Kids' Jam Winter 2011 Success!

Hi. We had a great time at the Jam , Saturday. There were almost 50 students and 100 guests! It was a great place to have it, The Underground , in Naperville. Kids from 5 to 17 played. Everyone did a great job. I had three people making vid's so hopefully I'll have some good shots. As soon as I get something I'll post it.

After another successful Kids' Jam I think some thank you's are in order for all the help I had.

First I want to thank Wendy Daly for suggesting The Underground at Alleluia Lutheran, it was a nice place to play music. She also did a lot to setup/takedown chairs and to get the show started.

I want to thank Craig Johnson, Katie Khoury and Scott Dahl for taking video during the performance. This way I don't have to run around looking for snippets of video and trying to put it all together.

I want to thank Missy Wichhart and her daughter for keeping track of the smoothie coupons. I anticipated 55 students running around and she did a great job getting liquids into their empty stomachs.

I want to thank the parents of the performers that made sure their students were able to practice. And to the students for diligently practicing in-between homework.

I want to thank the parents who brought their kids just to watch and had to stay an hour longer than I said. 

I want to thank Morgan and Hannah for working so hard to sing songs they didn't know. They did that to make some of the bands more complete. Well done, ladies.

I want to thank my student and associate teacher Joe Pillatsch for running around with a tuner so kids didn't sound too avant-guard. 

I want to thank Alissa McCoy for popping popcorn even though we couldn't have it at The Underground (my misunderstanding).

I want to thank my son, Brendon, for helping put amps in place, running extensions, setting up chairs, helping with the organization and getting some of his students to perform.

I want to thank my daughter, Tegan, for putting up with me when I made her practice and learn a very difficult acoustic guitar part.

Most of all, I want to thank my wonderful, beautiful wife of 36 years who has to put up with all this and my general madness in the week leading up to the jam. She did a great job rounding up adrenaline-crazed, smoothie-high musicians for their performances. 

If I forgot someone, I am sorry. Please let me know.

It was really, really fun... and I think the kids had a good time , also! 

Terry

Kids' Jam Winter 2011

Hi there. Saturday , January 29th, we will have our next Kids' Jam at The Underground in Naperville! I'm real excited. There are over 30 performances on the schedule. The kids have been working real hard to get ready for it. I'll post videos and pictures as soon as I have them.

Kids' Jam 2010

Hi. This August, the 21st to be exact, I will be holding my 2nd Annual (kinda, sorta) Kids' Jam. I'm inviting all my non-adult students, Brendon's students, Joe Pillatsch's students and Kevin Conlin's students. We are going to get together and play some songs, play some jams, have some contests and listen to some solo performances. The last one I had was a lot of fun, this one should be just as fun, and more.

The kids get to play with other kids, durning the jams they get to play anything they want and they get to play it as loud as they would like. This is about as close to a recital I can come. I used to hate recitals, being in them and listening to them. No fun.

And this isn't about showing off. We're just going to play and share music and try to have some (loud) fun for a while.

Right now I have over 20 students registered and, with parents and friends, it totals almost 100 people. Ernie Ball and D'Addario have sent some goodies for the kids. Luna Guitars said they would send some soon. I haven't heard from Jim Dunlop.

I'll post updates as I have them.
Terry

2nd Annual (kinda sorta) Kids' Jam

NapervilleGuitarLessons.com is proud to present the 2nd Annual Kids' Jam August 21st , 6-8 PM at Grace United Methodist Church in Naperville Il. The Jam is by invitation and registration only. We are going to get a bunch of guitar , drum and bass students together and just play a lot of music. There will be some contests ( some hard some easy) and any kid that wants to perform alone (shiver) for the group will be allowed to.

I have also invited Randy Buescher to speek/demo his voice teaching philosophy . Randy shares the same values I do as a music teacher; we both help the student reach their musical goals. Visit his website a t www.speechlevelvoice.com/

Here's the location for registration

www.napervilleguitarlessons.com/kjam.html

See you there.
Thanks, Terry

The Great American CAGED Shoot Out

We had our CAGED contest and it was a great hit! Lucas won by performing 9 chords in 5 keys in 16 seconds! Everyone did very well. 

Here is a link to the pictures from the evening.

http://picasaweb.google.com/candrewmorrison/CAGED2008

Thanks to Marc Morrison for taking the pictures. I was busy running the contest. 

We had a lot of fun and after the contest, the kids got to jam. They got to play whatever they wanted, with whomever they wanted and as loud as they wanted! It was great!

The Great American CAGED Shoot Out

Hello everyone.

As I was teaching my teenage students the value of the CAGED system an interesting thing happened; they all began to compete to see who could play all five keys the fastest. It has become a real focus among most of them. So I decided to have a formal competition and see who really is the fastest. 

March 15th at Vocals and More, ( 481 N., Suite 100, Commons Rd, Aurora  630-851-3262,) 7:00 to 9:00, we will hold our Great American CAGED Shoot Out. I'll be sending out emails and fliers once I have to rules formalized. It looks like there will be up to 15 of my teen students competing. After the competition we will try to have one big teen jam, hopefully in blues. Anyone is welcome but only the teens can compete and jam. 

For those of you not up on CAGED, it is a systematic way to learn notes, scales and chords up and down the guitar fingerboard. It makes it easy to learn to play in other positions without brute force memorization.  Many songs use CAGED shape chords and variations so it is helpful to learn these. That cuts down your learning curve for a particular song. And the hand and finger exercises are worth the effort. 

thanks and keep playing guitar.

Terry