Banjo versus TV: Week 35

A weekly check-in on the Banjo versus TV project — J.R.'s resolution to spend more time in 2008 on his banjo than on TV. After having fallen up to 4 weeks behind on his so-called-weekly check-ins, he's now nearly caught up and is posting this check-in a mere one week late.

The big news this last week was, of course, the Four Corners Folk Festival, which you can read all about by following this label.

I lugged my banjo all the way to the festival and only jammed a little, but it was good jamming.

My nicest playing-my-banjo experience this week was on the dirt road on the way to the festival. I was about half way through the 4-hour drive from Albuquerque Airport to Pagosa Springs, CO; in the middle of nowhere Colorado. I hadn't seen anybody else for some time and I decided to pull off the road to admire the scenery and pluck a little.

Here's a picture of that experience. If you listen closely, you can hear me singing "This Land is Your Land."

I saw lots of people at 4CFF, just not Earl

Let's start with the big disappointment at the Four Corners Folk Festival in Pagosa Springs, Colorado: No Earl.

They waited until the absolute last minute to announce that Earl Scruggs was too ill to perform. The Legendary Earl Scruggs with Family & Friends performed without him.

They played without a banjo at all until the last two numbers, at which point they brought out Warren Kennison, Jr. -- the guy who did the tablature for Earl Scruggs and the 5-String Banjo.

I wish Earl well and I really hope I'll get a chance to see him perform.

Oh, well. It was a great weekend at the festival, even if it wasn't the weekend I thought I was going to have.

In the coming days I'll be posting about some of the people who I really did see at the Four Corners Folk Festival. Stay tuned.

On the road to the Four Corners Folk Festival

Hello to the friends, new and old, I met along the way to the Four Corners Folk Festival in Pagosa Springs, Colorado.

Hello to my high school friend Samir and his wife, Kshama, who just happened to be riding the same plane to New Mexico. It was nice catching up with you.

Hello to Bridget, my seatmate who let me talk her arm off about my Banjo versus TV project. Bridget, the web site I recommended to you is Flatpicker Hangout, the companion site to the Banjo Hangout. Enjoy the wedding and keep up the guitar practice!

Hello to Maggie, who works the counter at Avis and who once had Steve Martin stay over at her house, back when he was a banjo-and-balloon-animal comedian. Yes, Steve Martin knows how to handle a heckler. "I remember my first beer" is brilliant.

And hello to the kitteh in the window of the room downstairs from mine at the Days Inn.

Let's hear it for pets-allowed hotels!

I'm going to see Earl!

I'm behind on my Banjo versus TV blogging by (count them: 31, 32, 33, 34) four weeks. Life's been busy. But I've got to get all caught up so I can blog about my upcoming weekend in which...

...I GET TO SEE EARL SCRUGGS PERFORM!!!...

...at the Four Corners Folk Festival in Pagosa Springs, Colorado.

So expect to see some fast-and-furious catch-up blogging in the next couple of days. Then? Earl.