Still time left to sign up for workshops at the Los Angeles Old-Time Social on May 18. David Bragger will be teaching Pennsylvania and Kentucky fiddle tunes from 3-4 and Chris Berry will teach old-time Kentucky two-finger banjo from 4-5. Lots of other workshops plus jamming and a square dance to follow.
Plus more music on May 16 and 17.
Mark your calendars for Monday, July 15 at 7 p.m. for Sausage Grinder’s J.A.M. Session at the Ford Amphitheatre in Hollywood. This event is FREE.
Susan Michaels will be calling an evening of square dancing (with plenty of instruction — and Susan specializes in getting non-dancers comfortable and into the action).
And musicians are welcome and encouraged to bring fiddles, banjos, guitars and what-have-you and join the band. If you’ve never played old-time country music before, we’ll have plenty of experts on hand to show you the ropes.
This is a great summertime event — the doors open at 6 and again it’s FREE and open to all ages. We hope to see you there!
If this is what those mysterious Elders were really getting up to with their world-controlling Protocols, I want in:
Hello everybody! It’s been a while but after a not-so-brief hiatus, Sausage Grinder is back with more of our usual foolishness. We’ve been practicing away in the Old-Time Tiki Lounge and have some new tunes and a new lineup. David Bragger and I (I being Chris Berry) are extremely pleased to have the lovely and talented Susan Platz join us on fiddle, washboard, banjo and vocals. We’ve been playing with Susan for a couple of years now and are thrilled that she is joining us.
We’ve got some new shows lined up, although we can only tell you about two of them right now. First is the 8th Ever Old-Time Social, which runs from May 16-18. David and I will be teaching fiddle and banjo workshops in the afternoon of Saturday the 18th and then Sausage Grinder will be playing a square dance along with the Hollywood Bollweevils, Jessie Milnes, Emily Miller and Friends and callers Susan Michaels and Amy Hofer. It’s a great time and we hope to see you there.
Then on Sunday, May 19, we’ll be playing from 3:30-4:30 at the Dance Barn at the Topanga Banjo and Fiddle Festival. This event needs no introduction — come out and jam, compete, what have you. Watch out for rattlesnakes and drink plenty of water.
If you’re wondering what happened to our Grinders Emeritus, Bobby and Margie moved far far away so Bobby can continue his genetic experiments, and Matt and Josh have moved on to play with Nick Bachman and Max Ward in King Baby — they’ll be playing Friday night at the Old-Time Social so be sure to go and check them out!
We’ll have some more gigs to announce very soon; until then here’s a little taste of Sausage Grinder 2.0. Enjoy!
Sausage Grinder will be playing a square dance at this year’s 40th Annual Old-Time Fiddlers’ Convention in Goleta, CA on Sunday, October 9. The festival starts at 10, the dance is around noon, and David and Chris will once again teach fiddle and banjo workshops later in the afternoon. And we’ll be hanging out and playing all day so come say hello.
This is one of the premier old-time events in Southern California (well, Southern-ish) – don’t miss it. There’s a great line up this year including Laurie Lewis, Eric and Suzy Thompson, Peter Feldmann and more, plus of course the contest. You can read more at the convention website or like their Facebook page.
Here’s some footage of the Grinder from last year jamming with Steve James, plus a bonus track of Chris on the contest stage with our friend Jennifer Fitzpatrick playing a little Memphis Minnie. See you there!
The California Traditional Music Society’s Equinox Festival is September 10-11 at Rancho Cordillera del Norte in Northridge. Sausage Grinder will be there officially on Sunday (although most of us will be there on Saturday hanging out, jamming and going to performances and workshops.
David and Chris will be teaching fiddle and banjo (respectively) workshops from 1-2 p.m. and then at 2:45 we’re playing a square dance called by our own Bobby Reed.
You definitely don’t want to miss this festival — folks like Dan Gellert, Triple Chicken Foot, Old Sledge, Ginny Hawker and Tracy Schwarz and a bunch more will be there. We had a great time last year and this year’s festival is going to be even better. You can check out the schedule here.
Click here for ticket information and we hope to see you there!
Mel Durham, 2003
It occurred to me this evening that Mel Durham would have been 97 years old a few days ago if he were still around, so I thought I’d share one of his tunes with everybody.
If you don’t know who Mel is, he was a fiddler and bass player originally from Southern Illinois who lived in Southern California from after WWII until he died in 2008. He was a lot of fun to be around and play with and shared a lot of his music with a lot of people in the old-time community around here. You can read a lot more about him and see more pictures here.
This is a tune he called “Brush Creek,” and chances were good that if you were starting out in G, Mel would play this tune first. Somehow this tune got left off Mel’s “Skillet Fork” CD (which you can buy here) although I know it was recorded during those sessions. This version is from 2000 from a few recordings I made with Mel at his house in Lakewood on one of those little Tascam 4-track cassette recorders. Sound quality isn’t the best, and I think I just stuck the fiddle on one side of the mix and the guitar on the other when I transferred these onto my computer, but Mel’s in good form on this tune.
Enjoy!
As Inspector Kemp said in Young Frankenstein, “A riot is an ugly thing. Und … I think it is just about time that we had one!”
Well, we feel the same about our Sausage Grinder web posts, so today we have some fiddle and banjo lessons for you, plus the news that our album Delicious Moments is on sale for only $9.99. We know you already have one, but with wedding season getting underway why not buy several for gifts? Who really needs a set of guest towels anyway?
We’ll have some news on some gigs coming your way soon. Meanwhile, why not enjoy this?
