News/Thoughts

Monthly Archives: August 2019

Kelley Lands #1 Single

Irene Kelley started playing music at 15, and joined her first full time bluegrass band, Redwing, in 1981. By 1984, she was headed to Nashville with her guitar, a handful of original material, and a love for traditional and bluegrass music. Although it was MCA Nashville’s country division that signed her to a record deal, she was adamant about having Carl ...

Read More »

Chasing Her Dream

Singer/Mandolinist Amanda Cook started singing music with her dad when she was in her mid-20s through her mid 30s. Her dad, a well known banjo player in their hometown and regionally in Florida, bought her a mandolin to play when they formed the band. “I was literally learning to play an instrument while I was in the band,” she admitted. ...

Read More »

Province Of Thieves

Province Of Thieves is an acoustic ensemble hailing from Charlotte, NC. They feature guitar, mandolin, ukulele, Irish bouzouki, banjo, upright bass, and percussion. Their blend of unique instrumentation with powerful vocals is impressive; so much so that it earned them a 2018 Carolina Music Award. The “Thieves” have been together since 2012 performing predominately all original music, which is influenced ...

Read More »

AMA 2019 Award Nominees

The Americana Music Association will be celebrating it’s 18th year of artist achievements at their annual conference and awards ceremony, September 10th through the 14th, 2019 in Nashville, TN. Emmylou Harris said the event was “the shining star of Nashville and music everywhere.” The Americana Honors & Awards has been broadcast in years past on CMT, Austin City Limits via ...

Read More »

IBMA Award Nominees

The International Bluegrass Music Association will celebrate the 30th anniversary of it’s annual awards this September (24th – 28th) in Raleigh, NC, at it’s annual conference and music festival. Del McCoury, who is celebrating his 80th birthday will co-host the event with famed music songwriter, Jim Lauderdale. “What could be better than Del co-hosting the Awards Show with the legendary ...

Read More »

On The Road

It is mid-summer and I am on the road from Norfolk, Virginia to Annapolis, Maryland thinking of the upcoming festivals I will be playing later this summer and fall. They are all quite different. The best ones create a fest-family of artists that then grows to include the audience. As a veteran of performing at festivals, and producing a music ...

Read More »

New Festivals Everywhere

I don’t remember how or when I first heard of Under the Big Sky Festival, which took place for the first time last weekend in remote Whitefish, Montana (just outside the gates of the epic Glacier National Park). It must have come across my social media since I follow a few of the acts on the bill. In the dreary ...

Read More »

Why They Write

If you can compose a written sentence in a grammatically accepted manner that conveys a coherent thought to a reader who finds that thought interesting, you are a writer—NO! To be a writer, one must modify those words with others so that the whole word grouping provokes emotional feelings in the reader’s mind. When done properly, a story emerges. Story ...

Read More »

Alice Gerrard

If you are a fan of Alice Gerrard who, along with her duet partner the legendary folksinger, Hazel Dickens, pioneered the emergence of women in bluegrass, you might be interested in this bit of information. Several years ago at the IBMA convention in Raleigh, NC, the AR trade booth was located near an exhibit explaining a film producer’s effort to ...

Read More »

Ashville’s Zoe & Cloyd

Natalya Zoe Weinstein is a multi-instrumentalist and an award-winning songwriter. Together with vocalist, John Cloyd Miller, they make up the string duo of Zoe & Cloyd. Founding members of the trio Red June, the pair have been touring as a duo since 2015. They met in Ashville, NC hanging around the local music scene there in 2005. Red June lasted ...

Read More »