Welcome to the old time community, this style of music has a long and rich tradition in the Appalachian mountains of America. The music is closely linked with dance traditions and I like to imagine a bunch of ‘hillbillies’ getting together for a barn dance, while I'm not sure Toowoomba’s ready for that just yet, we can get to practicing! ;)
Old time guitar is one of the backbones of this music. The 'Boom Chuck' picking rhythm really drives the sound. Its somewhat 'boring' if your criteria for 'fun' = lots of chords.... if you are open minded to all the glorious bass runs and the richness of a swinging groove then this is the place to be! Its glorious!
Usually using minimal chords a lot of the interest lies in the lovely bass lines played on the down beats ( beats 1 & 3) and the rest of the chord is strummed on the 'chuck' or 'cha' on beats 2 and 4. Here is a lovely example of this style. For more info or a lesson feel free to get in touch with Me (Ayden - https://calendly.com/a-r-guitar < heres my teaching sign on page.)
The following document contains links to resources detailing where I like to broaden my knowledge about this kind of music.
I’ve thoroughly enjoyed the podcast by Cameron Dewhitt “get up in the cool’ in which Cameron interviews and jams with artists who are involved in this and other styles of music and performs a handful of tunes and discusses some of the influences, techniques, histories and modern context that this music has.
For enjoyment, I really like listening to people like Bruce Molsky, Lonesome Ace Stringband, Brittany Haas, George Jackson just to name a few modern folks & theres a tonne more older folks who are accessible on youtube and spotify, Tommy Jarrel, Stanley Brothers, Tony Rice and Norman Blake, Ralph Stanley, Clyde Davenport, Art Stamper, Ed Haley.
Though also anything from ‘Clifftop’ a fiddle convention in America (much to be found on youtube), and then there is a bunch of random people posting playing online… such as this quartet playing a tune called lost indian
Resources
chords sheets - download a booklet of tunes and their chords from Pegram.
Some of the places and people I have been enjoying learning from. ( there is so much info out there - theres some folk who are right into this stuff!)
Also for sheet music, just google the name of the tune and there will at least be a 'guide' for the music.
For Technique -
Understanding harmony
For Songs -
Rhys Jones has this playlist of songs played slow for learning
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVodYRAzcQZunXa6P0vM8jsxKC7hVk6Pu
Baltimore Old time have prepared some ‘slow jams’ to learn from
And they have a spotify list with some rip roaring tunes on there.
Maine Fiddle Camp
https://www.mainefiddlecamp.org/tunes/
- slow recordings, fast recordings and sheet music
Tune/Reference Lists
Slippery Hill https://www.slippery-hill.com/ is a resource with thousands of recordings of people playing these tunes, more often than not, from times long past :)
inspo
Shove that pigs foot. Scholarship on the guitar right here.
https://youtu.be/zioV_zVFrvA?si=y_6Qc93u4rSp_xgH - Key of G inspo
