RE: [Harp-L] SPAH51 so far

[Patrice Rayon <stpat95@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hello Winslow,

"Merci beaucoup" for the report... I often think about you all in St Louis at the moment :) ...
Have great time there... I am sure you are very busy for now ;)

Maybe you receive the visit of artists, dancers from the St Louis university who spent a week next to the village of my parents in Normandie end of June...World is so small, but never to make publicity ;))

Patrice Rayon
PS: Do you plan to make the next SPAH convention in St Louis or somewhere else ?

> Date: Fri, 8 Aug 2014 06:29:30 -0700
> From: Winslow Yerxa <winslowyerxa@xxxxxxxxx>
> Subject: [Harp-L] SPAH51 so far
> To: harp-l <harp-l@xxxxxxxxxx>
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> 
> SPAH51 is going great so far. We'd expected attendance to recede from the high water mark of last years 50th anniversary celebration and it has but this year's event is still very well attended. We'e been constantly upping our numbers for the Saturday banquet and have been able to find rooms for folks who didn't reserve before the deadline, even though the hotel had been reluctant for awhile due to strong business from other trade.
> 
> The event is running as smoothly as I've ever seen. Some of the credit, of course, goes to the St. Louis Gateway Harmonica Club, which has always been a strong club and an excellent host, with Bill Dulin running the SPAH store, and other club members coordinating the tours and hosting the hospitality suite and guarding doors at times when badge checks are required. 
> 
> The backbone of making this whole thing work has been Convention Director Elizabeth Atkison and her husband, Vice President LJ Atkison, with assistance from Phil Duncan. Membership Director Phil Franklin has kept registration running smoothly and efficiently. We have a great volunteer team this year, ably coordinated by Rikki Patton, herself a volunteer.
> 
> We've had some great shows so far, conceived, assembled, and presented by Entertainment Director Paul Davies. 
> 
> Wednesday night featured a variety of acts drawn from the Filisko team, capped by Jimi Lee's varied and tasty presentation of jazz and standards backed by acoustic bass and brushes and featuring several guests - Jimi loves to collaborate and he used that tendency very effectively, integrating both a bass-and-chord trio into his act and a trio of diatonics (with Mike Caldwell and me filling out the other two voices).
> 
> Last night featured TJ Klay's acoustic set, buoyed at one point by an ensemble with bass and chord harmonicas and several additional diatonics - unusual and musically effective in a way you might not expect. This year has a theme of the Harmonica Band Reboot, finding new ways to combine bass and chord harmonica with other harmonicas that reflects how the harmonica is used today instead of focusing solely on using chord and bass in the traditional context of harmonica band repertoire. Thefive youth award recipients presented a varied combination of acrobatic dance/hip-hop freestyle with Aaron Pomerantz, some amazing traditional acoustic blues harmonica from Jake Houshmand, more uptown blues from Jarred Goldweber, flawless classical playing by Julian Perricone, and highly accomplished blues from 18-going-on-35 veteran Nic Clark. Koei Tanaka presented a beautiful set of jazz and ballads with his ethereal tone on his Fabulous 16-hole chromatic, in a
>  mind-meld with Jimi Lee and some very effective duetting with Brandon Bailey. The show was capped by Country firecracker Mike Caldwell, who had never presented as a solo artist before but could have fooled anyone with his smooth presentation, not to mention his virtuosic playing. Again, Mike included a harmonica trio and other collaborators in his presentation.
> 
> For tonight's entertainment, RJ Mischo and Dennis Gruenling are in the house, as is PT Gazell, with Tony Sgro and friends poised to deliver a high energy set of harmonica band favorites. If you're in the area and want to check out what's going on, come on dow! Details at spah.org.
> 
> Vendors are doing fine, lots of informative seminars, plenty of camaraderie and sharing, jamming all over the place. Great T-shirt designs, too, thanks to our new Harmonica Happenings Publisher and graphic designer, Doug May, who has plenty of ideas for increasing our media and online presence. I've been slowly filling positions with strong contributors who have both good ideas and the experience and perseverance to put them into acton in an effective and sustainable way, and over the next year or two we'll start to see those ideas starting to come to fruition.
> 
> A word about the Blues Blowoff. Blowoff Producer (and SPAH Stage Manager) Chris Richards found us an economical bus provider and I took the decision to personally back funding for this. We made our money back on donations from riders, with the overage going to SPAH. The event itself was a rich presentation not only of blues but also some jazz (Koei Tanaka) and harmonica band music, thanks to George Miklas and family.
> 
> Now on to today's activities . . . .
> 
> Winslow Yerxa
> President, SPAH, the Society for the Preservation and Advancement of the Harmonica
> Producer, the Harmonica Collective
> Author, Harmonica For Dummies, ISBN 978-0-470-33729-5
>             Harmonica Basics For Dummies, ASIN B005KIYPFS
>             Blues Harmonica For Dummies, ISBN 978-1-1182-5269-7
> Resident Expert, bluesharmonica.com
> Instructor, Jazzschool Community Music School