folkjam.org is our answer to being unable to find acoustic music jams to join when traveling. folkjam.org is an international list of user contributed jam sessions, folk festivals and acoustic music camps/workshops.
We've seen site after site that are (or have been...) lovingly maintained by musicians and organizations looking to help spread the word about jams in their area. Some are always up to date and easy to navigate. Others, sadly many, contain data on jams that have changed day or venue or may no longer be happening. The regular attendees of the jam didn't know about the site, and the site's maintainer has no way to know that a jam in a distant city has changed.
We've addressed that by making it very easy for anybody with a computer and a web browser to register with folkjam.org (free), fill out a simple form, and maintain information on their favorite acoustic jam sessions with folkjam.org. We take care of the boring parts of maintaining jam session details - placing them on maps, making them easy to search for and working out session dates. When you contribute a recurring jam you tell folkjam a simple rule, such as "this jam happens on the third Friday of every month" or "weekly on Tuesday October through April" and folkjam.org will work out the calendar dates for the jam. It will even put the jam on a regional calendar.
Another challenge we have in finding music outside of our home town of Kansas City is in finding the locations. When a folkjam.org contributor gives an address for their jam session, folkjam integrates with several popular web based map services to give you driving directions.
One final gripe we have with so many jam session sites we find on the net is navigation - finding the content you want is time consuming. When I'm visiting a new city, I don't know what towns are within a 30 minute drive. Many sites assume that they are catering to the local community, where the fact that Centralia is fifteen minutes from East Town is common knowledge. A visitor is not likely to know this. With folkjam.org, you tell us where you are or want to be, and folkjam will find jams in a broad radius, showing you a map that indicates your position relative to the jams in the area. This is necessary for an out of town visitor and helpful even for the locals. A nice side effect is that you are not forced to rummage through the session lists that show jams in Wales, Germany and New York City all on the same page.
Visit the folkjam.org community today. Register with us to find jams in your local area or in a new city, and please help your neighbors and visitors find the jams in your area by contributing the details to folkjam.org .