Eureka, MO Festival & Tuesday's Jam Session

The Chris Talley Trio played Friday night in Eureka, MO for the Annual MABC Spring Bluegrass Festival. I love this festival! The Bluegrass Shack had instruments and accessories set up in the vendor room, so I got to talk to and meet lots of people. We even had some great jamming in there! We sold some instruments, bought some instruments, and traded some instruments. We now have a "new" vintage Martin guitar, Fender solid F style mandolin and case, vintage blond Gibson A style mandolin, grafted scroll violin, and German 1900's violin.

Last night, we had our open jam session. Folks started arriving at 6:00 p.m. even though the jam doesn't officially start until 7:30 p.m. Bob and Lori drove in from Iowa to look and fiddles and do some jamming. We also had a Kansas truck driver stop by to play some banjo with us. He checks www.folkjam.org for local jam sessions when he's on the road, and he saw our jam listing and came by. Many of the locals were here, plus some folks from St. Jacob, IL, Hillsboro, MO, Ellis Grove, IL, Carbondale, IL and more!

We were so busy that I never got to jam with everyone. This is the first time I was so busy that I didn't get in on the jam session. I ended up straightening a warped bass bridge, fitting the bridge, and changing the strings on a beautiful vintage Kay bass. It looks just like mine! Roberto is from Brazil and he brought the bass in for me to work on. We had it up and playing by the middle of the jam. Polly from Hillsboro came by to purchase a nice 3/4 size fiddle for her grandson Mateo who is a fantastic little musician. I spent at least an hour with the folks from Iowa checking out our wall of fiddles. Several folks were busy talking mandolins with Roger from Red Bud.

In the end, the only "jamming" I did was on my flute with Chelsea after most everyone left. Chelsea is a good clarinet player, so we sight-read Himie Voxman duets for an hour or so.