Note salad

A month ago, on the first Saturday of August, I was at the bluegrass festival of La Roche-sur-Foron in France when I received an email from Rick Cornish with this short but perfectly clear message: “Welcome column, please.” Oh, soot! I had gone to France directly...

Notes from High School

The last month has been a musical turning point for me. After attending the Mandolin Symposium at UC Santa Cruz by myself, I realized just how hard I have to work if I ever want to be on the same level as any of the instructors there—people like David Grisman, Mike...

Notes from Nashville

Dateline: Nashville, TN; October 4, 2009 As I write this, I am sitting in a seedy, run down motel near the airport in Nashville, Tennessee. I just returned from a brief walk in a chilly, albeit gentle rain to get a couple of bottles of beer. I walked past rows of...

Notes from the 2010 Spring Campout

What a time the 2010 CBA Spring Campout was! The weather, always a dodgy issue in April in northern California, was spectacular. We had been trained to believe that dry but windy was as good as it got. How about bright and sunny all day? Yeah, we’ll take that! With...

Notes from the Road

There’s no question about it: travel is one of the great perks of life as a professional musician. But make no mistake, music touring is not – I repeat NOT – vacation travel. It is usually hard work all by itself. Case in point is my current ten day tour, which...