TrevorR

That’s a good approach and really helps develop the ear. It was, after all, how the old fogies among us like me learned - playing along to the radio or to records. There’s absolutely a degree of innate skill involved there but a lot can be achieved by practice ad studying the right things - over time, of course! And being thrown into the deep end at something like a jam really sharpens up the skills and focuses the mind!! 🤣 When I was in my 20s I would play in the worship band at church, led by a friend of mine on acoustic guitar. He was quite disorganised and rarely knew what songs we were going to play until the Sunday morning. Often he didn’t know what songs he was going to do next during the service and wouldn’t necessarily start them up with the correct chords or in the right key. So I had to learn to busk/jam along early on and me and the keys player spent many services squinting at his left hand to work out the key and chords! Also, learning to play songs from chord sheets was helpful in terms of working out how to link notes and chords together on the fly. In terms of learning and developing skills, the things that were really the lightbulb moments for me were… Learning the major and minor scales and, in particular the shapes related to them on the fretboard, Learning and getting an innate feel for what different intervals sounded like - third, fourth, fifth, major and minor sevenths - that just takes lots of practice and repetition, but the BIG one was… Understanding the harmonised major and minor scales and how they related to common song chord structures. That is (not sure how much folk have looked at this) understanding how the standard chords in a particular key are made up from notes of that scale and that the pattern of major / minor chords is the same across different keys. Knowing that, for most mainstream rock/pop, if you’re in the key of G, the most likely chords to come up are G major, A minor, B minor, C major and D major really - or if you’re in A then it’s A major, B minor, C# minor, D major and E major - really helps navigate the way through a song you’re not familiar with. And of course, that’s where the understanding of intervals helps identify the next chord. Starting to understand the commonly used chord patterns was a huge thing when combined with the above. Al the last country jam I ended up playing a few songs I’d not heard before and it was really helpful when the guitarist said, “It’s a simple 1 -4-2-5 in G…” (i.e. G major, C major, A minor, D major) and I immediately had a mental roadmap for the notes I should be aiming for to begin with.

I was just wondering that.

They were bloomin’ brilliant, weren’t they! Such a fun sounding band. And I can attest to how good Lee’s old Fender sounded through the Kemper. He was using at the gig they did at Pizza Express Live last year too. Nice little setup for a very bijou stage.

I love this band. They are so, so good. Saw them at one of the Last Flight album launch gigs last year and at the Proms doing their concept piece about the history of the BBC and (obvs) Public Service Broadcasting. Their stage set-up is stunning and, I guess why one of the five members, Mr B, just focuses onstage on the AV elements of the show.

I originally popped this in the wrong thread so… Big Horizon were fantastic at Pizza Express Live - Holborn in London last night. A lovely evening of Yacht Rock, 70s West Coast pop tinged music. These guys are absolutely top of their game (which explains why the spend most of their time backing megastars on tour - ELO, Take That and many more). Great set, great playing and what a fabulous voice Iain Hornal has! They did a couple of Jeff Lynne’s tunes (an obscure ELO one - Four Little Diamonds, and Handle With Care by The Traveling Willburys). As Jeff Lynne’s backing band for the last 10 years, they paid tribute to him and the unfortunate way the tour ended with him being too unwell to continue to his big Hyde Park retirement gig. Wonderful evening! Lee Pomeroy was a highlight, of course but watching him mangles my brain because all the strings and fingers are in the wrong place. Fab to see Gary PB and Costas there too!

Oops, just realised, wrong thread!

Before @cetera jumps in… Big Horizon were fantastic at Pizza Express Live - Holborn in London last night. A lovely evening of Yacht Rock, 70s West Coast pop tinged music. These guys are absolutely top of their game (which explains why the spend most of their time backing megastars on tour). Great set, great playing and what a fabulous voice Iain Hornal has! They did a couple of Jeff Lynne’s tunes (an obscure ELO one - Four Little Diamonds, and Handle With Care by The Traveling Willburys). As Jeff Lynne’s backing band for the last 10 years, they paid tribute to him and the unfortunate way the tour ended with him being too unwell to continue to his big Hyde Park retirement gig. Wonderful evening! Lee Pomeroy was a highlight, of course but watching him mangles my brain because all the strings and fingers are in the wrong place. Fab to see Gary PB and Costas there too!

