September 27 - October 1, 2023

Do you love acoustic blues guitar? So do we. So much so we dedicate 5 days to bringing the best acoustic players and teachers here to Menucha for an extended weekend filled with all the blues goodness. And, this year, we're having 5 absolutely fantastic musicians on the faculty!

Arriving Wednesday afternoon you'll be welcomed to our slice of Pacific Northwest heaven. Thursday, Friday and Saturday will be filled with classes, getting to know fellow players and taking your playing to the next level in classes and jams. Friday night you can show your skills during the student concert just for Blues participants. On Saturday night you'll be treated to a public concert featuring the instructors. Sunday brings parting ways to return home filled with good friends, food and music. Don't miss it!

Come and immerse yourself in five days of instruction with four of the best acoustic blues musicians.

Faculty for 2023

  • Guy Davis
  • Mamie Minch
  • Kristina Olsen
  • Mary Flower, artistic director

 

Register

 

Cost to Attend

The costs below are per person and all-inclusive of class fee, all 12 meals (Wednesday dinner - Sunday lunch), public concert, and lodging. Your cost will vary according to the number of people you are willing to share a room with. There will be an option to add on a t-shirt, hat or vest for an additional cost.

  • Triple Occupancy (you and 2 roommates) $833
  • Double Occupancy (you and 1 roommate) $933
  • Single Occupancy (just you!) $1033
  • Commuter (classes, lunches & dinners, no overnight lodging at Menucha) $726

Would your partner/spouse like to come with you and stay in the same room with you but not take the classes? They can! The cost for them is $458. Total cost for the two of you is $1391

At the time of registration fill out your information and choose "Double Occupancy" then when you see the "add another registrant" button, click on it and choose Non-participating Partner/Spouse for them. They'll stay in the room with you and eat all meals with Blues participants, enjoy the public concert and not have to do dishes all weekend!

COVID Info: Proof of Covid vaccination or a negative Covid test (can be a home test, taken within 24 hours of arrival) are required to attend. This may change closer to time, but for now this is our policy.

 

 

Guy Davis

Guy Davis is a two-time, back-to-back Grammy nominee for Best Traditional Blues, a musician, Actor, Author, and Songwriter. Guy uses a blend of Roots, Blues, Folk, Rock, Rap, Spoken Word, and World Music to comment on, and address the frustrations of social injustice, touching on historical events, and common life struggles. His background in theater is pronounced through the lyrical storytelling of songs “God’s Gonna Make Things Over” about the 1921 Tulsa Race Massacre, “Welcome to My World”, and “Got Your Letter In My Pocket”. His storytelling is sometimes painful, deep, and real, an earthy contrast to modern-day commercial music, meant to create thought, underlined by gentle tones from his guitar or banjo fingerpicking.

A self-taught “Renaissance Man”, he first heard the banjo at a summer camp run by John Seeger, the brother of the American Folk Musician, Pete Seeger, and soon after, asked his father for one.

His records, while terse and truthful, are softened by songs like “We All Need More Kindness In This World”, denoting lyrical inspiration from Pete Seeger’s “If I Had A Hammer”, then teased with lyrically strutting works nudged by Hip Hop and Honky Tonk, like “Kokomo Kidd”. The contrast between pieces provides a robust, balanced experience, while giving Guy and his audience a healthy outlet for frustration through song and dance.

When asked about his experience as a performer, Guy has replied, “There is no tale so tall that I cannot tell it, nor song so sweet that I cannot sing it.”

Learn more about Guy...

Mary Flower

"a world-class finger-style guitarist and lap slide player.”

-DownBeat

No less an authority than legendary Jefferson Airplane/Hot Tuna guitarist Jorma Kaukonen admiringly described Mary Flower as "a national treasure in your own backyard."

Indeed, the internationally renowned award-winning Portland, Oregon-based singer/guitarist/songwriter is a prodigious talent whose seasoned skills have established her as one of America's foremost roots performers. Flower combines a deep historical knowledge with a restless creativity that keeps her music evolving into new creative territory while echoing influences from Piedmont to the Mississippi Delta, with additional stops at ragtime, swing, folk, and hot jazz.

Midwest native Flower relocated from Denver to the vibrant Portland music scene in 2004. Since then, she's continued to impress crowds and critics at folk festivals in America and abroad, including Merlefest, Waterfront Blues Fest, King Biscuit, A Prairie Home Companion and the Vancouver Folk Festival, while maintaining a parallel career as a renowned guitar teacher. Mary has shared her guitar skills at over 25 guitar “camps” and is about to celebrate 10 years at her own guitar intensive near Portland, Oregon, Blues in the Gorge. Along the way, she's twice been a Finalist in the International Fingerstyle Guitar Championship, as well as being nominated three times for the Blues Foundation's prestigious “Blues Music Award.” Mary is a contributing writer for Acoustic Guitar magazine and has recorded several instructional DVDs for the Homespun label.

