STRUNG TOGETHER
2023 SCHEDULE September 15-17
This year's Strung Together Music Jam Campout will be held on the coast of Searsport, Maine at award winning Searsport Shores Ocean Campground
FRIDAY
2-5 PM: Check-in, reception, & informal picking time.
Free to all: Introductory Old Time music session 3-5 PM for this session. Promises to be a great introduction, refresher, or warm-up session for Old Time Music. Get your groove on!
5-6:30 PM: WELCOME (registration, orientation, etc) Hoping you can all arrive by this time. The wood fired pizza bar is open! You'll have your choice of veggie, chesse or meat pizza! $10/ pie recommended donation. All you can eat! Beverages available. Please sign up ahead of time so we can make enough fresh dough for everyone 🙂
6:30 PM: Opening Concert – Skip Gorman performs songs from the Old West.
Fred Coon will follow by sharing a few Old Time Tunes before getting everyone involved in the evening's music jam for all of the Strung Together Gang. A celebration of Old Time Music at its best!
8:30 PM: Small Group Jams Pick a spot in the center of things or seek a quiet spot to make music. Spaces will be identified on a map. Sit by the fire, make music, make friends, eat chips, and enjoy music by and with friends.
SATURDAY
8-9ish Fresh Baked Scones and Coffee in the Recreation Hall
10-11:30 AM Bill Monroe Mandolin Workshop
Skip Gorman is one of the leading teachers and players of Monroe-style mandolin in the country. He has taught bluegrass mandolin with Ronnie McCoury, Frank Wakefield, Mike Compton, Norman Blake, Chris Thile, Butch Baldissari, Mike Seeger, Barry Mitterhoff, Rhonda Vincent, and others at IBMA World of Bluegrass, European World of Bluegrass, Grass Valley Bluegrass Festival.
Skip has followed Monroe’s traditional fiddle style of mandolin playing for over 50 years. As an old-time fiddle player himself, Skip has captured the essence and beauty of Monroe’s playing on the mandolin-having sat with the master on several occasions.
“Skip Gorman remains best known in bluegrass circles as perhaps the finest exponent today of the style of mandolin Bill Monroe played with the Monroe Brothers.”
Art Menius – Bluegrass Unlimited Magazine
“Beyond phenomenal… I’ll go to anything he does… Skip was very responsive to questions and requests, and had a very interesting program laid out, besides being an excellent player and a really friendly guy… Really helpful… Get him back!”
Skip’s Workshops at Wintergrass – Anita Graham, Workshop Coordinator

10-12 AM Jams begin. Please check the marker board for what’s happening and where.
11-12 PM Grey Larsen and Cindy Kallet led this hour jam starting off with some great Joe Dawson tunes! Don't miss this session.
12 PM: Picnic Lunch (On your own)
1-2:30 pm Two-finger banjo style workshop with Fred Coon. This style of banjo playing has been passed down through his family for generations, which he learned from his father who learned it from “Uncle Otis” Coon in Boone County, West Virginia, in the 1930s and so it goes back into time. Fred was raised in West Virginia and during his early years he enjoyed the stories told and songs sung to him by his father and other Appalachian Mountain relatives.
1-2:30 PM The Basic Dos and Don’ts of Bluegrass Fiddling
For any old time fiddler who’s tempted to join a bluegrass jam but wonders how the heck to do it.
In this workshop we’ll go over the basic dos and don’ts of bluegrass fiddling including: Understanding chords and chord families and how to play them on the fiddle. Knowing when to play the melody and when to play backup. Various ways of playing backup. How at add fills.
Resa Randolph is the founder and leader of Miners Creek Bluegrass Band. Primarily a guitar and mandolin player, she started learning fiddle 7 years ago and has managed to unravel the mysteries of playing bluegrass fiddle in her spare time.
We will be learning: Bury me beneath the Willow in A. I’ll fly away in G. You Are My Sunshine in C.
1-4 PM: Jam Sessions continue. Volunteer jam leaders will be on hand or feel free to begin your own. Plenty of space to work with others on particular songs as well.
2:30-4:00 PM Old Time Fiddle Workshop with Skip Gorman
Skip is deeply immersed in the fiddle styles of the American West, as well as its Celtic and Appalachian roots. He has presented Fiddle Workshops in a variety of settings both by himself and with well-known fiddlers, such as: Natalie MacMaster, Tom Sauber, David Greeley, Pete Sutherland, Rodney Miller, Joe Cormier, Tom Anderson, Eugene O’Donnell, James Kelly, and others- as well as countless hours in informal settings playing with legendary American fiddlers such as Kenny Baker and Tommy Jarrell, and
in Ireland and Scotland with Johnny Dougherty, Aly Bain and Tommy Peoples. Among
his earliest musical memories is witnessing the live performances of the elderly Texas
fiddler, Eck Robertson, in the 1960s.
4 PM: Cocktail Music Hour with the musical stlyings of fiddler, Ed Howe followed by the Community Pie Supper
5:30 Sweet and Savory Pie Dinner $20 or enjoy your own picnic in the garden
6:00 PM China Pettway from Gee's Bend sings a few spirituals to honor the life of Katharine Colby
7-8:30 PM: Saturday Evening Coffee House. Sea Strings Community Orchestra kicks the night off with a square dance led by Pat Danscen.
The players coffee house is always a blast. Sign up with new or familiar combinations to play up to two pieces. Coffee house followed by campfire and jam circles. Buildings and tent jamming spaces will be available throughout the evening in case it gets a bit chilly 🙂
SUNDAY
8-9ish Fresh Baked Scones and Coffee in the Recreation Hall. All are invited to play Reveille on your harmonica, key of C.
8:30-9 AM- Sunday morning community sing with Mike and Suzy, in the round by the garden kitchen. Bring an instrument and/or voice.
9-12 PM: Jam tents open.
11 AM and On: Natural Dying with Garden Plants- Free workshop. Stop in between 10 and 2 PM.
11:30AM Songs, Tunes and Stories: Fred Coon Final Strung Together concert with a master of the 5 string banjo.
12-2 PM Mexican themed lunch at the Tango Shack
12:30-3:30 PM Gus La Casse- A Hard Driving Trad Fiddler Performs on the Main Stage
Gus will get us in the perfect mood to end our music weekend on a high note! He will be joined by Mathias Kamen (a powerful vocalist and talented multi-instrumentalist with a love of old-time music) for a Sunday performance which promises to be a high flying Old Time music event!

Jams begin by 9 AM: The first 12 players are seated in a circle on chairs. Extra players or people that just want to observe are welcome to stand around the circle to listen in. Slow Jam and Fast Jam Tents are open to all. Players choice. Many of the playing sessions will be led by an old-time or bluegrass player. Anyone willing to teach please get in touch.
Workshop suggested donation: $50-$75.
Lock up storage room available for all instruments.
Other workshop possibilities include
Playing for contra-dancing A fun workshop focused on matching tunes to dances and/or general contra repertoire.
Meat & Potatoes-Old Time Tunes everyone should know (bring any instrument).
A sign-up board (time, space, topic) will be set up at registration for anyone willing to offer other workshops, wanting to partner with someone to learn a tune, or just to organize a jamming circle.