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Author Topic: Where to Study for a Year  (Read 12183 times)

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docEdock

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #60 on: July 31, 2013, 11:32:14 AM »

I feel like I am having my cake and eating it too. I enrolled in Boombal dance class and Gooik diatonic workshop even though they overlap. The BoomBal folks kindly let me skip the last days so that I could start Gooik. Very accommodating of them.

Will anyone be attending Ghent Boombal http://www.boombal.be/stage/or Gooik http://muziekmozaiek.be/index.php?onderdeel=3991&titel=Stage+Volksmuziek? If so, give a shout and I'll stand a round of these terrific Belgian beers.

p.s. Chris, I found the Muzikantenhuis and am headed that way to check it out now that Festival is over.
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boisterous budgie

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #61 on: August 05, 2013, 12:02:37 AM »

:) pity I don't drink beer. I'm pitching a tent @ Lovendegem from 18 to 26 August  8) 
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Chris Ryall

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #62 on: August 05, 2013, 07:42:49 AM »

Sorry, clashes  with UK's Whitby. enjoy. Hope it doesn't rain.  ;)

Bieres artisanales have become increasingly common here in France, several are on offer here at Grand Bal. But nothing quite matched Gooikoorts!
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docEdock

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #63 on: August 29, 2013, 06:59:49 AM »

Boombal dance workshop and Gooik Diatonic workshop were terrific fun and very rewarding.

Virtual postcard at http://loafingaboard.blogspot.be/2013/08/tying-mazurka-knot.html
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Chris Ryall

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #64 on: August 29, 2013, 07:44:45 AM »

Glad it was such good fun. I've argued the dance link here, interesting to have someone deliberately do this journey

Question: starting from a base of a couple of decades of melodeon playing, how important did you feel dancing the 9/8 mazurka in learning how to express it musically? Would you have got on top of the rhythm without that?
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docEdock

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #65 on: September 07, 2013, 11:01:05 AM »

Glad it was such good fun. I've argued the dance link here, interesting to have someone deliberately do this journey

Question: starting from a base of a couple of decades of melodeon playing, how important did you feel dancing the 9/8 mazurka in learning how to express it musically? Would you have got on top of the rhythm without that?

At my level of musician every little bit helps. I recall being at Boombal Stage on-learn-to-mazurka day. We spent the morning walking and then dancing the rhythm. During lunch I put some Naragonia mazurkas on my mp3 and practiced the steps. As if by magic I could suddenly hear the musical suggestion to ma, zur, ka. It was as if Toon or Pascale lifted a cue card. Before it was only a phrase I played.

I do believe there is a link. A little dancing really does help hear the music. I can only imagine that a lot of dancing, enough to move beyond having to count out the rhythm and struggle to remember the steps, would truly cue the musical expression.

In contrast I have not found that my playing the music helps me do the dance. The partnership between fingers and brain to play a mazurka stops at my belt, leaving my feet on their own. Perhaps with more experience I shall break through the belt line.
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Theo

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #66 on: September 07, 2013, 11:39:26 AM »

Doc, that is a wonderful experience you have had. I think you will get the music down to your feet as you get more playing hours and internalise the music.  Just look at the video of Pascale for the mazurka that was totm recently. She is sitting, but clearly dancing with every part of her as she plays.
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Theo Gibb - Gateshead UK

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Chris Ryall

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #67 on: September 07, 2013, 11:53:48 AM »

Oooooo, y'know I'd not noticed that, Theo :P

My lass Dolly is the same, conducting her choirs, or improvising …  everything moves. eg here at the (generally not MAD!) Bagpipe Society AGM :o Another keen dancer; another friend of Ghent, too.
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Theo

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #68 on: September 07, 2013, 12:07:41 PM »

Oooooo, y'know I'd not noticed that, Theo :P

How could you miss that!  Most exciting thing on youtube!
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Theo Gibb - Gateshead UK

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docEdock

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #69 on: September 07, 2013, 01:59:42 PM »

Just look at the video of Pascale for the mazurka that was totm recently. She is sitting, but clearly dancing with every part of her as she plays.
This summer I have had the luxury of leaning against the stage and watching Toon and Pascale play for the dancers. I have come to believe that every part of her creates the music, which then flows through her arms and out of her instrument. A seashell is said to produce the roar of the ocean. This may be so. But I am certain that if Pascale put her hands over your ears and you listened, you would hear a mazurka.

This summer has changed my thinking about how I might eventually become a musician. At the start I thought it was about the buttons. I am beginning to realize that it starts well upstream. A new friend pointed out that in my final Le Lac de St-Croix TOTM -- the one with Guus -- I was beginning to smile and dance a bit, whereas my previous videos strictly featured a staunch melodeon face and stiff body. That was a revelation. Perhaps lessons in the chair dance are next, along with lots of time doing buttons and bellows.
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Theo

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #70 on: September 07, 2013, 02:18:25 PM »

No, you just need a dance partner.   (:)  it really is the only way to get inside this music.   

I'm oversimplyfing, of course. You do need to know about buttons, bellows control, chords and all the other ordinary things we all have to learn in order to make your instrument work, but if you know the feeling of dancing to the best (like Naragonia) then you know where you are trying to get to in your playing.
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Theo Gibb - Gateshead UK

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Bobtheboat

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #71 on: September 07, 2013, 03:41:49 PM »

I'm on the same journey with the same goals and the same inspiration. Since having an intro' lesson for dancing at the Sheffield Naragonia Bal. it has revolutionised my approach and , I feel, much improved my playing (thanks all!) Now the problem is finding euro dance events in Staffordshire  :-\
Regarding Pascales video on YouTube. I agree with Theo, it's definitely the best thing on there! Bob
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Chris Ryall

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #72 on: September 08, 2013, 11:34:48 AM »

I came under fire posting my videos of french 'bal folk' music in our 'teaching' section, but that was deliberate. I've now got round to indexing them, and plan to link to a few more once youtube has finished uploading the videos that facebook baulked at.

Focus will be on how the music links to the dancing. Agree that this is very much second best to dancing it with a good partner. Ideally going to source, as Doc has done, but it isn't always practicable. I'd offer that something of this nature might be beneficial to other dance based music that presently gets mangled in the UK pub session, but these are not my field.

  Index: http://forum.melodeon.net/index.php/topic,13089.0.html
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docEdock

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #73 on: September 12, 2013, 10:27:56 AM »


Here's a final virtual post card from Belgium http://loafingaboard.blogspot.com/2013/09/fortunate-summer.html. Thanks for all the advice, suggestions, sessions, and visits to Ballenstraat. The diato cruise is over, sigh. But there's always next summer.
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Gary P Chapin

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Re: Where to Study for a Year
« Reply #74 on: September 12, 2013, 02:13:32 PM »

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Read the l'Accordéonaire French music blog: http://accordeonaire.com/
The Bal Folk Tune Book Project: https://accordeonaire.com/bal-folk-tune-book-project/
The Free Reed Liberation Orchestra: https://accordeonaire.com/the-free-reed-liberation-orchestra/
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