For more information regarding Mary Flower...

Mamie Minch

Mamie’s honest, deep singing voice and old school guitar walloping become a vessel for her toughness and pathos as she delivers timeless performances that can rile, groove, sooth, and understand. If you’ve been lucky enough to see Mamie perform in New York City or somewhere else in the wide world, then you know: there are some things a person is simply meant to do.

These days, you can catch Mamie in her duo with Dean Sharenow (Kill Henry Sugar, Joan Baez) at their residency at Barbes, Brooklyn’s best small club, or solo at Jalopy, NYC’s mainstay of Americana music.  Mamie began playing guitar as a teenager in her bedroom listening to reissues of class country blues on repeate. Her job at a local record store gave her first dibs on releases from labels like Yazoo and Document. She would hurry home and try her hand at picking out the songs of legends like Mississippi John Hurt, Lightnin’ Hopkins, Memphis Minnie and Bessie Smith. She loved the steady thumb and percussive right hand of these blues players, but she also devoured lots of different styles of music, from soul to psychobilly and old time to punk rock.

After graduating from art school in non-traditional printmaking techniques, Mamie came to New York City where she fell in with a crowd of 78 record collectors, some of whom had contributed rare recordings to the same reissue labels she loved.  It was a mind-expanding time for her and she connected with a crowd who were interested in early American music.  Soon, she was playing around the city in small clubs with her first band, Delta Dreambox. She met Meg Reichardt (Les Chauds Lapins, Low Down Payment), another guitarist and singer who could sound like she’d jumped off of an Edison wax cylinder, and they founded the four-piece, all-woman harmony group the Roulette Sisters, who played together for a decade and recorded two full-length albums.

When she’s not making music, Mamie spends her days as a guitar repair luthier at Brooklyn Lutherie, the shop she and her business partner, Chloe Swantner, opened in 2014. It remains one of the few women-owned and -operated shops around.  She also teaches, writes articles about luthiery and guitar playing for She Shreds and Acoustic Guitar magazines, and runs the annual Ukulele Building Camp for Girls in Brooklyn, NY.

Learn more about Mamie...

 

Kristina Olsen

Kristina Olsen, California USA.  A superb multi-instrumentalist as well as an award-winning songwriter with a big bluesy voice, Kristina has audiences around the world coming back for more.  Her mix of powerful songs ranging from sassy bottleneck blues to lilting ballads to swing jazz to raunch and roll (as well as her hilarious storytelling) makes for a diverse and satisfying musical experience, on stage and on disc.  In 2016 she released her 15th recording, Sweet Stillness.  Her songs have been recorded by Eric Bibb, Fairport Convention, Mary Coughlan, Maddy Prior and Mollie O’Brien among others.  She has been a session player for Michelle Shocked, Rikki Lee Jones and Mary Coughlan. With a Bachelor’s of Music from Berklee College of Music in guitar and interdisciplinary studies, she loves teaching at music camps and is passionate about unlocking the mysteries of music with her students. Kristina also has released an enhanced ebook with 20 imbedded songs which is also available as an audio book called “They Paid Us In Tub Time”

Learn more about Kristina...

Class Descriptions

Guy Davis

Blues Harmonica (level 1,2)

We will learn the scales. Learn simple tunes like Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, slightly more complex tunes like Shenandoah. We'll learn to bend notes, play basic riffs and Blues tunes.

The middle of the harmonica is the easiest place to start from, but we'll work until you know all it from the bottom to the top.

 

Box and Rack (level 2, 3)

Bob Dylan did it. Jimmy Reed did it. Paul Geremia, and John Hammond did it. Play the harmonica and the guitar at the same time. Do you have what it takes? Want to learn? Come on! Bring your guitar, harmonica holder, and harp in the key of A.

 

Finger Style Guitar (level 2,3)

In this class, we learn the "lazy man" method, using only the energy necessary to accomplish a musical task. The more of these tasks we can make 2nd nature, the more the performer can add. Whether you want to do Leo Kottke style instrumentals, or just sing while you play, you got to have musical tools at your command. Because I teach in layers, those students with more ability will learn more complex patterns, and those with less ability will learn the more fundamental elements.

