Animaterra

Yes, very lovely! And not to contradict you, Al, but I quite like the reverb! Allison

A friend pointed me to this site: http://www.catfeather.com/listening_room Listen to the song: Hexagon Zombies. No concertina is playing on the recording as far as I can tell, but the song is all about our favorite topic!

These are great fun! Allison

Lovely, Mark! Wish I could get down there sometime!

What's happening this weekend in NoHo? I'll be in Amherst (briefly) on Saturday afternoon! (I'm on temporary leave from my morris team so I'm out of the loop!)

Thanks for doing this. Jody! I had fun re-living Arnold the Armadillo and will look forward to perusing the others on this page.

Oh, David, what fun! Brought it all back for a moment!

No idea, Kate, but I want to wish you well. When do you leave?

It looks like a lovely instrument. Hopefully someone here with more knowledge about English than I will give you some advice!

Geoff, you need a Utilikilt! http://www.utilikilts.com/index.php?page_id=13

At NESI on Saturday afternoon, I happened to pick up my Jeffries "wrong side up" and noticed for the first time how worn the bellows are on the "thigh side". Now, I've not been playing it for more than a little over 3 years, and could not have been solely responsible for the amount of wear, but I took it to Bob Snope to see if I should be worried. He did a great trick- opened the bellows, licked his lips, and held the instrument up to his mouth (no, he didn't kiss it!), testing to see if he could detect a tiny leak at each fold. Nope, it's still nice and tight- but I'm glad I'd already begun practicing holding the instrument at chest-height. It's a heavy instrument to maintain such a position for long (for me at least ) but I'm going to try not to add to the wear any more than I can help. I know a little of the recent history of the instrument, but from the shiny worn leather I saw, I think I can guess it had at least one other owner I'll never know of- probably the original owner, who held it on his (?) right thigh and played a lot!

Home and tired- I got to bed earlier than most last night, dozing off around 2:30 am, up with the birds and squirrels as usual around 7:30. But what a great weekend it was! For the first time I felt something like a "regular", hanging around with CNet and other friends. Warm conversations with David B, Ken C, Kate P (who didn't seem shy to me at all, Ken!), Wendy/Bellowbelle, Perry, Howie, Britt, fiddlers green, Jody K and many other fine folk who don't know what a good time we have here on line. Wendy's foot bass was fantastic! Now I want one of those, too! Wendy, I hope you will stay the weekend next time- and you don't even need to bring me prezzies (Wendy had a grocery tote for me that says "Life is Complicated: Eat Dessert First!" Just the right size and shape I needed for a school tote- ok if I don't use it for shopping?) Other hits were the wonderful songs last night (although I'll never think of moose in quite the same way again...), workshops with the likes of Jody Kruskal, Rachel Hall, and Bob MacQuillen, stellar entertainment at the concert, the euphoria of the processional on Saturday night, falling asleep to the sounds of accordions and concertinas right outside my door, and especially this year, really warm and substantial conversations with all sorts of folks. Weekends like NESI give us all a chance to be our best selves and open ourselves to people we may not see more than once a year- if that. Now I'm going to start practicing songs for next year! BTW, Hit-an-Miss, which Jim were you??

Aha! I have to right-click and "Save Target As..."- I'm still new at this mp3 stuff. Listening to Bonaparte right now- fantastic!

Wendy, you're going to be a popular girl! I look forward to seeing it and you!

Jody, I don't know if it's my computer but I don't get any music when I click the titles on your website!

WHAT was going on there, Lester?????

Oh, do come, Mark! Come, honey, do!

Yummmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

AWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW- Thanks, Leo!

Hmmm, I've never seen geeks and nerds and cool and hot so definitively defined. I thought they were qualities best described by "a certain je ne sais quoi..." But I think concertina players are totally cool!

That does look like a happy bunch. I'm happy to know that y'all are really like that- only often sillier! Congrats on #500!

What's the processional music for Saturday night, Rich? "Road to Bucksteep"?

I second the recommendation to check out Jeremiah McLane- he is DEFINITELY not a geek! Allison-who-is-.also not Helen but not a recent poster...

September is almost here, school is about to begin, so can NESI be far behind? I am so looking forward to it! Who will be there?

Very nice!