May Acoustic Jam

Last Sunday was the latest jam session of the Downingtown Area Acoustic Jam meetup group (yeah, Sunday was actually June, but it was the May meetup.) These are always fun, and Darling Wife, who comes along to sing, enjoys them every bit as much as I do.

You're supposed to bring two new songs to every session, and Darling Wife suggested a couple, which I researched and printed out. The first was Neil Young's "Don't Cry No Tears". I wasn't familiar with this song, but it's a good song, and easy to play, with just a few simple chords. She also suggested Eddie Vedder's "Guaranteed" (which I've blogged about playing.) It's a tricky song to finger-pick, but not hard at all to strum the chords.

When our turn came, I handed out "Don't Cry No Tears" - and it went over like a lead balloon. I don't know what the problem was - even if you didn't know it, it's not hard to follow along. But people acted totally lost. I'm not sure what the problem was, but it just didn't fly. Darling Wife was a bit traumatized, and told me absolutely not to hand out the Eddie Vedder on our next turn. So I didn't, and called for an old standby (and one of my favorites) - John Denver's "Country Roads".

Notwithstanding our apparently misguided selection, it was a fun afternoon of good music with good people. Guitar great Doc Watson passed away last week, and a few people brought Doc Watson songs to the group.

As a teaser for my next post, I talked with a friend after the jam session, and we toyed with the idea of playing a few songs at the open mic on Tuesday night.

The set list, as best I can remember (and I know I'm missing a few songs), is as follows:

• Deep River Blues (Doc Watson)
• Peaceful Easy Feeling (Eagles)
• Don't Cry No Tears (Neil Young)
• Act Naturally (Beatles)
• For What It's Worth (Buffalo Springfield)
• Let It Be (Beatles)
• Mrs. Brown You've Got a Lovely Daughter (Herman's Hermits)
• I Know You Rider (Grateful Dead)
• Sittin' On Top of the World (Doc Watson)
• Take It Easy (Eagles)
• Country Roads (John Denver)
• Preston Miller (Dave Carter and Tracy Grammer)
• Tennessee Stud (Doc Watson)
• This Land is Your Land (Woody Guthrie)
• Southern Cross (Crosby Stills and Nash)
• Ferry Across the Mersey (Gerry and the Pacemakers)
• Sunshine (Johnathan Edwards)
• Old Time Religion (Pete Seeger)