Jesse Smith and Ryan McGiver at Tara Hall

A nice concert February 15, 2012 at Tara Hall featured Jesse Smith (fiddle) and Ryan McGiver (vocals and guitar). Here are a few images from the night.

Jesse told the audience what tunes would be played and where he learned them.

The pace of the tunes were very comfortable, which gave me a chance to really hear the tune and the variations Jesse played.

Tara Hall is now located on the south side of town, in a somewhat shady neighborhood.  However, the setting is now more akin to being in a house concert, which is actually a very nice change from your usual pub concert venues.

 

The main room is divided into the concert corner and a pub.  Tara Hall is the home of the Ancient Order of Hibernians in Columbus, Ohio.

Jesse Smith

I didn't want to use a flash during the concert, so I had to push the ISO up to 6400. That results in a lot of noise in low-light settings such as this venue, so I decided to play with a bit of processing techniques to accentuate the noise by featuring some grain. Here's one of those processing experiments.

Ryan McGiver

Here's another portrait using my grain technique.

"Half the concert is tuning, the other half playing out of tune."

Jesse uses a C tuning (DADGAD tuned down), which was really a nice sound.

As a musician, I'm glad Ryan took time to tune, and it was certainly worth the wait. He's an excellent musician and it was a pleasure to hear him play.

Ryan sings with great feeling and passion.

I tried to capture that passion by doing a monochrome processing on this portrait of him.

This portrait sums up the thoughtfulness with which Jesse plays. I really enjoyed the style and nuances he brought to traditional Irish music.

 Jesse looks so relaxed while he's playing.

I find it a real challenge to get a photo of a fiddler in concert when there are so many mics and mic stands in the way. 

 

All-in-all a nice way to spend a Wednesday night.