Mama Don't 'Low^TM Signup Page

For more information on the newsletter, please see the Mama Don't 'Low home page.

We want to hear from you. We want to share with you. We want to answer your questions. We want to send you any freebies that I've mentioned on any of our web pages. We really want you to join our community of like-minded people.

This is the form you use to sign up for our newsletters. (Afterwards, you'll have my e-mail and be able to e-mail directly.)

Snail Mail Contacts - If you have something to mail, you can send it to us in care of:

Paul Race
Breakthrough Communications
2991 Fowler Rd.
Springfield OH 45502

E-Mail Questions - If you have a question AND you want to sign up for the newsletter, please use the form on this page (after reading the caveats).

On the other hand if you JUST have a question and are not interested in receiving my newsletter, please use our Contact page.

Why do I have two separate pages? You would be amazed how many people who contact me with a question about one of the topics we discuss (say, 6-string banjos) sign up for the newsletter, then freak out when they get a newsletter that mostly talks about something different (say, zither banjos). This way we hope to avoid accidental signups and the resulting confusion.

No Phone Calls, Please - Please don't call our house or call me on my cell phone unless you've already contacted me through this form or the Contact page and told me what you want to talk about. That way I can be prepared to take your call, and we can be sure that we're respecting each other's time and priorities. Don't think this is silly; I've had readers with "emergencies" call me when I'm eating dinner, in bed, and even on stage. Even if I take the call at such times, I may not have the resources handy to answer your questions.

What To Expect if You Fill Out This Form - [Paul Race speaking] By signing up here, you are signed up for my newsletter, which basically covers my ongoing projects, including updates about acoustic instruments I'm researching or working on and news about my music "career" (such as it is).

I mention this because some folks have signed up to hear about places I'm going to play or songs I'm working on, but unsubscribed angrily because the first issue they received had mostly links to autoharp articles or whatever.

Other folks have signed up to get information about dulcimers, say, and have unsubscribed angrily because the first issue they got included information about places I'm playing or songs I've written, and didn't have any dulcimers articles that issue. But the next issue might be entirely different. Just warning you ahead of time.

In other words, I'm inviting you to come along on a journey of music and discovery, with occasional side trips to focus on:

• My current musical involvements and related happenings,

• Original, traditional, and traditionally-inspired music,

• Neglected or misunderstood instruments and,

• Related directions about traditional musical forms and instruments, especially as reader questions or puzzles pique my own interest.

If this sounds good, I WANT you along. But I only want you along for the journey IF all that sounds good to you. Hope that makes sense.

The most recent newsletter, and the first full newsletter after my "reboot" in which I relegated articles about vintage saxophones and Christian music to a separate newsletters, is here.

I hope you enjoy it, but if you don't, just let me know. Also, if there's anything specific you'd like more coverage of, just let me know. I'm not saying I'll jump right on it, but if it's something I already have on the back burner I may move it to the front burner.

Please Fill Out the Whole Form - We won't send you anything you don't ask for, and we won't give or sell your contact information to anyone else. But over the years we've had thousands of scammers, spammers, trolls, and plagiarists attempting to sign up with fake e-mails, even real e-mails belonging to other people! For such reasons, and many more that are too complicated to explain here, we now require anyone contacting us to tell us at least as much about themselves as we've told you about ourselves in this page (such as real name and address).

We also require people to tell us why they are contacting us, using specific examples related to the page in question. (None of this generic "Cool site, I've learned so much." stuff that the robospammers send.)

I hope you can understand why I'd rather spend my time interacting with 40 people who are really interested in what we do than waste it sending out 4000 e-mails to people who aren't really interested in what we do or, in some cases, aren't even real people. Not to mention wasting time "vetting" requests that are incomplete or unconvincing.

Consequently, any form that is missing required fields or which contains obviously fake information will be deleted automatically, with no warning to the sender. And the way the form is set up, it is possible to send an incomplete form (this catches some robospammers) or a form containing nonsense, like obviously fake addresses (this catches almost all of the rest). So be certain to check your form over before you submit it.

