Sammy And The Band

[Yahaira Petrov]

Sammywas the partnership of guitarist Luke Wood and guitarist/vocalist Jesse Hartman.[1] The band was initially signed to Smells Like Records, the label owned by Sonic Youth drummer Steve Shelley. Later the band signed to DGC/Geffen. The band was signed to Fire Records in the UK and Europe.

Most of my influences in music became my friends, so I had access to a wealth of knowledge and advice about the business. I would say the best advice was treat your audience with respect on and off stage and make them your friends. They will support you forever.

I started messing with banjo at the age of 5. I learned as much as I could from my grandfather who played and other local musicians. In the 1970s, Wayside Park in Stuart, Virginia, became a really big bluegrass festival and brought in the top names in bluegrass at the time. After seeing bands like the Osborne Brothers, Seldom Scene, JD Crowe & the New South, and many others, I began to dream of doing what they were doing. I spent my teenage years putting in a lot of practice learning from all of those bands and listening to as many different banjo players as possible to learn everything I could.

I grew up and still live in the rural areas in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. I can take 10 steps from my house and be in the woods and enjoy walking and taking in all nature has to offer. It keeps your mind from getting cluttered and open to your surroundings. Everything in nature is musical.

I always try to find some quiet time before a show to get my head together. Then try to warm up on banjo for at least 30 minutes prior. I have two young sons at home, so rehearsal time at the house is nonexistent these days.

Sammy de Len is one of the most recognized Latin bandleaders in Northern Ohio. He plays the timbales, a twin set of metal-encased, single-headed drums with a cowbell and a cymbal on the side. He began to play professionally at age 13 and has since played alongside the greatest of the genre: Tito Puente and Grn Combo de Puerto Rico, among others.

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ARCHIVED TOPIC: Sammy Shelor fingerpicks - wide or narrow band?

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I use the narrow bands....dont have very big hands and find they are the most comfortable pics I've found. Sammy is offering the narrow bands again - I got a pair from him at a recent show at the Birchmere. Either way you can't go wrong.

Guys, they are making the narrow bands again. Just got a set from Janet Davis. I use the narrow bands, fits my my short little fingers better. The wide bands felt they were slipping off. Matter of preference, I guess

Like so many aspects of picking, it is a matter of personal preference. I like the wide band, as it is very comfortable and spreads out the pressure over a larger area of the fingers than a narrow band would, making the picks feel more comfortable to me. Plus, the wide band feels more secure to me in terms of the picks not getting loose while picking.

The last time I checked in with drummer Sammy Siegler, we chatted about his life in the hardcore scene, playing in such bands as Youth of Today, Side by Side, and Shelter. It's the latter group that brings us to today's piece as Shelter will be embarking on a European tour next month, and a pair of dates in Brooklyn, NY and Garfield, NJ (both presented by No Echo).

Another Shelter tour you did back in the day was with Type O Negative. Now, that sounds like a crazy pairing on paper, but how did it go from your perspective? Any funny Peter Steele stories?

I remember having dinner at a devotee's house, he was an adult, he lived in a mansion that was painted saffron on the outside, there were two women there, one was a famous chef named Mother Yamuna who cooked food with bits of gold and silver in it, and the other sang on the recording of [George Harrison's] "My Sweet Lord." It was a wild scene.

I know you prefer the earlier Shelter material, where it was a bit less melodic. What can we expect from these upcoming shows in terms of the setlist? Do you guys play that by ear, or do you have things pretty dialed-in before a run of dates?

Since childhood, singer-songwriter Sammy Rae has been writing songs with the intention of one day being in a band. Two EPs, over 650,000 Spotify listeners, a slew of singles, and over 66.5K Instagram followers later, Sammy can confidently say she is doing what she loves with her band, Sammy Rae & The Friends.

Sammy Miller and The Congregation are on a mission. Crisscrossing the country like a vaudevillian revival show, this six-piece band of superstar, conservatory-trained musicians retain their childlike wonder for bringing people together with a bracing dose of joyful jazz performed with infectious theatricality.

Freely mixing vocal and instrumental tracks, often sharing the lead melody between the two, this New York City-based, familial collective carries the audience along on an exuberant romp, playing songs of unflinching optimism with frenetic energy and a dash of comedy.

Sammy Hagar: Great. When was the last time you did something for the first time well? For me anyway, I sang about seven Van Halen songs at 6 o'clock in the f**king morning. Yeah, Mike and I, and importantly, Jason, we pulled it off and Jason was singing some of my parts because they said I can't sing the chorus and the verses. It was really interesting.