Performance Class (all levels)

Stage fright? Never been up in front of people before? Can't relax? Not sure how to improve your performance? Sometimes all you need is a tweak. This class is non judgemental. Everybody has a say.

 

Song Writing (all levels)

Got words that need music? Got a tune that needs lyrics? Pieces of ideas that need development? Bring them even if you don't sing or play an instrument.

 

Jam Class (All levels)

Bring your instrument and your voice. This is a participatory class in a round robin format. Any style of music. Bring originals. Bring covers. Learn to listen and lead. Let's have fun.

 

Mary Flower

Guitar Styles of Rev. Gary Davis (two classes, level 3)

This class will explore the ragtime, gospel and blues guitar fingerpicking of the prolific and legendary Gary Davis. Davis' challenging rhythms and moving melodic chord voicings up the neck were piano-like and inventive. We will dig in and learn a few songs from his remarkable repertoire in an attempt to glean wisdom and technique from this master.

Advanced players will benefit from this class. Tab will be available and audio recording recommended.

 

The Bluesy Side of Lap Slide Guitar (all levels)

Bring your Dobros, Weissenborns or lap steels with raised action and a tone bar of some kind. (This is not a bottleneck class.) In the world of country blues, Casey Bill Weldon and Black Ace preferred lap to style bottleneck guitar. Class will explore basics like vibrato, tone, and how to hold the bar while learning scales, melodies and songs for solo and accompaniment/group playing. We'll use G tuning as well as D tuning,

The ability to read tablature will be helpful and students are encouraged to audio or video record any parts of the class.

 

One Simple BLues in E (1 class, level 1)

Class will learn Leadbelly's "Good Morning Bues", a 12 bar with a call and response between the vocal and the guitar. This is one song that will easily fit into your repertoire that everyone can learn in one class period.

 

Great Tunes in Open G major tuning  (2 classes, level 2-3)

Mary will share ideas for getting around in this tuning which will give you inprov ideas. Class will learn "I Will Turn Your Money Green"  which was recorded in 1928 by Memphis legend Furry Lewis. The guitar accompaniment is unusual and fun to play. We'll also visit Judy Roderick's version of "I Know You Rider" as well as a Memphis Minnie groove.

 

Mamie Minch

Your Dancing Right Hand (3 classes)

In this 3 part class we’ll learn a new song each day, highlighting ways to use your plucking hand beyond strumming and picking. Rolling and brushing with the fingers and thumb, percussive palm techniques, nimble downward strikes, and more.

 

Guitars 101 (all levels, offered once)

The basics of care, feeding, maintenance and guitar health from the manager of a guitar repair and restoration shop!

how about two classes of:

 

Playing Together (all levels)

An intro to the basics of the art of backing blues guitar

 

Kristina Olsen

Slide Guitar: (Level 2)

Come learn the seductive sound of the slide guitar! We'll focus mostly on blues and mostly on slide played in open tunings. Slide guitar is a great class to take when your left hand fingers are sore, no calluses needed! You don't need any previous experience playing slide, but you do need fundamental knowledge of the guitar.

 

Groove, Grunt and Gimme (Level 3)

Hidden treasures stolen from jazz, funk, and soul to make your blues irresistibly sexy! Dig a groove so deep you don't know how to climb out of it yourself! Put some grunt behind your right hand to make your blues shout gimme gimme more!! You should be competent at fingerpicking and know basic chord and some barre chords and be able to make chord changes in time for this class.

 

Pushme Pullyou or The Physics of Partner Dance (All Levels)

Learn universal lead and follow techniques so you can dance with anyone to any music!  This class is appropriate whether you are a total beginner or an experienced partner dancer. You do not need a partner to come to class! You just need a flexible mind and a desire to dance! This class has been the surprise hit at swing camps in Canada and the States.

 

Fretting Away Your Time or Practice Makes Perfect (All levels)

Practicing techniques for your fretted instrument. How to get the best workout in the limited amount of time you have to play. We’ll do practicing together of scales, intervals and arpeggios, and investigate all aspects of a practice session, such as how to break down a difficult piece into manageable chunks and how to create a scheduling round robin to work though all the modules you want to touch on.

 

Guitar Solo-ing for people who have no clue: (Level 2-3)

Do you freeze up when someone says 'take it!' Do you have no clue how to go from playing chords to playing single note leads? Do you worry that your guitar playing friends will start to talk behind your back? Come to this class and learn how to dazzle those same nay sayers with your new skills.

