Recently I saw a rerun of a 2013 PBS TV show documenting the life and times of Jimi Hendrix, the famous electric guitar player and singer. One of the things that came out in this documentary is that Jimi almost always had a guitar with him, wherever he went. Besides having a musical gift, it’s obvious that he was highly motivated to develop his musical craft. That’s a good reminder for those of us who don’t make much progress on our own musical instrument because we don’t practice enough! In one segment of the documentary it showed Mr. Hendrix lip-synching to one of his own songs. But the surprise is that while he was doing this he had a fiddle in his hands, sort of sawing away on it with a bow, but an inch above the fingerboard so that no sound was coming out. Did Jimi really play the fiddle? If not, why did he have it with him? And what does that scene of Jimi Hendrix with a fiddle have to with the September 2017 Walker Creek Music Camp?
Walker Creek Music Camp, as many of you know, is a four day schooling in the fine art of playing bluegrass and old time music instruments, as well as singing and other musical things related to the pursuit of excellence in pickin’ and grinning. The music camp is held annually in the months of April and late September, twice a year, at the 1700 acre Walker Creek Ranch/Outdoor Education site, about fifteen miles west of Petaluma, California. Ingrid Noyes is the camp director, and she does an outstanding job to make everything run as smooth as the skin on a newborn baby that has just shed its wrinkles. One of the things I like about the Walker Creek Music Camp is that the classes are held inside temperature controlled buildings. So it doesn’t matter if the weather outside is too hot, too cold, or wet. Inside the temperature is just right. And hey, if you are in hot pursuit of learning as much as you can about your musical instrument, you can attend Walker Creek Music Camp in April, go to the CBA Music Camp in June at Grass Valley, and then go to Walker Creek again in September.
Among the fiddle classes to choose from are those for bluegrass, old-time, and swing styles. This year’s September 2017 bluegrass fiddle core classes were taught by Alisa Rose. Alisa has impressive musical credentials, in both worlds of classical and bluegrass music. There are many wonderful classically trained violinists in the world today, but having talked with some, and reading about more of them, often they cannot break away from printed musical notation, they have trouble crossing over into bluegrass music, and they are befuddled when it comes to improvising. This is not the case with Ms. Rose!
Having been immersed in bluegrass music for the past fifty years, I’ve heard many impressive fiddlers. But once in a while someone comes along and rises above the others in terms of her or his playing. They have more punch and pizzazz. They stand out. Their playing reaches out and grabs you. And your ears let you know that you are in the presence of the out-of-the-ordinary. Euphoric? Maybe. What Jimi Hendrix might sound like playing a fiddle? Let YOUR ears decide. Warning = This is not your Uncle Pen’s fiddling!
Besides her musical journeys with a number of classical duos and ensembles that have performed all over the world (including Carnegie Hall), and on radio and television, Alisa’s bluegrass fiddle performance connections include, “49er Special” (2009 Rockygrass Band Competition winners), “Homespun Rowdy,” “Super Mule,” and “Hardly Strickly Bluegrass.” Most recently she fiddles in the, “Lonely Bird Band,” with Scott Nygaard (guitar) and Jesse Appelman (mandolin). The “Peghead Nation” website features Ms. Rose demonstrating (video) the sound of a low-tuned baritone violin/fiddle on the Monroe tune, “Jerusalem Ridge,” and then a fiddle and mandolin duo with Tristan Scroggins. Are you in a musical rut? Do you want to hear something different? Well this is it. And Alisa’s recent CD collaboration, “Grana,” with Tristan Scroggins (a young mandolin wizard) as a barebones duo is a must have if you want to stretch the limits of traditional bluegrass and find yourself baptized in new acoustic musical adventures that include a notable twist on the Monroe class, “Wheel Hoss.” And then there is an updated version of, “Cluck Old Hen,” that will leave you in the land of improvisation. No failure of imagination on her improvisations here. An additional bonus is the original tunes by Rose and Scroggins on this CD. Her Bio and various videos of Alisa’s fiddle/violin playing are at her website, way too numerous to list here. I don’t know if she has been or will be teaching at other bluegrass fiddle music camps, but if not it’s their loss.
Alisa Rose calls San Francisco her home. You don’t have to wait for, “The Big One,” to hit this city, because every time Alisa picks up her fiddle and draws the bow across the strings, you can feel the earth quake. Just a little.
