About the Sessions
The Songs for the TIMES Sessions are held on the second and fourth Sundays each month from 7-9 p.m. (CST) hosted by Allison Johnson and Matthew Cook and other guest leaders. The second Sunday sessions consist of a leader-led singalong with pre-selected songs, followed by a traditional song circle session meaning that singers of all levels are invited to attend and take turns leading songs while others are muted and sing along. On the fourth Sunday of each month, some of the most prominent Irish, Scottish, and Celtic vocalists conduct a master class vocal workshop for attendees. A virtual TIP JAR is provided so that attendees can help support these guest leaders. Click on the button below to access the session.
December 12th, 2021
Craig Allen
Craig Allen is a folk musician, singer, actor, and sometime poet. While piano is the first
instrument on which he was trained, he took up guitar in high school, teaching himself to play simple chords, allowing him to have a more portable instrument with which to
accompany himself in the coffee houses he later frequented in college. His repertoire
covers a wide range of folk music, from early to modern, and encompassing American
and Celtic traditions.
Songs for the Night
TBD
Q&As
We will be using Zoom for our sessions. There are some settings that we would recommend that can be found HERE that will maximize the quality of the sound and make your session experience more enjoyable. To access the sessions, click on the button above no earlier than 10 minutes before the session is to begin and wait until you are admitted by the host.
Whether leader or participant-led, the aim of these sessions is to learn songs from the Celtic genre, along with relevant history and stories behind the songs. Lyrics will be provided and each singer who shares a song is asked to teach the group the song. We want to emphasize the educational nature of these sessions rather than to be solely a vehicle for performance. Our hope is that you all come away learning a little bit more about the songs we all love to sing, and perhaps learn a new song or two.
No, but there is a PayPal LINK that serves as a virtual tip jar to support the guest leaders.
Yes, and that is encouraged. You can ask the leader(s) during a break between the songs or enter requests in the chat window. Please understand that they will sing what they know and can sing well. By the way, we ask each song leader to submit at least one set of songs that will be played at the session they are assigned. The sets will be displayed above in the schedule. Before each session, the songs will be posted HERE so that players can sing along during the session.
The songs played in these sessions should be traditional Irish, Scottish, and Celtic folk music only. Songs may be in English, Irish, or Scottish Gaelic and new tunes are especially encouraged. Song leaders are asked to select in advance a number of songs that they will share. See the schedule above and the songs will be listed under the song leaders names if provided. For an archive of previous song leaders and songs, go to ARCHIVE.
Yes, discussions can happen between songs, though we ask that you refrain from open discussion during the guest singer portions of the session. You are encouraged to enter questions into the chat window and song leaders will pose your questions to the monthly guest singer. For all other portions of the sessions, just unmute yourself and speak up, but please avoid controversial topics. We want this to be an enjoyable experience for everyone.
Yes. The whole purpose of this session is for people to learn and master songs, so recordings are okay. We ask that you don’t post or distribute recordings of the sessions without permission of TIMES and the guest leaders involved.
You can find an archive our past songs in our Song Session Archive.