HGG10: Sunday Morning Madness

I wish we could make it a rule that we only hold the Harp Guitar Gatherings on the weekend of Daylight Savings Time – because if ever there’s a night you wish you could set your clock back an hour, this is definitely it. After Saturday night’s post-midnight jam session, I don’t know how anyone got up the next morning. But they did, and apparently anxious for more. I don’t even remember getting out of bed, but somehow I found myself back at the Uptown Theater, already a hive of harp guitar activity.

The beehive analogy is fairly literal, as the theater had all sorts of separate rooms, alcoves, wings, and nooks and crannies for Gathering goers to engage in all sorts of musical and social pursuits.

There was a whole separate “black box” theater that we commandeered for the traditional Round Robin, or in this case, a casual mini-stage where anyone could (and did) play for each other. Dennis Mitchell wrangled that segment for us, with these photos by Dan Pease.

Dennis, playing the short-scale harp guitar he built

Michael Schreiner, playing his own new harp guitar

Martin Delabano – another builder/player

Bruce Labadie, playing his enhanced Lark in the Morning

and Robert Stallard, playing his “stock” LIM

Charlie Hill, playing his Merrill

The black box impromptu performances continued on until 11. Meanwhile, a series of workshops began at 10 in separate rooms.

Stephen Bennett and Andy Wahlberg each led a group behind closed doors, as did Oleg Timofeyev (where I spent several enjoyable minutes).

We gave the main stage to Tim Donahue for his performance/Q&A workshop, where we were treated to all sorts of brand new material. At the close, he let a couple of people test drive the new instrument.