A Great Crowd Tonight!

We had an exciting rehearsal last night! 14 people showed up, and it sounded great.  We had many different sounds (mandolin, octave mandola, mandocello, guitar, and bass) and it made for a great blend of sounds. 2 people (who were at the church practicing for a play) stepped in and asked if it was okay for them to come and just listen sometime.  That was encouraging. They didn't know how to play the mandolin, but they like the uniqueness of our sound and just wanted to come back and listen to us practice sometime.  

If you didn't make it last night, we'd love for you to join us next week.  

Our 2nd Rehearsal - Our New Location

We had our second rehearsal tonight at our new permanent location, Cross Church of Springdale.  We had fewer people tonight, but we were able to really work through 4 of our songs.  By the end of the evening, we had played through Dreams of the Night, Tic Toc Polka, La Raspa, and El Vaquero.  Although I was so focused on my part I couldn't really hear the entire group, I think we actually sounded pretty good for our 2nd rehearsal.  


Hopefully next week we'll have a larger group.  Tonight there was a lot of talk about heavy storms (and possible tornadoes), so that may have kept people at home.  But we are excited about the possibilities with this group.


If you live around Northwest Arkansas, why not come out and join us next week!

Mandolin Orchestra of NWA Rehearsal Location

We have a permanent home for rehearsals!

WHERE: Cross Church Springdale Campus
(Formerly First Baptist Church of Springdale)

ADDRESS:
1709 Johnson Rd.
Springale, AR 72762

ROOM NAME: Atrium 7
LOCATION: South end of the campus by the Children's Building
DAYS: Every Tuesday (Room not available on July 17th)
TIME: 6:30 - 8:15

INSTRUCTIONS:
Enter the building through the south doors, by the covered drive.
2 of the doors will be unlocked
Atrium 7 is on your left, near the Worship offices

Our first meeting at this new location will be next Tuesday, February 28th.

Check out www.MandolinOrchestraNWA.com for more information.

Mandolins and Crystal Bridges Museum

I finally got out with my new camera for about 30 minutes this afternoon.  I took one of our mandolins down the walking trail of the Crystal Bridges Museum and took a few photos.  I have more posted on my Facebook Page (Ozark Mandolins).  But here are a few that I thought turned out pretty good.

Some First Photos w/my New Camera

Today I got to get out and play with my camera for a few minutes before the sun went down.  So far I am just using the Portrait setting and the Landscape settings.  These are fully automatic settings where Portrait gives you an F-stop of around 1.8 - 2.0, and Landscape gives an F-stop of about 5.6.  The other settings (ISO and Shutter Speed) are most likely automatic.  So in Portrait mode, you will get a much smaller center of focus, with the background being blurred.  Here are a few of the pictures from this evening.

I'm studying other photos that I like and hope to start playing with angles.  I took a few shots tonight, but I'm not sure exactly how to frame them up so they capture the effect I see in other pictures.  Here is one, just as an example.

I welcome any suggestions on ideas on getting the proper angles. I've always shot pictures that are perfectly squared off, but there is not much creativity in that...

My Canon T1i Finally Arrived!

My camera finally arrived today!  I've been waiting for almost 2 weeks now.  I ordered it on ebay, and the shipper must have put the wrong address down because after about 10 days, he received it back at his home in California.  So he had to ship it a second time. This time he added a tracking number, and it was "missent" from Little Rock to Mountain Home, which really isn't close to where I live. So even after it was reshipped by the seller, it still was delayed an entire day because of the USPS.  But it finally arrived today.  My family thought I was a bit obsessed.  I went around taking pictures of everything. I still have little to no idea about what most of the settings do, but I have posted a couple of photos here that are my firsts with my new camera.  I was indoors and had to use a flash, so you can see shadows on the second picture of the boot and mice. But I was just practicing. So over the next few weeks I will hopefully be able to get some good mandolin pictures up here.   I'm excited about what tomorrow holds.  Maybe I'll watch a refresher YouTube course on the basics of photography!

Mandolin Orchestra of Northwest Arkansas - Inaugural Meeting

Had our first meeting for the Mandolin Orchestra of Northwest Arkansas tonight. Nine players showed up, and there were several others that couldn't make it because of prior commitments. We covered a lot of business, but managed to play a couple of songs toward the end. For our first try, we actually sounded pretty good. Here is a photo to commemorate our inaugural meeting!

Invite your friends to join this Facebook Page. The link "Invite Friends" is to the right of the screen. You can also send them to www.mandolinorchestranwa.com and have them join our mailing list. That way we can keep them informed of practice schedules, performances, and workshops.

It was a great evening! Can't wait for the next rehearsal!