Need Tips on Hosting a Guitar-Night

how many is too many?

Of course it depends on the size of you place.. but if you say that space is no issue then I would say maybe 6 to 8 tops. You could always take turns, not everyone has to place on every song or all the time.
should we come up with a list of songs to try?

I dont think its a bad idea to have a list of songs or basic tabs of songs. Plenty of copies too. My guitar instructor does something similar where my lessons are except that its a blues deal. So everyone plays the rhythm and then one at a time we go in a circle while someone plays over it.
what should I have on hand(besides beer) – picks, tuner, capo, stools/chairs of varying heights?

I'd be careful supplying beer. You may be responsible and so forth but you probably dont know the limits of the other guitarists and they might not know their limits either. Other than chairs, I'd say the other stuff is "bring your own"

do you just sit down and “let it happen” or is it best to have a general idea going in of who will do what?

I think it'd be best to keep it informal and fly by the seat of your pants.
Thanks for your input
Any time. :D

Jim

I have been a part of several guitar nights.

The ones I like best is where everyone is required to bring a couple of songs that are easy, but that they play well. Then you play lead for your good songs, while everyone else plays rhythm. And take turns leading. Each person brings a dozen copies of their own song, or whatever.

That way you get exposed to a bunch of new songs that aren't too hard, and you can hear them played well. For songs the group really likes, we agree to take home and work on for the next jam, so that you have a good variety of new songs, songs you all are working on, and songs you have practiced enough that they really sound good.

Be careful who you invite into your home.

I would say having the music would be a big plus. They would have to be fairly easy songs for people to pick them up on the fly. I friend of mine use and overhed projector and just beams it on the wall so we only need one transparency of each song. Then you don't need music stands etc.

With that said I've been doing this for a couple months. Not just guitarists we usually have one or two guitars, bass and drums. Without music we found we all knew a bunch of songs but we didn't know many of the same ones so sometimes we struggled with what to play. Wes has played with us several tmes and he can vouch for how unorganized it can be.

But we were/are trying to do something more serious than just a casual guitar jam. We wanted to work on several covers and maybe play an open mic or something. hasn't quite worked out that way.

When they are good they are fun when they are unorganized it can be frustrating. Doing a bit of homework and getting a feel for the music everyone knows or wants to play may help getting started. You can always do some simple 12 bar blues and take turns soloing or something. I'm not all that into that so we don't do a lot of that.

Definitely have to have some beer/soda/water maybe chips and stuff. I require Jaegar at all jams...We've had all kinds of food from steaks to burgers and hot dogs, the last time I made some broccolli rabe w/sausage and pasta..

A nice timely post as I'm trying to put together something similar right now. Right now, it's looking like a guitar playing co-worker, a bass playing co-worker, my guitar/keyboard playing son and myself (guitar). We are going to pick a few songs ahead of time to avoid the "I don't know that one, do you know this one" syndrome. Right now, all we've got is Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here".

I wouldn't go overboard w/ extra gear and drinks, but having a few extra picks and a tuner (make sure you have one that has an input for electric, you mentioned you only have acoustic) wouldn't hurt. You might want to have a few extra batteries around, as my tuner batteries always seem to go out at the wrong time. If you do go electric, having a couple of power strips would be a good idea, as you will run out of outlets quick when everyone starts plugging in their amps, stompboxes, etc. Chairs would be a good idea :) I wouldn't worry about having different heights unless you already have them.

I'd say make it BYOB and have some cokes and water on hand. Either have a couple bags of pretzels/chips or wait til everyone gets there and get everyone to pitch in an order pizza.

Just let it happen. If you've already agreed on the songs, once you sit down, ask who's comfortable taking the lead on whatever you're getting ready to play and let them take it. If you've got 2 people that want to play lead, play the song twice! :D Just keep it lose and relaxed and everyone will have fun.

I've only played guitar with a few people, but when I have, it's been fun. Each time, we seem to trade knowledge and take turns teach eachother different songs. It's been a while though. One moved away, one is 3 hours away and the other guy has almost given up guitar while going through the big dee-vorce.

Sounds like a cool idea :D

One thing that's not been specifically mentioned, but you shouldn't just assume - it really helps that people understand that bringing songs (or the host supplying songs) means bringing PAPER, something that people can read along with, sing along with, and also write their own notes on. If this becomes regular, you might find yourselves putting together a songbook so that everyone can play right away without the whole "what are those chords again?" thing.

And, as everyone has mentioned, have fun above all. Sounds like it will be a great time. Be sure to post about it on the "Gigs and Jams" Forum page.

Peace

I'm working on getting a once a month jam circle going myself. My problem is getting folks together. I know a number of folks who play, but some are what I call casual players who play only oce in a while, an others are in bands and spend a lot of time with that and so aren't too interested in doing music outside of the band thing. Still, I was able to get three of us together a few weeks ago and hope to do another one sometime this mont. Hoping we can get it going on a regular basis and it will catch on.

Anyhow, I read an article online, I think on the Play Guitar Mag site (even though the mag is out of publication., the website is still up and has back articles.) It had some good suggestions that I tried and they seem to work well. First, I put together about four three-ring binders with some easy songs; that way we have at least some songs everybody will have the music to. However, we don't do every song from the book, it's the option of whoever's turn it is. My guests introduced some other songs they liked, and I'm going to add someof those to the books for next time.

We provided some light snacks, such as chips and salsa. The article suggested having a pitch in for pizza or something. That's definitely an option. As far as alcohol, it was strictly BYOB. That works well for our crowd. We did strictly acoustic.

Also, I keep an e-mail list and I'll send oput mailings to everyone as we get dates together. I'd like to have a regular schedule, like the first Friday evening of each month or somethimng, but we will see how that goes.

One thing I'd like to have that I don't is a few extra music stands.

Good luck with your circle.