 

Freddy Green Chords to take you from blues to Jazz (Level 3)

Freddy Green was the engine behind many of the early big bands and he created really hip three note chords to play so the fingerings are easy but the sounds are complicated. Give that jazzy sound to your blues!

Example Schedule

2023 Schedule

We'll have copies for you when you arrive.

WEDNESDAY Septebmer 27, 2023
TIME LOCATION: Wright Hall
3:00 PM Arrival & Check-in
4:15 PM Welcome & Orientation
5:50 PM Meal servers to dining hall
6:00 PM Dinner
7:15 PM Staff Intros,  Class Overviews, Q&A with instructors
10:00 PM Quiet Time in Wright Hall
Jams use Creevey or Greenhouse
THURSDAY September 28, 2023
TIME LOCATION: Wright Hall LOCATION: Greenhouse
8:00 AM Breakfast
9:15 - 10:15 AM
Class 1
Kristina Olsen
Fretting Away Your Time OR Practice Makes Perfect
(All Levels)
Mamie Minch
Your Dancing Right Hand

(Level 2,3)

Break
10:30-11:30 AM
Class 2
Kristina Olsen
Guitar Soloing for people who have no clue
(Level 2,3)
Mary Flower
One Simple Blues in E
(Level 1)
12:00 PM Lunch
1:00-2:00 PM SPECIAL GUEST!
2:00 PM Break
2:15-3:15 PM
Class 3
Mary Flower
The Bluesy Side of Lap Slide Guitar
(all levels)
Guy Davis
Jam Class
(All Levels)
3:30 PM Break
3:30-4:30 PM
Class 4
Mamie Minch
Playing Together
(All Levels)
Guy Davis
Fingerstyle Guitar
(level 2,3)
5:00 -5:30 PM Intro to Jamming with Adam Scramstad
6:00 PM Dinner
7:30 PM Playing Well Together
All Instructor Presentation
10:00 PM Quiet Time in Wright Hall
Jams use Creevey or Greenhouse
FRIDAY September 29, 2023
TIME: LOCATION: Wright Hall LOCATION: Greenhouse
8:00 AM Breakfast
9:15 -10:15 AM
Class 1
Mary Flower
One Great Tune in Open G Major Tuning
(Level 2,3)
Mamie Minch
Playing Together
(Level 1)
Break
10:30-11:30 AM
Class 2
Kristina Olsen
Slide Guitar
(Level 2)
Guy Davis
Blues Harmonica
(Level 1,2)
12:00 PM Lunch
1:00 PM SPECIAL GUEST!!
2:15 -3:15 PM
Class 3
Mary Flower
Guitar Styles of Rev. Gary Davis (1/2)
(Level 3)
Guy Davis
Song Writing
(All Levels)
2:45 PM Break
3:30-4:30 PM
Class 4
Mamie Minch
Your Dancing Right Hand (#2)
(Level 2,3)
Kristina Olsen
Freddy Green Chords to take you from blues to Jazz
(level 3)
Freetime
6:00 PM Dinner
7:30 PM Student Concert - sign ups at Camp
10:00 PM Quiet Time in Wright Hall
Jams use Creevey or Greenhouse
SATURDAY September 30, 2023
Wright Hall Greenhouse
8:00 AM Breakfast
9:15-10:15 AM
Class 1
Mamie Minch
Your Dancing Right Hand (#3)
(Level 2,3)
Guy Davis
Performance Class
(All Levels)
Break
10:30-11:30 AM
Class 2
Mary Flower
Guitar Styles of Rev. Gary Davis (2/2)
(Level 3)
Kristina Olsen
Groove, Grunt and Gimme
(Level 3)
12:00 PM Lunch
1:00-2:00 PM SPECIAL GUEST!!
Break
2:15-3:15 PM
Class 3
Kristina Olsen
Pushme Pullyou or The Physics of Partner Dance
(All Levels)
Guy Davis
Box and Rack
(Level 2, 3)
Break
3:30 - 4:30 PM
Class 4
Mamie Minch
Guitar 101
(All Levels)
Mary Flower
Another Great Tune in Open G Tuning
(Level 2,3)
5:30 PM Dinner
7:00 PM Acoustic Blues Concert CONCERT is held at the Corbett Grange Hall --we'll have maps, it's about a mile away, and included in your registration fees!
10:00 PM Quiet Time in Wright Hall
Jams use Creevey or Greenhouse
SUNDAY October 1, 2023
Wright Hall
8:00 AM Breakfast
9:15 AM Pack-up Time, early jam, or sleep in
10:30 AM All-Camp Gospel Jubilee
12:00 PM Lunch
Travel safely on your way home.