Re: [Harp-L] SPAH Elections etc

[Winslow Yerxa <winslowyerxa@xxxxxxxxx>]

Thanks, Michelle, for your thoughtful observations on the SPAH convention. And I certainly sympathize with the difficulties you've experienced in being able to attend the SPAH convention. I had some tough years where I had to stay away, and I really missed it and the many good friends whom I get to see only at that gathering.

One thing I'd like to clarify, at least as far as it concerns me and my candidacy: I'm all for new ideas, and am not "clinging to the tradition that SPAH has worked long and hard to cultivate." But new ideas have to be carefully evaluated. To be workable, they must: 

-- Be acceptable to existing SPAH members
-- Offer us a benefit we don't already have 
-- Be achievable on a practical level given our financial resources and 
    available hands and heads to do the work
-- Not expose SPAH to financial peril.

The model of renting out campus dorm space for a teaching event has been mentioned to me before, and I think it's worth looking at. 

I've had a few different alternative models brought to my attention, all different from each other and from SPAH's current event model, and I'd like to investigate them in greater depth, and evaluate them for SPAH, both for adaptation to its current needs and for new possibilities they might offer. As always, it's down to available resources.

Let the discussion continue. This is exactly the sort of sharing of ideas an experiences that I've been hoping for.

Winslow

Winslow Yerxa
Candidate for SPAH president
Author, Harmonica For Dummies ISBN 978-0-470-33729-5
Harmonica instructor, The Jazzschool for Music Study and Performance
Resident expert, bluesharmonica.com
Columnist, harmonicasessions.com