REVISED - Bull Harmon Workshop

Due to numerous requests, the Bull Harman workshop for the Memorial Day festival will be geared more to intermediate to advanced players. Unique and original created chords, different styles of rhythmn techniques and appropriate use of them will be taught as well as creative "licks". Bull will be around the festival all weekend and will be more than happy to answer any questions you may have.

This class is limited to the first 12 paid attendees. The fee for the four hours is $25 Contact Chris at cooperrider@yahoo.com or 260-302-1555

NIBGA Board meeting minutes 2/20/2011

February 20, 2011 Meeting of Northern Indiana Bluegrass Association at Southwest Conservation Club, 5703 Bluffton Road, Fort Wayne, IN 46809

The meeting was called to order by President Jim Winger at 12:00 P.M.
Officers present were:                                    Board Directors:
 President - Jim Winger                                    T.J. Collins      
 Vice President - Joe Steiner                            Paul Saurborn
 Secretary - Barbara Collins                             Pam Keiper - Via conference phone call.
Treasurer - Linda Winger                                    & Dave Keiper

Chris Cooperrider - Special Projects
Jeanette Young - Vendor Chair
Others present were: Tonia Bacon, Carol Bacon, & Michaela Gerkin

• Minutes of the January meeting were e-mailed to each officer by Sect. Barb Collins on Monday January 17, 2011; Paul Saurborn motioned to accept the minutes. T.J. Collins second. All approve. Motion carried.
• January Financial Report was e-mailed to each officer by Treasurer Linda Winger on February 16, 2011. The report was reviewed at the meeting; Joe Steiner motioned to accept the Treasurers report. Paul Saurborn second. All approve. Motion carried.

                                                      INFORMATION ITEMS

• The 1099s were mailed to bands in January.
• 1099 forms were sent to IRS on Saturday 2/19/11
• NIBGA taxes are due in May. They will be done on time.

                                                          OLD BUSINESS

• 503c3 investigation. Chris Cooperrider reports she is waiting for the IRS software to become available. 
• Joe Steiner reports. The Electrical problem at the gate area has been resolved. 
• Joe Steiner - V. Pres/Band chairman has completed the hiring of the bands for Spring and Fall 2011 for the N festivals. A list was given to each officer. Joe has been able to stay under budget again. Good job Joe! This job is very time consuming and we appreciate Joe's talent and time it takes to contact and contract bands. 
• Chris Cooperrider has been working on plans for festival workshops. Bull Harmon will be doing an four hour guitar workshop. Chris will be working up a list for the scheduling of all workshops. Some to be planned are: harmonica, mountain dulcimer, bass, clogging, & jamming. And hopefully: workshops for mandolin, dobro, fiddle, banjo, song-writing, and harmony singing can be set up.   Chris will have more information for the March meeting and the April newsletter. This information will go on the NIBGA WEB and Blog. 
• Chris purposed that the people directing workshops will get two weekend tickets. She suggested that jamming workshops be early in the weekend to free up people on Saturday to watch the stage shows. All but the guitar workshops will be free with a festival ticket.  
• Paul Saurborn motions to charge $25 for the four hour Bull Harmon workshop. Joe Steiner second. All approve. Motion carried.
• Paul Saurborn motioned we pay up to 6 additional instructors, $50.00 each, for workshops. Joe Steiner second. All approved. Motion carried.
• Discussed and approved.  An Open House crafting session will take place on Wednesday May 25 in the Log Cabin, from 1:00 to 5:00 p.m. Each person will bring their own craft project to do. Craft and Chat session, a good way to spend time and meet new people and share your talents. 
• Jeanette Young reported on Vendors up to this point. The lemon shake-up people are interested in setting up a Leather goods booth. This will be charged a normal fee.  Jeanette is talking to several people trying to find a group that will do a Bake Sale at the festival. A man from Nashville has inquired about setting up a booth to sell his handmade (USA made). 
• Advertising: Jim Winger reports on all the possibilities he has investigated and inquired about. Some are possibilities for us and several not. Some possibilities are NCCVB rack cards in welcoming centers (Visitors Centers), & radio stations.  Good places to advertise will be WAWK Kendallville, WFGA "Froggie" Auburn, and a maybe a Coldwater or southern border Michigan station. Jim will continue to work on these.  Barbara Collins motions we advertise with three radio stations. Pam Keiper seconds. All approve. Motion carried. 
• Facebook - Nathen Gerkin has contacted bands to "like" Tri-State page. 
• Joe Steiner suggest asking Bands to cross link with NIBGA on the WEB
• Collect e-mail addresses from attendees that would like to receive notices and information via-email. Not decided. 
• Joe Steiner motioned to adjourn. Paul Saurborn second. All agree. Meeting adjourned at 2:10 P.M. 

