New jamming DVD from Acutab

Thanks to Acutab Publications for news of their latest release: the two-and-a-half-hour DVD Bluegrass jamming essentials, designed to help the picker make the essential transition to playing with others. It also serves as a course in the fundamentals of how a band works.

The artists taking part describe the basic roles of the bass, mandolin, guitar, banjo, and fiddle in the band setting, and address such crucial topics as tuning, choosing keys and tempos, proper capo use, and more. Other concepts covered include backup and fills, soloing, playing with drive, a variety of song formats, and communication within a band while playing.

They demonstrate all this using twelve bluegrass vocal and instrumental classics, each chosen to show these important concepts in a variety of keys, tempos, and styles. And for each song, they leave a spot for you to play your own break...

All the musicians will be familiar to pickers in Ireland: Bill Evans & Megan Lynch have toured here three times as a duo, while Adam Steffey, Tim Stafford, and David Thomas have played here with Alison Krauss & Union Station, Blue Highway, and Special Consensus respectively.

Full details are on the Acutab website, where a six-minute-plus video sample can also be seen.

PS: Megan Lynch, six times US national fiddle champion, won the Randall Franks Trophy at the Fiddlers' Convention at Ringgold, GA, in May 2010.