Baltin: Coming back to some of these Van Halen songs, were there any of them that really changed for you guys? Because some of these songs I'm going to guess you hadn't done in a long time.

Hagar: Probably Joe can answer that question. Cause we all miss Eddie. Mike and I do, but Mike and I have been playing these songs, not all of these songs. And Jason, the three of us with the Circle, we've been playing four or five Van Halen songs every night when we played. So, we kind of got over that.

Baltin: I saw Queen and Adam Lambert Saturday night and I was there for their first show. And the reason that works is because Adam is very talented and he's smart enough to never try and be Freddie and that's why they've been able to tour for 10 years. Where I was getting with the emotions is every song brings back its own memories. Do you hear the songs in a different way?

Hagar: Oh 100 percent. My money situation has been very secure and I don't have to go out and work, but I choose to work and I choose to work with the people I want to work with. And I love this band. I love Vic Johnson too, who's been in the circle forever, but playing this much Van Halen you've got to have Joe Satriani. There's nobody else that I think understands Eddie the way he understands him. So we're doing this cause we really want to do it. And when I'm singing a song that's sort of silly '80s lyrics, like when I was 40 acting like I was 20, I can honestly think about the people that are listening to it. And Mike and I talked about that. We're going out to serve the fans that we accumulated and it gave us this privilege to live like we live. And Jason talks better than anybody about how he grew up on those songs.

A: It started during college. I was mainly into athletics, but there were times on weekends with neighborhood friends, we would sing. I grew up in Chicago, home of The Temptations, Sam Cooke, and singers of that caliber. We had a recording studio near a train track. We would hear the harmonies of our voices and the echo sounds of the train going by and thought it was cool.

A: With my band performing two to four times a month. I enjoy playing locally, and I also like playing in other different venues. But the thing that I love the most is that when I travel, I know that I will be coming back to Sedona.

Sometimes there are instruments in the ensemble other than those shown above. These are linked to their respective principal instruments with either a "d" if the same player doubles the instrument, or a "+" if an extra player is required. Whenever this occurs, we will separate the first four digits with commas for clarity. Thus a double reed quartet of 2 oboes, english horn and bassoon will look like this:

Thus, the Copland Fanfare shown above is for 3 Trumpets, 4 Horns, 3 Trombones, no Euphonium, 1 Tuba and Tympani. There is no separate number for Bass Trombone, but it can generally be assumed that if there are multiple Trombone parts, the lowest part can/should be performed on Bass Trombone.

These numbers tell you how many of each instrument are in the ensemble. The first number stands for Violin, the second for Viola, the third for Cello, and the fourth for Double Bass. Thus, this string quartet is for 2 Violas and 2 Cellos, rather than the usual 2110. Titles with no bracketed numbers are assumed to use "Standard Instrumentation." The following is considered to be Standard Instrumentation:

The bracketed numbers tell you the precise instrumentation of the ensemble. The system used above is standard in the orchestra music field. The first set of numbers (before the dash) represent the Woodwinds. The set of numbers after the dash represent the Brass. Percussion is abbreviated following the brass. Strings are represented with a series of five digits representing the quantity of each part (first violin, second violin, viola, cello, bass). Other Required and Solo parts follow the strings:

Principal auxilary instruments (piccolo, english horn, bass clarinet, contrabassoon, wagner tuba, cornet & euphonium) are linked to their respective instruments with either a "d" if the same player doubles the auxiliary instrument, or a "+" if an extra player is required. Instruments shown in parenthesis are optional and may be omitted.

The second example is common for a concert band or wind ensemble piece. This ficticious work is for 2 flutes (plus piccolo), 1 oboe, 3 clarinets plus alto and bass clarinets, 2 bassoons, 5 saxes (soprano, 2 altos, tenor & bari), 2 trumpets (plus 2 cornets), 3 trombones, euphonium, tuba, tympani, percussion and double bass. Note the inclusion of the saxes after bassoon for this band work. Note also that the separate euphonium part is attached to trombone with a plus sign. For orchestral music, saxes are at the end (see Saxophones below. It is highly typical of band sets to have multiple copies of parts, especially flute, clarinet, sax, trumpet, trombone & percussion. Multiples, if any, are not shown in this system. The numbers represent only distinct parts, not the number of copies of a part.

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