Guitars in Dumfries

I spent the weekend at the Friar's Carse Hotel in Dumfries, at the guitar weekend.
I went last year and really enjoyed it but this year was even better!
It took me 8 hours to get there- hampered by a two-inch snowfall in Barnet on the way that meant it took an hour to drive 45 miles- and then more snow, a humungous jam on the A1, a cross country experience to escape that and straight into another on the M!
But I got there, and had a whale of a time; there were about 20 of us, all with our acoustic guitars, learning blues scales and strumming country chords. In the evening, Gary, Brian and Martin kicked off a lovely little acoustic night, performing in the huge hotel fireplace that did wonders for vocalists (some strange acoustic thing). People sang their own songs, weird covers, and played instrumentals. What a bunch of characters!
Next day, we all sat in a circle and played our favourite chords in sequence, and Trois Gymnopedies by Erik Satie, and the Bond theme (well, we just played the last chord- the teachers played the complicated bits), before bombing back to our nerdy homes and trying to remember what we'd learned.
I'm going to do a workshop at the next thing Andrew is organising- a songwriter's weekend in the Lake District.
And hello to Ragtime Steve! I enjoyed your rags, don't know how you manage to remember how to play them!