These are the strangest of strange times. Sitting at home, worried about the world, our families, our friends, our jobs, everybody’s health, the economy and anything else we can think of. I’m trying not to spend too much time watching the news and more time playing and writing about music. It keeps me busy, occupied, distracted, and calm.
To stay productive, I’ve been teaching some lessons online (let me know if you’d like to try it!), working on a new book (Early Music Gems for Mandolin), and putting finishing touches on the newly launched Musix website (see Announcing New Website Design).
To find calm and focus, nothing works better for me than playing music. Music takes me to a wonderful place that’s soothing and enriching. I guess it’s a kind of meditation. It’s a place I’ve worked on getting to for probably fifty years now, and it’s my go to place in difficult as well as good times.
The isolation is difficult but music can ease the situation somewhat. In hopes that playing music might also help you to get through this, we’re offering a special 15% discount on every order through April 30, 2020! We hope we have something that you can use during these odd and worrying times.
Maybe this is a good time to improve your playing or learn a new style? Use the drop-down menus at the top of this page for ideas by instrument or search by style at the bottom of our homepage. (Click the “Home” link at the top of this page.)
Or maybe you’d like some play along books/audio to have “someone” to jam with at home? If that’s the case, check out the Play-along book/audio sets below.
Play-along book/audio sets
Might I suggest our several “play-along” book and recording sets? All of them include recorded bands, real people playing together, that you can jam along with. They’re the next-best thing to jamming in person and can help you make music at home.
Our newest products are Parking Lot Picker’s Play-Along: Mandolin and Parking Lot Picker’s Play-Along: Guitar. Both are book/downloadable audio sets with 15 all time great bluegrass, old time, and gospel hits. Play along with a real Bluegrass band, practice and learn back up rhythm, leads, solos, vocals.
Our BackUP TRAX series also provide a backing band for you to play along with. We have several different editions featuring different styles of music: Basic Blues for Guitar, Old-time Fiddle Tunes for Mandolin and Fiddle, Swing & Jazz, Early Jazz & Hot Tunes, Traditional Jazz & Dixieland. Our motto is : We’ll jam all night long!
You might also enjoy our Gypsy Swing and Hot Club Rhythm book/play-along sets. We have four sets total, two each for guitar and mandolin: Gypsy Swing & Hot Club Rhythm for Guitar, Gypsy Swing & Hot Club Rhythm for Mandolin, Gypsy Swing & Hot Club Rhythm for Guitar Vol. II, Gypsy Swing & Hot Club Rhythm for Mandolin Vol. II.
No matter what you order, these sets or anything on our website, the 15% discount will automatically be applied when you check out.
Wishing you all good health and better times,
Dix