small group meeting 7/1

Chris, Brad, Wayne, Scott in attendance
Brad's pad

Chris, Brad and Wayne meet on the grass and begin at 8:00 with a circulation. to warm up, they take four first primary patterns in a sequence that alternates when changing direction on the neck to ascending or descending (with the 13th position as the pivot), in sixteenth notes at 80 BPM. Scott arrives shortly after this work begins, and the group retakes the exercise; a small adjustment in tempo is made.

next, the group splits off into pairs to work on Growing Circle - Brad teaching Scott the bass part, and Chris teaching Wayne the intro and main section of the lead. as it begins to get dark, the group reconvenes and relocates upstairs for some ensemble practice: two takes of just the intro and main section, to get the new players' feet wet; then, a couple takes counting the bars while playing. 

this latter work leads to some ideas for division of attention practice, and to a counting exercise using the main theme from Invocation. Brad prefaces this with the suggestion that we should be working to expand our capacity to do this kind of work for greater lengths of time, e.g. to be able to divide attention for ten or fifteen minutes, or more. tonight the egg timer is set for eight minutes. Wayne departs shortly after this at 9:31, on family-related business.

Chris gives an exposition on a C Major exercise he has been working with based on closed triads on the top three strings. some of the chords are difficult, and the group winds up taking the 3rd inversion sequence for actual work, visualizing moving fragments of C Major across three strings. Chris even demonstrates how such fragments can be incorporated into dance music.

a final circulation to close the meeting, shortly after 10:00.