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MANDOLIN CAMP NORTH® April 13, 14, & 15, 2007 Director: Mike Holmes Music Directors: Lorraine Lee Hammond Martin Grosswendt Mike Kropp

MCN 2007 Class Descriptions

MCN 2007 Class Schedule

MCN2005 Panoramic Photograph

2004 Banjo Camp Photos.

Camp will open Friday at 12:30 PM for registration, jamming, and instruction. Registration will occur in the Adult Center starting at 1:00 PM. We'll have hands-on workshops, round robin demonstrations and guided jam sessions for three days, a Friday night "meet the faculty concert," a formal concert Saturday night, and lots and lots of time for jamming and getting to know each other. Our resident instrument specialist will be there from 12:30 PM on Friday and all day Saturday. Lecture-demonstrations about Mandolin history and setup will be offered. Instrument vendors and makers, plus recordings, accessories and books will be on sale in our market area. Attendees are encouraged to bring Mandolins and other instruments for sale or trade.

The Beginners' Track provides instruction for absolute beginners (those who haven't played before), and those who can play a little bit, but still can't play with other people or pick out tunes on their own. Click below for more information.

Advancing Beginners and Intermediates will find classes geared to their levels and needs. Advancing beginners may still only play a few phrases and chords, but they have some basic mandolin experience. In general intermediates know some tunes but aren't able to play up to speed yet. They are still working on rhythm. They may already read tab or notation, but can use help playing by ear and learning to arrange a tune or song on their own.

Classes at the Advancing Beginners/Intermediate level will include Learning To Play What You Hear, Playing Slow Tunes, Controlling The Pick, Choosing Your Next Mandolin, Bluegrass Mandolin Monroe Style, Introduction to Modern Bluegrass Style, Old Time Mandolin -- Brothers Music, Translating Fiddle Tunes To The Mandolin, What To Do When Another Instrument Has The Lead, Accompanying Singing, and many more. At Mandolin Camp the emphasis is on using tab minimally - just to get you started playing.

For the Advanced Players, there will be added classes in Arranging Tunes or Songs For The Mandolin, Introduction To What It Takes To Be An Effective Sideman, Playing For A Living, Playing And Composing For Commercials, and more.

The weekend will include at least 100 class hours plus guided jams at all speeds and levels. After each evening program there will be plenty of time for free jams, again at various levels. Most of the classes are hands on, practical learning situations. A few are demonstrations or mini-concerts, but even in these classes the intention is for you to take something away that you may want to learn or speak with the instructors about later. You are encouraged to bring a recording device of some kind.

Mandolin Camp North takes place at a beautiful wooded lakeside setting near Groton Massachusetts. Cabins are heated, so you don't have to worry about our unpredictable New England weather.

Cabins: The cabins each have 3 or 4 rooms, and each room has 2 or 3 bunk beds. Each cabin also has 2 bathrooms and one shower. Separate women-only cabins are available. Cabins are far enough away from the playing/jamming areas so that quiet at bed-time won't be a problem. But then again many of you won't want to sleep, anyway! There is no smoking allowed in any of the buildings and no alcohol allowed on the camp site. Local accommodations are available for those who want to bring the family, or just prefer more privacy. The tuition fee will be adjusted for commuters.

Meals: Meals are provided as part of the tuition package, and vegetarian meals are available. Dinner will be served promptly at 6 PM Friday. The meals schedule for the rest of the weekend will be announced in the program book at camp time.

Off site residence: Click here for local accommodations. Electric hookups are available on site for motor homes, but there are no on site facilities for water or waste hookups.

Staff List:

Roland White has a distinguished career playing bluegrass in several of the most popular and influential groups in the music’s history. They include The Kentucky Colonels, Bill Monroe, Lester Flatt, Country Gazette, and the Nashville Bluegrass Band. In 2000, embarking on another chapter of personal musical discovery, he formed The Roland White Band. Roland has taught mandolin and guitar privately for the past 12 years and teaches in many workshops and camps. He has put out his own instruction book/CD sets, Roland White’s Approach To Bluegrass Mandolin and Roland White’s Mandolin Christmas. He has a reputation as a gentle and patient teacher. Add together his mastery of ensemble playing, harmonic sophistication, and warm voice and you have the legend of bluegrass that Roland has become.

Joe Walsh is the first person ever admitted to the Berklee College of Music to study mandolin. Joe has shared the stage with Bela Fleck, Earl Scruggs, Emmylou Harris, Ricky Skaggs, David Grisman, and Gillian Welch, toured New England and the Midwest with Joy Kills Sorrow, played at the Kennedy Center and the Country Music Hall of Fame, and he currently performs throughout New England with some of the finest bands in the area, including Northern Lights and the New England Bluegrass Band. "Some of the better tone I've ever heard"--Chris Thile. "Fabulous mandolinist. The Sam Bush of Boylston Street"--Matt Glaser.

