Learn Blues Guitar With the Franke Center For the Arts in Marshall

If you’ve been messing around with a guitar for a while, here’s your chance to take it to the next level.  The Franke Center for the Arts is having a new six-week guitar workshop with one of The Franke Center’s favorite performers, Kjell Croce. Lessons will be geared toward intermediate players looking to expand their skills and learn new techniques. You will need some basic chord knowledge.

Croce will teach fingerpicking blues guitar techniques and the workshop will feature the songs of the great bluesman Mississippi John Hurt. Guitarists who haven’t tried fingerpicking before will find this a great introduction while guitarists who are already comfortable with fingerpicking will add new skills to their repertoire. The workshop will cover equipment and techniques and participants will learn Mississippi John Hurt songs including Creole Bell, Louis Collins, Stack O’Lee Blues, Sliding Delta, and Got the Blues, Can’t Be Satisfied in several keys. Each session will run 1 to 1 ½ hour.

Workshop dates will take place on Tuesdays: May 4, 11, 18, 25, and June 1 and 8, from 6 pm to 7:15 pm. The cost is $100, and guitarists 16 and up are welcome to participate.

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Guitarist Kjell Croce is a musician who wears many musical hats. Now based in Marshall, Michigan he has traveled and lived in various parts of the United States, and has been fascinated by the abundance of musical styles throughout the country. From blues to bluegrass, folk to jazz with a big helping of rock and roll, he has absorbed these styles and made them into his own. He has shared stages with bluesmen Lonnie Brooks and Jimmy Johnson, singer/songwriters Ellis Paul, Kate Cambell, and Dave Ramont, and performed at the Michigan Talent Showcase, the Ann Arbor Dancing Lights Folk Festival, and Harmonyfest in Three Rivers. Also, his last CD “Lightnin’ Rod” received airplay in the US and Europe with Ray Pieters-Dreesens of Radio Milo commenting, “Very expressive voice, strong lyrics, great rootsy and diverse sound.” In addition to his solo work, he can be seen performing with the group's COW and 3LB CUT.

To sign up for the workshops or to get more information, click here.