THE FOLLY OF BAND SCRAMBLES

The YBA president recently attended the Big Horn Festival in Buffalo, WY. She lauded the jamming and that is correct - in the night time camping area. Little jamming during the festival hours though. I was there a couple of years ago and have my own opinions. She apparently enjoyed in taking part in the band scramble probably with her banjo and good for her. Her group won the competition based on crowd applause. I, too, entered their band scramble and was personally gratified, but not too excited about doing it again. First it took about three hours to organize, time that I was missing out on other workshops and performances. Not surprisingly about five times too many strumming guitars wanted to play. You only need one good one who can flat pick a lead beside backup with chords. Only one real bass player showed up and I was one of two fiddlers so they could only have two bands. My group got stuck with a wash tub bass (which we could not hear at all when our music started.)  We did have a great 15 year old kid who had just won the State banjo contest. Man, he could roll out all those terrific Earl Scruggs classics.  Time to decide what to play and we only had 45 minutes.  A young kid about 16 stated he wanted sing lead and wanted to play "Fox On The Run."  So in what key? Well, he slapped his capo up several frets on his guitar and then said, "I don't know. I've only played for about six weeks."  Wonderful! An experienced guitar player figured it out for him. Then we tried to rehearse it. We spent about 30 minutes on that and it was a total disaster. The players looked about in wonder - what to do? I finally suggested we get back to basics. How about "Old Joe Clark?"  They said yes, but what for our second tune. "How about "Bury Me Beneath the Willow." Yes, again. Our mandolin player was the organizer of the jam and a big shot for the whole festival so he kicked it off. He nodded to me and I proceeded to play "Old Joe Clark" with shuffle bowing, drones and double stops, and the crowd went wild. I couldn't believe it. Most must have never heard a fiddle playing two string stuff. I had great compliments afterward. So that was part of my personal gratification. Peter Wernick, aka Dr. Banjo, held a jamming workshop.  There were three fiddles there and the other too were younger gals who soon dropped out, but the songs he was teaching were very basic and I had played all of them some with a few variations. Afterward he thanked me for coming an playing. That was the rest of  my personal gratification. Would I go to Buffalo again? Well, maybe, but I doubt it. But in the infamous words of 007, "Never say Never Again."