1. Every Wednesday Evening, 7:30 - 10:30
   

2. 
   

   
   

   
   

   
   

   _______________
   

   Jam Session Vacations and Closures due to Bad Weather
   

   We take a few weeks off during the year, as follows:
   

   1. 1.Late July/early August;
      

   2. 2.Wednesday before Thanksgiving;
      

   3. 3.A couple weeks around Christmas and New Year’s.
      

   Generally if UNH closes due to bad weather we will too; we may close independently if it seems advisable. I’ll send out an e-mail to the session e-mail list, by 4:00 if possible.
   

   1. ❖2014 Vacation Schedule: We will not meet on the following dates: 8/13, 11/26, 12/24, 12/31.
      

    
   

   _______________
   

   Other Fiddling Events!
   
   Canterbury Fiddler’s Picnic
   

   To be announced.
   

   Details: 3:00 - 6:00, Pot Luck Supper around 5:00, in the field near the Parish House. Click on the title to go to the event web site.

   Durham Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, 20 Madbury Rd. Durham, NH.  It’s a very nice room for a jam session with good acoustics.
   

3. We welcome anyone interested in playing traditional fiddle music on fiddle, piano, guitar, bass, or any other instrument that can be made to fit in! Musicians of all levels are welcome.
   

4. We ask for a $2 donation to cover rent (students $1). for more information, contact Peter Yarensky at peter dot yarensky at unh dot edu (I’m sure you can figure out how to put that together!). If you look up my phone number, don’t call before 10:00 AM!
   

Directions: See map. From the south, take I-95 to the Spaulding Tpke. to Rt. 4W to Durham. From Concord take 4E to Durham. From Manchester take 101E to 125N to 4W to Durham. Parking: Turn onto Woodman Rd., go past the DUUF and park on the side, or park on Madbury Road. Don’t park on Woodman Road; they ticket!

Click on this link to download the Directions with Map in PDF format.

Click on this link to read a Brief History of the Wednesday Night Jam Session.

Click on this link to read an article about Marcel published in the Morning Sentinel, 1/26/07.

Music: Every week we get together to play a variety of old-time Canadian fiddle tunes: Quebec, Maritime, Ontario; waltzes, reels, jigs, two-steps, polkas, etc. We also play New England square dance and contradance tunes; and Scottish, Swedish and Irish tunes now and then — bring in your favorite tunes!

About the Jam Session: The Durham Wednesday Night Canadian Jam Session traces itself to the Wednesday Night Soirées hosted for years by Marcel Robidas in Dover. When Marcel moved away, several of us decided to continue playing Canadian fiddle tunes every Wednesday night. We still play many of Marcel’s tunes. In keeping with Marcel’s wide-ranging repertoire, we also play a wide range of tunes as described below.

We like to have a friendly, relaxed atmosphere at the jam session, and we enjoy the fact that we’re playing for ourselves rather than for an audience in a bar; thus in addition to playing music we can stop to socialize, or discuss the tunes and playing styles, as we please.

Click on this link for a partial Tune List for the Jam Session.

Listening. We used to take a 15-20 minute break at about 9:15 or so to socialize, eat snacks, and listen to recordings of the great fiddlers in the traditions we play; usually we’d listen to one side of a record per evening. We’ve listened to fiddlers such as Jean Carignan, Isidore Soucy, Graham Townsend, Patti Lamoureax, Marcel Robidas, Ward Allen, Andy DeJarlis, Omer Marcoux and many others. This has allowed people who don’t have extensive record collections to hear how the tunes are played by some of the excellent fiddlers who grew up with the music and who have influenced how we play it.

Click on this link to view a Complete Listening Program & Current Selection - a listing of everything since we started listening to recorded music at the jam session.

1. If people express interest I’d be happy to restart the Listening Program again.
   

Note: Please report any broken links or give me feedback on this web site through the Feedback Page.