Happenings from INAFA Convention

This will be my first posting on the happenings at the 2006 INAFA Convention. I will try to post every evening (late) when I get from the convention. I'll post some stories and pictures from the day.

Today was a prep day. Dan Ricketts, Karen Boyles, Bill Timothy, Bob DeMattei and I met with Kathleen Joyce-Grendahl at the NDNU Campus in the morning to go over all of the last minute details. We also met two of Katheleen's interns, Jake Hull and Jarod Pool. These two guys are studing music as CNU and are promising young musicians. You can see them jamming with Dan Ricketts in this first photo.

There were several other folks who showed up early for the conference, including Utah Phillips, Angel Cruz, Sherry and Gary Kuhl. I went to dinner with Dan, Angel, Karen, Sherry and Gary. It was really fun to spend time talking to Sherry and Gary since they never travel far from their Oregon farm and this is the first time that Sherry has returned to California since 1963. After spending so much time talking to Sherry on the phone, it was great to finally meet her. We reminisced about the times we had individually spent with Hawk Littlejohn and also about Ward Stroud and others. If you don't know Sherry Kuhl, she organizes the Oregon Flute Circle, which was the first flute circle ever started. Xavier Quijas Yxayotl showed up about 10 PM after a long drive from So Cal.

We will be on the radio this afternoon 2:00-2:30 PM, on the Bay Native Circle progam on KPFA. If you are in the bay area, you can tune into 94.1. Otherwise you can catch the show live on the internet feed by going to their website: http://www.kpfa.org

If you miss the show live, you can download the MP3 file of the Bay Native Circle on their website.

Gary Kuhl (left) listens while Angel Cruz plays a tune