Jeff Foxall Originally hailing from Connecticut and now living in North Carolina, Jeff Foxall has been making music for over thirty years in a variety of bands and styles. In Connecticut, while still in high school, he studied with mandolin guru Walter Kaye Bauer and then branched out into bluegrass and string swing with the bands True Life String Band, Last Fair Deal, The Stockwell Brothers and a multitude of free-lancing with Mike Kropp and Bill Henry, Rich Starkey, Orrin Star, and even played for the Hartford Ballet Co. in a piece written and conducted by Bill Wallach. He moved to Winston-Salem twenty five years ago to play music full time and still does, with Craig Smith and Scott Huffman (both also members of Laurie Lewis and the Right Hands) as well as teaching and free-lancing.

Rich DelGrosso is, according to author Mark Hoffman, "the greatest living blues mandoman, the best since Yank." He has performed for the past thirty years, mentored by and performing with blues-band legends at clubs and festivals throughout the country. He has been a writer for Blues Revue magazine since 1991 and an associate editor since 1966. A respected writer in the blues realm, his work has also appeared in Living Blues, Mandolin World News, Frets, Mandolin Magazine, and Footsteps. DelGrosso's latest book from Hal Leonard Publishers is Mandolin Blues: from Memphis to Maxwell Street.

David Surette is highly regarded his work on the mandolin, guitar, and bouzouki. He plays regularly in a duo with singer Susie Burke, as a soloist, and as a freelance accompanist. He was also a founding member of the contradance band Airdance. His most recent release, Northern Roots, is a collection of traditional New-England based music that has drawn strong praise. His diverse repertoire includes traditional American roots music, Celtic and contra tunes, original compositions, bluegrass, blues and ragtime, and folk music from a variety of traditions. He coordinates folk music programming at the Concord Community Music School and is the artistic director of their March Mandolin Festival.

Dave Howard started playing mandolin, guitar & banjo in the early 1960’s starting with Old-Time & Bluegrass and has since branched out into traditional Country, Western & Eastern Swing, New England & French Canadian dance music, Honky-Tonk, and what he calls “Smoochy” songs. His versatility as both an instrumentalist and a vocalist keep him in constant demand as a utility player, and he regularly performs with Walach & Howard, The Rick Lee Trio, Please & Thank You Stringband, and Lazy Aces. His latest release is Southern Schoolhouse Rascals, and he is currently recording his first solo album.

Bill Walach's chosen voice has been the mandolin for more than 30 years. In his musical journeys he has played folk, folk rock, contra-dance, country, old timey, blues, standards, swing, jazz-world-music fusion and classical music. He has commissioned and premiered pieces from such diverse composers as Vaclav Nelhybel and Ornette Coleman. Bill writes music both for mandolin and larger ensembles. He is a strong advocate for the idea that the mandolin has its place in all music, both acoustic and electric.

Richard (Richie) Brown has been a part-time bluegrass musician in the Boston area since the mid-sixties. Richard has played with several prominent New England bands and occasionally filled in with nationally known bluegrass artists, as well. He has done mandolin workshops with Ron Thomason, Dave McLaughlin, and Lou Martin at the Joe Val Memorial Bluegrass Festival and other events for the Boston Bluegrass Union, and with Mike Holmes at the New England Folk Festival. Richard's playing is heavily influenced by Bill Monroe's style and "old style" mandolin players. He currently plays mandolin and sings in the Boston-based Reunion Band with Dave Dillon, Lauck Benson, Margaret Gerteis and Art Schatz.

Mike Holmes (MCN Director) is best known as publisher of Mugwumps Magazine now Mugwumps Online. He is the former chairman of the National Council for the Traditional Arts, and the National Folk Festival, and is widely regarded as an expert on the history of American stringed instruments. Mike has performed acoustic music on the North American and international circuit, and appeared on recordings of traditional and contemporary musicians. He is equally proficient on mandolin, guitar, and old time banjo; he also sings. His Smithsonian/Folkways book & CD set is titled Mandolin Instruction, Old Time, Country & Fiddle Tunes. Mike is also director of Banjo Camp North, an annual event, held in May and Old Time Music Camp North, held in October.

Martin Grosswendt (Old Time Music Director) has played old-time and blues mandolin since 1970. Known as a musician’s musician in a variety of genres, he also plays guitar, Dobro and bass, and is a powerful singer. He is a veteran of countless recording sessions and produces recordings for other artists as well as his own. His first album, Dog on a Dance Floor, was released on the Philo label in 1980; his most recent recording is Call and Respons, a collection of pre-war acoustic blues released in 2004. Martin has performed and taught at festivals and at WUMB’s Summer Acoustic Music Week and has been a Master Artist’s assistant at the Augusta Heritage Workshops.

Lorraine Lee Hammond (Music Director & Beginner's Track Co-ordinator) is best known for her Appalachian dulcimer playing and recordings. She is also a fine singer and teacher. Lorraine teaches instrument styles as well as classes in songwriting and basic music theory at the Cambridge Center for Adult Education. She also organizes two annual music festivals at the Center: The Blacksmith House Folk Festival held each November and the Blacksmith House Dulcimer Festival held each May. Since 1986 Lorraine has performed and toured extensively at home and abroad with guitar virtuoso Bennett Hammond. They married on Thanksgiving Day 1991. Together they run Great Acoustics.