I guess that I’ve been a bit derelict in my duty of keeping y’all up to date with how things are going on the worship team… well, I guess I’m now officially on the worship rotation, playing two evening services a month - the first and last. It’s with two different worship leaders with quite different styles. One leads from the grand piano while the other brings his own Nord keyboard to lead from. They both choose a nice range of choruses, drawing from more contemporary stuff but some oldies and oldies, which is great. The “cult of the new” in worship gets kinda tiring and there are many fantastic songs which were written ages ago. I like the mix. It’s our local(ish) Anglican church and the evening services is more of a modern format with just the band leading worship. Morning is a family-based service, again with a worship band and the traditional, organ-led hymnal stuff is done at a 9AM traditional service. The bands are similar - leader on keys/piano, a couple of singers, bass, drums acoustic guitar and occasional other instruments - in particular a saxophonist. All a really nice bunch. There are a couple of other leaders but I think they mostly play the morning family services. It’s hard for us to get to those as we’re ferrying our teenage boy to and from his theatre classes on a Sunday morning. The set list for the 26th October was as follows: Start 1. I could sing of your love forever (F) 2. Firm Foundation (He Won’t) (C) 3. Hallelujah (Be High and Lifted Up) (Eb) Response Song 4. New Wine (C) Communion Songs 5. Trust in God E 6. Only By Grace C End 7. The Potter's Hand G 8. Living for Your Glory C The following week, 2nd, it was… Start Break Every Chain Bless God Waymaker Response song I Will Offer Up My Life Salt & Light End Give Us Your Courage Worthy Really looking forward to getting to know everyone better (musically and personally) as I play with them more. Nice to have found a new spiritual home where we feel at ease.

Two separate Jams this last week. A bass player chum has started a monthly Country Jam in Staines which is very convenient for me. It was their second one last Thursday and so I brought my bass along. Got to play quite a few songs - 5 I think - as there was only me and Chloe who were there. Another bass player who had arranged to play couldn’t come along so I got a couple of his. Fortunately they have a broad definition of “country” which embraces Americana and stretches as far as 70s Fleetwood Mac so it’s not all tassels and stetsons… Though I’d be lying if I said that there weren’t a few who come along suitably attired. The songs I played included Tulsa Time (a blend of Pistol Anni and JJ Cale in style), a Teddy Thompson tune, a rootsy version of “You’re Still the One” and a Chris Stapleton song. Nice atmosphere so I think that it’s going to be a regular one. Last night was our regular Monday Night Jam in Woking - this time a blues focused night (in the loosest terms, of course). I ended up playing on three songs (She Does It Right - Dr Feelgood, me singing on that one too; Julie London’s jazzy version of Blue Moon and Rory Gallagher’s Bad Penny). I also got asked to sing Fire by Jimi Hendrix (that’s blues, right?) which was a lot of fun. She Does It Right was a lot of fun. I’ve wanted to do some Feelgoods stuff for ages and this seemed like a good opportunity. Bad Penny suffered from typical jam night issues. The singer seemed to be singing a different version of the tune, different meter/tempo, or maybe a different song (a perennial problem with that singer) - which would have been fine but the guitar player stuck rigidly to the chords sheet he had written down rather than listening to the singer and adapting to what he was singing. I needed to go over and say “He’s still doing the verse again!” and help guide him through. It was still fun to play though. Love that song as it was one of my late brother’s faves. And can I just say how much I LOOOOOVE my Sandberg. Such a nice bass to play. ❤️ Our next “theme night” is our Christmas one so I have about a month to hatch my dastardly plan - a Christmas version of… WAR PIGS!!!! God bless The Barenaked Ladies.

…sounds like a particularly saucy euphemism! 🫢😳😲

Sorry all, some last minute stuff has come up which means that I won’t be able to be there tomorrow. Have a fun day, all. So sad to miss it.

Fantastic - that’s going to be epic. Love PSB. Enjoy (like you’re not going to! 🙄🤦‍♂️🤣)

Preach it Brother! 👍 No desire to guy any of my basses either!

Nice! And Jodi Linscott on percussion if I’m not very much mistaken!

I’ve not had my Sandberg tweaked since I got it in January so a set up for it would be great. I’ll bring some new strings for it. @NancyJohnson also happy for it to go in the blind shoot out.