Hi members of the Southwest Blues Club.
The February Jam Day was another highly successful and highly enjoyable day with a good variety of “combinations” getting up to play during the afternoon. Our loyal “fanbase” at The Parade were shouting for more at the end of the session so that must be good.
It was a hot day and that made the fantastic Old Coast Brewery beers (and a pizza special) essential for me. And there is a great photo of The Parade (with our pergola set up in the garden) on our Facebook page, good job Dave and his Drone.
At the jam day we tried a new (for us) system of putting the guitar amps “through” the PA and I think this worked well. It enabled PA experts Ron, Dave and Gary to have greater control of the overall sound produced.
One of the objectives of the South West Blues Club is to promote blues music in the community and the recent opportunity to link up with Froth Bunbrewery has enabled the club to do this with “Blues Central”, which occurs at Froth on the second Sunday of each month. Established WA blues bands will be invited to play at Froth and a blues club band, or artist, will also feature each month. This gives South West Blues Club bands and players the chance to work towards the standard needed for a “gig”. The South West Blues Club Facebook page will have details of the bands appearing at Blues Central each month.
I mentioned in my last “View From The Chair” that my birthday was imminent so I decided to buy myself a new guitar amp. I bought a Fender Tonemaster amp, the appealing feature to me at my new age being it is not very heavy. It is actually the latest in quite a long list of amps that would be “the last one I will ever buy”. I find it an interesting amp in that it has four guitar input sockets (two for each channel on the amp). This reminded me of the first band I played in with three mates in Luton, in the UK, in the early sixties. We had three guitarists and a drummer, but no money. Eventually one guy bought a second hand Selmer amp which had four inputs on it so we decided we could play three guitars (including the bass) and a mike through the amp. It actually worked and we were able to do our first gigs at some local youth clubs with this set up.
It is interesting to see how many harp, harmonica or mouth organ players we have regularly playing at the jam sessions at the moment.( Do the players agree on a name for the instrument?) I think the playing is generally of a high standard and it is something to look forward to each month, adding an extra dimension to the music. Each player seems to have their own style and the way they fit in with the other jammers is interesting to see.
The next jam day at the Parade is on Sunday, 19th March, which will hopefully be a little cooler than our last jam day. Our loyal band of members who set up the gear will be there working from 11am to set up for 2pm and then to break down the gear and pack it away from between 5.30pm and 6pm. Feel free to join them and it will help you to get your spot on the board.
Cheers, Dave Corcoran.