Sincerely, NIBGA Secretary Barbara Collins
The next board meeting & Jam session will be Sunday March 20, 2011

Why don't bands want to promote themselves?

Linda is busy trying to put together publicity for the upcoming Memorial festival. The frustrating part is bands do an extremely poor job of having material that is press ready. Snapshots of fans, lots of them. Professional photo that tells a story for the newspaper, few or none. Color photos that most web sites and newspapers want, not to be found.

Where is the biography of the band that has a story versus Joe plays banjo, Tom is a great guitar player loved by his mother, etc. Don't bands ever read a newspaper story or look at some of the bluegrass magazines? Buyers of magazines, papers, blogs, etc. want a story not dry copy. Why is it up to the event producer to create this?

OK, some bands change so often that only the band leader is common from month to month. The leader could still have an interesting story to tell and a professional publicity shot.

Most bands now have a web site that someone has sold them on using the latest and greatest gizmo. Today that seems to be Adobe flash. Guess what, you cannot easily extract information from a flash presentation so it is unusable for publicity outside of the bands web site. If the band doesn't have an Electronic Press Kit, EPK in the jargon, then please, please create a web site that will allow copy and paste. I'm not going to retype your stuff!

One last word, a high resolution photo is not a photo that displays well on your web page. A high res is 1,000,000 pixel or larger not 1,000 pixel. The band has that high res photo when the picture was taken so put it on the web site someplace.

I feel better.

Masters guitar workshop on May 27, 2011

Bull Harmon will be teaching a four-hour class on the Friday before Memorial Day.  There will be a $25 fee for this class, and the class size is limited to 12.  Please sign up with Chris Cooperrider at 260-302-1555.


Bull is no stranger in the Midwest when you mention guitar playing, Bull has won numerous awards doing just that. A respected instructor and teacher in his field, Bull also traveled for several years with Rhonda Vincent and in 1999 formed his own band, "Bull's Eye" which he still performs with today. Bull and his band recently won 2009 National Single Mic Championship at Silver Dollar City. He holds the title of SPGMBA Midwest Guitar Player of the Year for 2004, 2006 & 2007. Bull has 2 solo projects that have received high recognition titled "Bull's Eye" and "Rosewood, Spruce & Ebony".



“Bull Harman’s workshop will include basic guitar instruction. Different types of rhythms used in bluegrass, lead-in runs to chord changes as well as basic chords and non-basic chords unique to Bull's style. Quick tips on string changing and different sounds from different tunings. Class will learn a basic tune. Feel free to contact Bull, bullharman@cs.com,  prior to the workshop if you have any questions.”

Spinney Brothers House concert Feb. 13, 2011

Enjoying the show

Spinney Brothers band

Spinney Brothers band

Snacks for the break, yum, yum

It was an awesome performance at our house concert by Nova Scotia premier band, the Spinney Brothers. A few snapshots will help you picture the scene. Folks setting in a living room 10 feet from the performers enjoy some of the best in bluegrass and old country music.

Need instruction!

A few months ago you guys were kind enough to answer some questions about jam sessions. Unfortunately, like a raccoon, once you feed me I keep coming back for more!

I am clearly not ready for prime time with my bass, but I am working on it. I am very interested in getting lessons with someone who is a multi-instrumentalist that maybe plays some bass but primarily plays one of the other instruments—so I can better learn what those instrumentalists expect to hear from the bass and at the same time get a few bass tips as well.

Do you have any recommendations for the Fort Wayne area?

Thanks again so much for your help!

Jon

Contact us and we'll forward it to Jon who lives in the Fort Wayne, IN area

Stewart V. Hall 11/24/1927 - 01/27/2011

Stewart Hall 83, a NIBGA member, passed away at his home in Plymouth, IN. He was very ill with cancer.

Stewart was a very accomplished banjo player and could play the fiddle when called up-on  to do so.
He came to many, many Kendallville festival's and will be missed by those who played music with him. I have played many times with him over the years and very proud to call Stewart my friend.


Stewart is survived by Rosemary, his wife of 55 years


Paul Saurborn