Big thanks to all of the performers and attendees at our first Student Showcase! Piano, guitar, violin, voice and ukulele were all represented along with a variety of age groups.

It takes courage to get up in front of an audience and perform. Several internal and external distractions have the ability to derail any performance. A musical mistake or error can be defined as a difference between the intended and actual musical outcome. How we deal with these unexpected outcomes is up to us. In my private lessons, a lot of what we work on is how to recover from these mishaps. How do you pick yourself up and move forward? Most of the time, the audience is unaware of a mistake and the only time they notice is when the performer makes it obvious.

To quote Zachary Poulter in Teaching Improv in your Jazz Ensemblethese “experiences prepare students for a world of increasing ambiguity by enabling them to confront and transcend uncertainty.” Every time you get up on stage to perform, you are one step closer to becoming a better musician and a better human. So keep learning, keep shedding and keep performing!

Thank you to our neighborhood pub, The Pullman for hosting!

 

This Wednesday is the first Guitar Shed Open Mic at The Pullman in downtown Kirkwood! What exactly does that mean? Well, this is the first one so it will be a learning process for everyone. But here are some guidelines….

This is a songwriter open mic, so the performance of your own material is encouraged but not required. Before I began writing my own songs, I learned a great deal from performing covers. Sorry, no spoken word or comedy is allowed. While it is important to practice your instrument on your own, I am a firm believer that the real learning takes place in front of an audience. This is a great low pressure way to hone your chops at a neighborhood watering hole. Did I mention they have great food?!

Sign up begins at 8:30 pm but you can sign up at any point throughout the night. Performance slots will be a maximum of 15 minutes starting at 9:00 pm and ending at 11:00 pm. This is a public open mic, so you don’t have to be a student at Guitar Shed to perform or attend. However, I encourage my students to do both! We will have a small PA system with a couple of mics and instrument cables. So just bring your axe, some friends and some songs!

Pullman

The Pullman

1992 Hosea L Williams Dr NE, Atlanta, GA 30317, USA

(404) 371-1115

[email protected]