Remembering the 9/11 Stick workshop?
Yes it's true.
With all the memorials going on yesterday, I remembered the 2001 Ann Arbor Stick Seminar scheduled to start on 9/15 of that year. We had secured Bob Culbertson to come teach that year and with only four days until the whole thing was to kick off, the unthinkable happened.
We did have a couple of guys who were flying out for the event and their plans were immediately dashed. One guy was still trying to figure a way out when his girlfriend became distraught over the fact that her sister (who worked in one of the towers) was missing. Understandably, he cancelled and they went off in search (note: she turned up injured but alive and well in a New Jersey hospital).
Ready to pull the plug on the whole thing, I spoke to Bob. Bob was driving up with his then girlfriend who was also planning visits with her Michigan based family. After discussing the possibility of this being a money losing proposition, Bob said he didn't care and said if we were still game, he'd come and work with whoever managed to show.
It was a small showing. I recall starting with a Friday night concert at Union Street Saloon in Detroit where Bob delivered an exceptionally poignant rendition of "Amazing Grace". The next morning, we moved the seminar itself from Oz's store into Oz's home. With a total of six students (plus Bob, Steve, and myself), we had our workshop and it turned out very well.
This was the third ever Ann Arbor event and only the second one I organized personally. I'll always be grateful to Bob for the fact that he didn't even consider not having this event and that for 2.5 days, we managed to tune out the outside world and just do music.
http://www.121normal.com/resources/events/seminar2001/