Mike Kropp is New England's premier 3 finger style banjoist. As a member of Northern Lights for 17 years, he has recorded CD's on Flying Fish, Red House and Prime CD. Since the 1960's, he has performed and recorded with artists ranging from Vassar Clements & Peter Rowan, to Don MacLean and Jonathan Edwards. Described as a "master banjoist", Mike is fluent in all styles of five string banjo, as well as guitar -- both lead and rhythm. He has taught for over thirty years, and participated in workshops at festivals across the country. In addition to his teaching duties, Mike will teach backup guitar and provide banjo support in the jams.

Ben Pearce Beginning his mandolin career in the Carolinas and making his way up to New England via Washington D.C. Ben Pearce has played bluegrass mandolin all over the east coast. Currently playing with Rhode Island's Pegheads and various other New England bands, Ben is also a builder of violins, guitars and soon mandolins. Don't let his youthful appearance fool you! He knows a hugh variety of tunes, songs and mandolin styles as a result of his careful study with many of the first generation mandolin giants.

Carl Jones has toured with Norman and Nancy Blake as part of the Rising Fawn String Ensemble, playing mandolin, banjo, and fiddle. He has been an instructor at Pinewoods, Port Townsend's Festival of American Fiddle Tunes, Mars Hill Old Time Week, and the Swannanoa Gathering. His songs have been recorded by the Nashville Bluegrass Band, Rickie Simpkins, and others. For Years Carl Jones and Beverly Smith have appeared on the traditional music scene, at festivals, on record, at contests and dances, in various bands and formations, playing just about anything with strings or tossing in vocal harmonies wherever there was the opportunity. They bring those years of experience to the art of the duet—songs and tunes, old and new, done simply and with love.

Phil Zimmerman has been a folk and bluegrass musician since his high school days in Chicago. He developed his multi-instrumentalist chops as a solo performer in college, and has won regional contests for bluegrass and clawhammer banjo, guitar and mandolin. He’s a founding member of Connecticut’s ground-breaking eclectic string band, Last Fair Deal, playing banjo, mandolin, and guitar with them since 1972. For ten years, Phil played mandolin and sang lead with Connecticut’s premier traditional bluegrass band, Traver Hollow. A few years ago, he joined with Phil Rosenthal (of Seldom Scene), Stacy Phillips, and Dave Kiphuth to form Bluegrass Union.

John Rossbach is originally from central West Virginia. He is equally at home in both old time and bluegrass. John currently works in two bands, his own bluegrass ensemble Chestnut Grove, and Mac Benford's old-time string band, the Woodshed All Stars. He has recorded with Bill Keith, Charles Sawtelle, the Burns Sisters, and Don Stover, and appeared on radio and television for CBS, TNN, PBS, BBC, and CBC. John has taught mandolin and guitar at all four Banjo Camps North and three Old Time Music Camps North, and at the Augusta Heritage program among others. He is also a fine singer. His solo album is entitled Never Was Plugged.

Alan Kaufman has performed Old Time Music for more than 30 years. A fine player on mandolin and guitar, Alan is author of Beginning Old Time Fiddle published by Music Sales. He currently is responsible for starting and leading well-received Old TIme Music jams in the greater Boston area. At camp he will teach mandolin, primarily with the novice and beginner track, repertoire, and lead jamming sessions. Alan will also teach Old Time mandolin, using fiddle tunes and duet-style playing in the Monroe and Blue Sky Boys tradition, among others.

Neil Rossi is a multi-instrumentalist who is best known for his fiddle and mandolin work. He is sought after as accompanist in both Bluegrass and Old Time settings. Beginning in 1960 when he heard the Osborne Bros, he spent hours every day learning banjo, three-finger picking. Later, he bought a mandolin and, in 1964, began learning fiddle. In 1966 he formed The Spark Gap Wonder Boys, and over the years has gravitated more to the fiddle and mandolin as his primary instruments. He has played those with The David Bromberg Band, The Yankee Rebels, Diamonds In The Rough, and Bob Yellin & The Joint Chiefs Of Bluegrass, among others. Neil currently plays mandolin and sings baritone with the Vermont based, traditional, bluegrass band Big Spike Bluegrass.

Dave Reiner is best known as co-author of Oldtime Fiddling Across America (Mel Bay Publications), and as author of Anthology of Fiddle Styles. He is also a fine mandolin player and teacher. He currently plays fiddle and mandolin with the Reiner Family Band and with Granite Grass in and around New England. Dave is the former Wisconsin state fiddle champion and has won many contests in the Northeast. A veteran of years of giving workshops, Dave will teach from beginner levels on up, focusing on fiddle tunes for the mandolin, including New England, ragtime, Irish and oldtime styles. He likes tune variations and unusual tunes.