Re: [Harp-L] SPAH 2004 and moving forward!



This message from Rob Paparozzi sums up for me JUST what SPAH is trying to do. (see below)

The SPAH charter states in the 'Aims'

"The object of this organization is to cultivate, develop, foster, preserve, promote,educate, advance and improve the art of harmonica playing and the harmonica generally"

and later

"The promotion and stimulation of a true fraternal feeling among the membership as a whole"

The Guys who wrote the American Constitution had vision.
The Guys who wrote the SPAH Constitution had vision.

I see nothing about diatonic, chromatic, chord, bass, etc, what I see is HARMONICA.
I see nothing about factions, I see the encouragement of fraternal feelings in music.


If it were not so I would not have volunteered for my job in SPAH and I wouldn't be surrounded by a great group of people who all mess in and run it, and we wouldn't have the great crowd of players who give so much to the conventions for reduced fees in order to mix, teach, learn and enjoy.... harmonica.

Apparently we had 500 doing just that last week.

Thanks Rob for pointing out stuff which is often forgotten.

Douglas Tate
President ... SPAH

At 11:38 29/08/2004, you wrote:
Congrats and a special thanx to SPAH especially Doug Tate and Paul Davies and Joe Fey's Gateway Club for working so hard and bringing us another great SPAH. Despite a few technical difficulties, I really enjoyed meeting & hanging and performing with some new and old members. Also, a big thanx to Tom Stevens for his hard work all week.


I wanted to thank our President Doug Tate for giving me the opportunity to perform with Bud Boblink (chord) and Frank Warner (bass) two great musicians! I learned volumes from this experience.


St. Louis was a cool town with some soulful & friendly folks. (and some great eateries!)

Everyone sounded so good (all week), I now have a lot of new licks to steal and new CD's to listen too in the weeks ahead!!


Still, much work is needed in between the:


Diatonic vs. the Chrom/Bass/Chord camps.

I spoke with alot of senior players that felt that the 'Diatonic' guys have taken over "Their" convention...feeling slighted in some ways. It's too bad I told them because, if SPAH does not grow with the new players...it will just fade away and end!

Internet groups like Slidemeister just alienate the the two groups even further apart. Hats off too Harp-l which keeps an OPEN forum.

The issue here is we NEED each other, the older gang is helping us "Preserve" the precious and beautiful works on Chord/ Bass & Chrom...the great Trio arrangements that we can learn so much from.Also, the diminishing number of Chord and Bass players is a serious problem that we need to address and attend to. I have learned so much about the instrument from these older players.

Ofcourse, it goes without saying, MORE promotion and Players are needed in our Classical realm!

On the other hand we MUST continue to "advance", this is why it's imperative to encourage ALL the diatonic players to join and attend SPAH and contribute their innovations and music. Advancement must continue as well for Chromatic as well as Chord and Bass. On a positive note, I did see more 'crossover' going on, more diatonic players making the jazz Jams more Chrom players hitting the late night blues jams.
The same crossover was going on at the seminars which was really nice to see.


This is only going to be a successful merger if both sides REALLY respect each others contributions, not look down upon them as inferior forms.

SPAH, has gone out of there way to provide equal time, space and spotlight for both camps, so why the beef?

I spent alot of time talking to ALL sides this last convention, it IS getting a bit better but NOT enough.

I know the founders of SPAH in the 60's had a vision,
that included ALL Harmonica music and I will continue on this mission to "unite" not "divide"....


PS.....interesting to note that diatonics are the REAL seniors, you see, the button thing didn't come along until the 1920's,-))...hmmmmmmm.

Thanx again SPAH

Love & Peace,
Rob Paparozzi




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