GDPR Information - This is for my Euro subscribers. Our newsletters and our informational articles do NOT use cookies or collect any user information. Some of them link to vendors like Amazon who do, but only if you click on the link. They are NOT MY COOKIES. :-)

The information you send us when you sign up is only for our verification purposes. Again, nobody sees it but us, and, once your subscription is approved, the only part we actually use is your e-mail address. If you're uncomfortable with that, please don't subscribe.

Note: - Signing up for this newsletter means that you agree to the terms and conditions in the GDPR section above. If you do not agree, do not sign uip for the newsletter.

Reader Survey - Finally, we'd like to know more about our reader base, too. So if you don't mind filling in a little survey (entirely optional), that will help us figure out what kinds of articles we should be working on next.

Paul Race

CreekDontRise.com^TM

ClassicTrainSongs.com^TM

PaulRaceMusic.com

Real First Name (Required) Real Last Name (Required) Your email address (Required) Your email address again, just to be sure (Required) Street Number and Street Name (Required) Apt. # or Suite # (optional) Your City or Town (Required) Your State or Province (Required) Your Zip or Mailing Code (Required) Your Country (Required)

Do you agree to the terms and conditions described in the GDPR Information paragraph above? If you click no, you will not receive this newsletter. I kow this is silly, but we have to cover our bases in case the e-mail police come after us.

Yes	No

We count on reader feedback to help us plan our site improvements. Could you please answer the following questions to let us know what you've found useful or would like to see more of?

What parts of the site have you found most helpful? (Optional, check all that apply)

Articles About Musical Instruments	Articles About Music Theory	Other Articles About Music	Articles About the Play	Articles About Regional History	Other Resources

To help us plan articles (and in some cases events), please let us know that aspects of music and/or theatre you are currently involved in. Nobody will see this but us, but we find this information very helpful. Also, if you have a web page that is related to the content of this site, or you're involved with an organization that has a web page, please post the link(s) in the comment area, in case we have an opportunity to point readers to your site for specific information.
Optional, check all that apply:

Playing Acoustic or Folk Instruments for Fun	Performing as a Solo Performer	Performing with a band, chorus or other group	Participating in Musical Theatre	Historical Research

And just for fun, please let us know any instruments you play. (Optional.) Nobody will see this but us. Also, if you feel like something needs more clarification, just put the additional details in the "Others" area below this list. If we get a number of folks listing the same instrument that we don't call out individually in this list, we may add it.

Instrument	Thinking About It	Just Starting	Not Afraid to Play In Front of Friends	Usually Don't Embarrass Myself in Professional Settings	Seasoned Professional
Acoustic Guitar
Bass Guitar
Upright Bass
Electric guitar
Dobro/National, etc.
Laptop Steel
Pedal Steel
5-String Banjo
4-String Banjo
6-String Banjo
Mandolin
Violin or Fiddle
Ukelele
Autoharp
Accordian (key)
Button Accordian, Concertina, etc.
Harmonica
Woodwind (please specify in "other" below)
Brass (please specify in "other" below)
Keyboard(s) (please specify in "other" below)
Drums
World, Folk, or Celtic Percussion (please specify in "other" below)
Other

"Other" - please add any instruments we didn't include in our list, or more specific instruments, such as Tabla, Tenor Sax, etc. (Optional)

What areas of the site would you like to see us add or enhance? (Optional)

For what areas might you be able/willing to provide content, suggestions, examples, etc? (Optional)

Please provide the URL for any sites that you own/operate with content related to this site. (Optional)

Please provide the URL for any organizations that you support/belong to with content related to this site. (Optional)

(Required) Please tell us why you'd like to subscribe to our newsletter and add any other comments or questions. (Required)

Thanks for getting in touch. When you hit the "Submit" button, an e-mail will be sent to us. If you asked any questions we will get back as soon as possible.