The Oneida Daily Dispatch (Oneida, NY)
Musicians offering kids jam sessions
Guitar Club & Band Lab Experiment: Rich Smith, Jeff Leahey leading jam sessions
ONEIDA >> Two local musicians who enjoy sharing their talents with younger protégés are teaming up to create an all-new outlet giving students the unparalleled experience of playing music for themselves.
Rich “D-Ras” Smith has played in numerous regional bands over the years, while also teaching guitar, bass, and ukulele lessons first at Oneida Music and on his own. Jeff Leahey is also a longtime band member of several groups, today playing music and hosting radio shows as the senior pastor of Church on the Rock in Oneida. Both of them have a desire to lead a new generation to music, and this coming Wednesday their joint outreach will make its debut right there at the Madison Street church.
Their new Guitar Club & Band Lab Experiment, hosted by Smith, welcomes all students grades 4-12 to come in and jam on electric and acoustic guitar, bass, and ukulele. Participants are encouraged to bring their guitars, but there will also be a “guitar-brary” of instruments for any students who don’t have one of their own. And even though the group is focused mainly on those string instruments, they also encourage musicians to bring along other music makers like tambourines, banjos, and hand drums.
Smith said he had been thinking about doing some kind of outreach like this for awhile, and found a kindred spirit in Leahey, who wanted to expand the offerings of Church on the Rock to include some kind of musical program for students. The Guitar Club was created to give young people both musical experience and a safe, social environment to meet, and also offer them the chance to see some concrete results fromtheir efforts.
There will be different segments to the Guitar Club, with the first simply getting the students together and organized for some lessons and practices. The second part will include some recording — the church has a substantial recording studio, and is also the home of their own radio station — and rehearsals to take their show on the road. The final part will be summer performances in the area, including a live concert at an open house where parents and friends can come to enjoy the students’ efforts.
Next fall, the whole Guitar Club experience will start all over again, Leahey said.
Like many music students, Smith said he started out playing trombone in third grade before losing interest by sixth grade. But then he picked up
New Guitar Club& Band Lab Experiment, hosted by Smith, welcomes all students grades 4-12 to come in and jamon electric and acoustic guitar, bass, and ukulele.
the bass a few months before he graduated from high school, and hasn’t stopped since.
“I guess the inspiration was the emotional connection I got from music,” he said. “The way it made me feel or said what I couldn’t articulate myself -- that’s what really drew me in.”
Smith says some of the benefits of playing music to him personally include stress relief, focus, self-discipline, release, fun, and relaxation.
“Honestly, it’s odd for me to not have an instrument in my hand or very nearby so it’s really a facet of every aspect of my life,” he said.
Leahey said he has traveled full-time with a Christian rock band and written 100s of songs over the years. Everything he does musically is tied closely with his work at the church and for the Lord, he explained.
Playing music has given him not only the chance to reach out to others, but also the opportunity to reach inside himself, Leahey admitted. Now, he wants to now share that same experience with others.
“Music has always been a way of expressing what I am going through,” he said. “It helps me connect to who I really am, and I knowthat these kids will be able to do the same.”
Leahey said this group is expected to be just the beginning of an all-new, multi- faceted outreach of the church. The Guitar Club is going to be the first of a bunch of clubs, he intimated, followed by music, arts, sports … whatever the community needs, he promised.
Both Leahey and Smith feel reaching out to young musician enthusiasts is a calling they are happy to answer.
“I guess it’s part of what I was put here to do,” Smith said. “It just feels natural. And I get a satisfaction out of passing the torch to younger players. I don’t know all there is to know but I’ll gladly show you anything that helped me. Pretty much everything I’ve ever learned has come from someone else sharing it with me, so I just keep passing it along.”
“Kids just need some inspiration,” Leahey added. “I believe if we can hook them up with something they are truly enthusiastic about that we can really see some changes out on the streets. We want to build up some northside pride.”
The Church on the Rock is located at 164 Madison St. in Oneida, and the first session is this Wednesday, Jan. 11, starting at 5:30 p.m. and running until 7:15 p.m. There is no admission charge, and participants can attend as many sessions as they can with no commitment.
For more information, call (315) 280-4044 or find the Guitar Club & Band Lab Experiment page on Facebook.