Swing band - Do we need a new song?

The noon section swing band definitely made a lot of progress on "Haunted ballroom" yesterday, but I'm wondering if we might be better off choosing a different song. The chord changes in that song are really pretty complex, and it's not obvious that we're going to get up to a speed that people are going to be able to dance to. Brandon had several big books of songs - is there something there that we might be get up to speed on faster? Anyone else have a suggestion?

Noon folks: Remember to bring instruments Tuesday!

A reminder that the noon section is going to try out the swing dance band thing next Tuesday (7 Nov). People who are interested can also meet at TMC tomorrow (1 Nov) at 8:30pm to go to the library to look for sheet music for the band to play.

A few thoughts on the class performances so far

I'd like to make some comments about some of the very impressive performances that people have shared in the class so far. While there has been some unevenness, a number of performances were really top notch and I definitely want to thank everyone for their hard work. I realize that it can be a bit nerve wracking to get up in front of a bunch of people you only met a month or two ago and perform/speak on a subject that is also new to you.

Some highlights (for me):

• Machelle's song and info on hobo life. I loved the song, and that she took the time to find it, make up music for it, and have the courage to sing it. The background info and the bits from her grandfather's memoirs were really informative and gave me a much better sense of what that life was like. I didn't know much about the hobo life beforehand, and I learned a lot of great stuff here.
  
• The two food events were good (and tasty!). Both groups provided some cool and useful background information, but in both cases the connections between the food and the music were perhaps a little more tenuous than optimal.
  
• Joe's connections from Africa through blues to rap was really cool. My main recommendation here would be to have the courage of your convictions. I think Joe had a great idea and pulled together some excellent evidence, but hedged a lot in his presentation when I think he could have been firmer. The kazoo performance was very cool, but he again he lost his nerve and stopped when (I think) he should have kept rocking! I also thought that he could have done more (gone longer) with the idea of doing beats over Muddy Waters - it was a cool idea and had a lot of potential, but he cut it off almost immediately so we never got a feel for what he was doing. I forgot to ask what he learned from working up that kazoo part. Joe?
• Megan's "Wade in the water" and (especially) the discussion that followed. It would have been cool to have sung some of the verses that were more specifically coding messages, however.
• Tyler's performance of the Skip James tune. It was neat seeing/hearing about him learning some new guitar styles and learning some things about tunings and styles.
  

One general comment I'd make is that there is a certain leaning towards things that resemble book reports more than performances, and I'm really much more interested in performance. One way to think about it is whether you'd ever do that for people outside of the course. You're almost certainly not going to read a report outside of class, but you might perform a song or read a poem. One thing I'm trying to get at here is a sense of the way that the people we're listening to/reading about approached the music as performers and not just consumers. They certainly didn't write book reports about the music - they sang it; we should try to do the same.

Keep up the good work!

We can leave the classroom for your performances

Many people have been posting about their performances as requested (thanks!), and it's been fun to see what sorts of ideas people have had. One question that's come up is whether we can leave the classroom for the performance, and the answer is absolutely yes. Each year we almost always make one trip to HFA to use the pianos in the practice rooms (we had a cool duet of "Frankie and Johnny" a while back, complete with plastic egg shaker percussion), and one year we went to the dance space in HFA for a solo dance performance. So be creative and think outside the box of Sci 3665!

Also, many people have talked in vague terms of how they would perform (I'll play this instrument, etc.), but very few people have said anything about what they'll perform. I realize that when faced this this assignment there's a natural tendency to focus on "What skill/instrument/etc. am I least likely to embarrass myself with", but I really want you to think seriously about a specific piece of roots music, which requires that you think of a song to perform as well.