About the Sessions
The Tunes for the TIMES Sessions are held fourth Mondays from 7-9 p.m. (CST) hosted by Ken Fleming and features former O’Flaherty Retreat instructors and their guests who lead the sessions. These are “play along” sessions meaning that players of all levels are invited to attend and, while muted, play along with the session leaders. A virtual TIP JAR is provided so that attendees can support the guest leaders. Click on the button below to access the session. Click HERE for our Q&As or scroll down past the following session schedule.
Dylan Foley
Monday, September 27th, 7-9 p.m. (CDT)
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. If you encounter issues, you can email times@irishtradmusic.org.
In “play along” sessions there is a scheduled leader or leaders who play tunes for the sessions. Everyone else is muted and plays along. Unlike “open” sessions where anyone, regardless of ability, can unmute at any time and play the tunes they know, these sessions are designed to help players learn or play tunes with musicians who have been selected based on their abilities to lead these sessions.
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 tunes or enter requests in the chat window. Please understand that they will play what they know and can play well. By the way, we ask each session leader to submit at least five sets of tunes that will be played at the session they are assigned. The sets will be displayed above in the schedule. This does not apply to the sessions led by the O’Flaherty Retreat instructors.
The tunes played in these sessions should be traditional Irish music only, and we prefer that they are tunes commonly played in sessions. The occasional “new” tune is fine. Session leaders are asked to select in advance a number of tune sets that they will play so that attendees can learn and/or practice them. See the schedule above and the sets will be listed under the session leaders names if provided.
Yes, discussions can happen between tunes. Just unmute yourself and speak up, but please avoid controversial topics. We want this to be an enjoyable experience for everyone.
Because this is a play along session of Irish tunes, a song would be not be appropriate. We have a “Songs for the TIMES” session on second and fourth Sundays each month. For the details, go to SONGS.
Yes. The whole purpose of this session is for people to learn and master tunes, 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.