SGRRC

Last week I participated as a volunteer for the 5th annual Souther Girls Rock & Roll Camp. It's one of the coolest things I've done in a long while (and was way cooler than attempt at being an official scorekeeper for Little League baseball).

The day camp was held in the music and recording buildings on campus at Middle Tennessee State University. This year's camp consisted of over 60 girls, ages 10-17, who spent the week in morning workshops and afternoon instructional classes and late afternoon band rehearsals. Some girls had returned from previous years to team up with fellow veterans from previous bands, but many/most were newbies who are more or less thrown together at the beginning of the week in accordance to their music tastes and band position requirements (guitars, bass, keyboards, vocals and drums).

I participated as a facilitator in the morning recording workshop and the afternoon keyboards & electronic music class, including teaching a 30 minute segment one afternoon on MIDI and computer music. I also tried to cover a little bit about "Gear Envy" and how to not let one's music playing self become paralyzed by what equipment they don't have. I had fun, but I don't envy those who teach (granite faced) teenagers on a daily basis. Those doing the heavy lifting on the instructional side rarely got any feedback clues on whether they were getting through or not. There was one exception: a 10 year old in the morning recording class, despite whatever degrees of capability, usually got to volunteer for the neatest exercises because her hand always shot up while the others sort of sheepishly scanned each other to see who was going to go first. It was not until nearly the end of the week before some of the older girls decided to pull age rank in order to get in on some of the fun. They did all have some pretty good questions by the last day that seemed to indicate they were leaving with the desire to learn more.

The week culminated with a Saturday night Showcase Concert featuring 16 all-girl bands, each playing a one-song set, and it was pleasantly amazing to see how far they all came along in one week. The bands were mixed ages and experience, but each had a good enough mix to pull off their one song with varying degrees of aplomb. For instance, one band had a 17 year old lead guitar and vocalist, with some mid-teen girls on bass and keyboards, and a 10 year old drummer (from the recording class) who was amazingly good. Together they sounded great, and not one of the bands had any nightmare off-beat or off-key like embarrassing moments. Plus they played to a full house in a fairly large campus concert hall, so I'm certain that all them -- whether they were intensely concentrated on their part or experienced enough to loosen up and groove a little -- experienced their dream for at least one night. I wish they had had something like this when we were kids.