More news (and a good idea) from FOAOTMAD

Following on from the news that the BIB republished last Saturday, FOAOTMAD, the UK organisation promoting American old-time music and dance, announce that their Spring camp is now definitely cancelled owing to new UK government restrictions. In addition Arnie Blake suggests to FOATMAD members in the counties of Norfolk, Suffolk, and Essex:

As we are all having to spend so much time indoors and cannot follow our normal pursuits in the usual way, I am planning to focus on a selection of tunes, some new to me, some half learnt at workshops but never really internalised, and then there are the tunes that seem to have languished forever on the 'to do' list. It then occurred to me that if a number of people worked on the same tunes then when we come out of this we could all meet up with a ready made repertoire in addition to the tunes that are already well known!

So if anyone would like to join in this local team effort, all you have to do is let me have your e-mail address and every couple of weeks or so a tune will turn up in your inbox. Tunes chosen will be available from Slippery Hill with other versions probably available too, e.g. on YouTube. Let's try to get some positive energy out of all this.

Enhancing both your own repertoire and your ability to play with others is something that pickers outside East Anglia should also find worth doing. There was (and perhaps still is) a regular jam in Belgium that published each month a list of half a dozen tunes (with YouTube sources) that would be played at the next meeting, so that anyone who came along could be prepared to fit in on those tunes, whatever else might be played.