, to hear some music.  The place was packed!  Turns out, there was some sort of a fusion variety concert or something.  I never quite understood.  Ernesto, Oscar and Richardo played again.  This time they were joined by Julian on drum set, Andres on congas and Agustin on bass.  Pretty cool stuff.  I joined them, as did  some other players for a big jam session at the end of their set.  Very fun, but I couldn't hear a darn thing.  I recorded it with my phone, but it's too much sound and didn't record well. 

Two interesting people that I met last night.

This is Pavel.  He plays jarocho music and makes jaranas and requintos.  He's a really interesting guy.  He's studying how to make an instrument called the banjoquinto, which is the traditional instrument of Morelos, the state where Cuernavaca is.  I hope to get to his workshop this week to see his instruments, and learn about the music of Morelos. 

Also, he knows about the Old Town School.  ¡Qué padre!

Another interesting person I met (I don't have a picture yet) is Catherine.  Catherine is from San Francisco and is now a music teacher at an elementary school.  She has an Irish music session today (Saturday) at Cafe Gringo.  Can't wait to check that out.

OK.  Onwards!

I took my banjo to school today and I was really glad I did.  We have ten minute breaks every hour and during a couple of those breaks I took out my banjo and played for a few minutes.  It's not much, but it certainly is relaxing.  It just makes me feel like I'm really being myself.  It's surprising the difference even a couple minutes of playing makes in my mood.

Today was the day that I was supposed to meet with Ismael en El Centro to learn some songs en español.  I waited outside the bar ES3 like we talked about,  but he didn't come by.  No big thing.  I just sat and played and relaxed.  And look who ran into me!  This is Jennifer.  She is a high school teacher and she used to work at the Old Town School.  She teaches íngles at elementary schools now.  It was great to catch up.

During this vaijo perqueño, I ran into some interesting people though.  This is Carlos (in the blue shirt) and his friends.  They work at a music shop that I stumbled onto.  They all play heavy metal guitar, but they were interested in my banjo.  They asked me to play some tunes, and then I handed it over to them.  I love watching people figure out how the banjo works.  Musicians take to it right way.  

I also ran into Ernesto, who I met last weekend at ES3.  He was one of the musicians that couldn't play in the street.  He invited me to play some music with him at a place called Cafe Gringo on Friday.

So, while I did miss Ismael, lots of other opportunidads sprung up.

Anyway, after I didn't see Ismael, I played for a bit more and then went back home.  When I got home I got the sad news that I my friend Felipe, who lives in México, D.F., isn't going to be around this weekend.  I had planned on staying with him, learning some música Huesteco, and visiting the Anthropological Museum.  That was disappointing, but what can you do?

I needed to work, and was feeling a bit stir crazy, so I thought I'd go back down to el Centro, and study and have a beer at ES3.  That's it on the left.  It's a great bar.  Very friendly and full of interesting people.  I ran into Mario and his friends, but I didn't hang out with them.  I really wanted to concentrate on my taraja (homework). 

So glad I came back downtown! This was really interesting.  There was a poetry reading outside the bar!  The bar is too small to set up any sort of a stage or anything, so all these people read poetry in the street.  They had a megaphone which one person would hold and one person would point at the audience.  So cool!  

After I got done with my homework, I hung out for a bit more and ended up meeting a couple of the bartenders and the owner, Marcela.  She told me that the "tres" en ES3 is because Tres because it's a bar, a gallery and a performance space.  Muy chido, no?  I found out one of the bartenders, Eric, has a blues band that is playing tonight (Sabado) at a bar called Bar Fresh, right downtown.  Really looking forward to that.
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That was that.  Nothing too big, but a really fun and very interesting day.

I went to the Grafton Pub last night for the One Mic Stand, hosted by Mike Alberts.  I had the please of hearing Sleepy Lou, the new duo from two of my closest friends, Maria McCullough and Jonas Friddle.  We've made a lot of music together over the years, so it was great to hear what they've been working on outside of that.  I was very impressed at how they used their voices to power the songs rather than their considerable instrumental abilities.

I will also go to any concert where Maria sings Golden Slippers.

I haven't been teaching quite as much as I had in the past, so I've been trying to make as much music as I can.

Last night I went to Banjo Night at the Lincoln Restaurant.

Banjo Night really means, 4-string banjo night.  It's a group of mostly older guys that play dixieland music.  I can't keep up at all, but it's fun to be around.

These are the guys.  The gentleman closest to the camera is Jerry.  He plays the accordian.  Next to him in the red Hawaian shirt is Clyde.  Clyde plays the trombone.  It's pretty cool because they come to the Thursday Night Special Jam at the Old Town School.  I've made a ton of music with them.  But at Old Town we play much different music and they play different instruments.  It's great to walk in and be on their turf.  I love being a beginner!

Written on Sunday, August 8, 2010
Just finished attending the Improvised music jam at Cafe Metstizo in Pilsen.  This is a picture of it.  I'm not sure if the "Lavanderia" sign is there because they can't get it down, or if it's there for affect.  But there is a cafe in there.

The jam has been going for years and years, but it's only been recently that I've been brave enough to attend.

This is the content of the email that gets sent out over the chi-improv listserve on Yahoo.

Interested in working on free jazz improvising? Meeting some new musicians? Come to Cafe Mestizo's improvised music jam every Sunday from 5 to 7. We're talking about complete improvisation - no charts, no tunes, no keys... nothing! Open to all instruments, electronicists, noise people - anything that makes sound. Hosted by Henry Mayer (drums and electronics).

Today the group was Henry on the drum set, Tom on fretless electric bass and I played my long neck banjo. The highlight today was that there was a PA that I could plug into. It gave me a chance to mess around with creating some feedback. I was doing that and Henry was playing some harmonics on the snare drum. The combined sound reminded me of a dolphin conversation.

Like I said, I've been to the jam a couple of other times. This was the band the first time I went. That's Matt on bass, Nick on drums and Josh on reeds.

The second time I went Henry was there too. This is his effects board. I plugged my banjo into it. It was a weird combination of me playing the physical instrumentt and him controlling the tone and volume. I was glad to give it a shot, but it was humbling to put my voice in someone else's hands.

Ginny was also the the second time. She played flute and this interesting instrument from Thailand.  It sounded like a combination church organ, bagpipe, harmonica.  It was great!