A.I.M. Users Bulletin Board

[OldAIMGuy]

Summer - That very short season in WI where people don't wear snow mobile suits..................

Around 1990 my folks gave me a musical instrument called a Strumstick. It was to be easy to play and essentially no wrong notes. However, it came at the time with no instructions, tuning info or song book. In many ways it was similar to what it's like for people to have money and no instructions, tuning or song book! As I've mentioned here before, money doesn't come with a set of instructions on the back, and neither did the Strumstick. So, my Strumstick sat pretty much neglected for a very long time.

Eventually along came the internet. Such information as I might need to make the Strumstick work as intended finally became available. It's a nifty, light weight instrument with a sound that's not quite dulcimer, not quite banjo nor not quite mandolin. I guess that makes it a unique instrument.

In spite of its name, it can be strummed or picked. This last winter I was looking around on Youtube for inspiration for new songs and ideas for my enjoyment and the amazement of others. (Some of you may remember Barry Savage and his original AIM compositions he did for us at the 2001 AIM Clan Gathering on his Ukuleke) While learning how strumsticks are made, their unusual tuning and the various types of music people were playing on such things, I stumbled upon a quick improvisation done by a young lady in what appears to be her unfinished kitchen. She picks up her strumstick and begins a picking and strumming jam that was quite fun. She, too, had received her strumstick as a gift. However, she got hers while visiting New Orleans where she was doing some studio work. In other words, she knows at her young age a ton more than I do about creating music.

So, after watching the segment by this gal, Hunter Adams (not to be confused with Patch Adams) I then back tracked on her name on Youtube and found her original composition that was just the thing for curing the Winter Blues. The title is SUMMER. It was recorded in a studio in Australia, her home.

I hope you, too, will find it just the thing to bring about some sunshine and summer time when the seasons grow cold.