Seedtime in eastern Kentucky refers to the period when settlers first crossed the Cumberland Gap into what was then the western wilderness. Appalshop, a non-profit arts and education center in Whitesburg KY, will present the 22nd Seedtime on the Cumberland to celebrate Appalachian culture June 10-14 on the Appalshop grounds and nearby venues.
Country traditionalist Kathy Mattea, singer-songwriter Darrell Scott and bluegrass great Jesse McReynolds—all performers with strong ties to the region—will headline the full-featured festival. Besides musical stages, the event offers film screenings, picking contests, gallery exhibits, sing-along, literary readings, a square dance and a lot more. Except for the headline concerts, all of it is free to the public.
While Seedtime has been a long time local tradition, it may gain broader notice now that Art Menius, formerly of MerleFest, has arrived as the director of Appalshop. It sure looks like a good option for the second weekend in June if you are anywhere within driving distance. There's a handy calculator on the festival directions page to figure that out.
Saturday, April 05, 2008
22nd Seedtime on the Cumberland to celebrate Appalachian roots
Thursday, April 03, 2008
Getting the Most from Merlefest - Preview
What’s your roots music taste? Do you want to see old favorites, new discoveries, or some of each? Would you prefer to get your music in more or less intimate settings, or don’t you mind big crowds? Do you want it traditional or progressive, mountainy or rocky? Just about the only constant, and now-a-days not even that, at Merlefest is that it’s an acoustic music festival. Beyond that, it’s your choice. Merlefest, to be held in Wilkesboro, NC from April 24 – April 27 this year, is easily the largest festival held in the east by any standard. Daily attendance approaches 20,000. Thirteen different sound stages. Hundreds of performers. Dozens of vendors. Every camping space and motel/hotel room within fifty miles filled. The very top names in acoustic and bluegrass music performing. It’s all there at Merlefest. With all this size and diversity, the question arises, “How can I get the most out of my Merlefest experience?” This post is designed to help you do just that.Gospel Jubilators on Cabin Stage
Planning - The best source for planning and managing your time at Merlefest remains the Merlefest web site. Once both a resource and a more-or-less open forum, the web site has changed in recent years, eliminating the lively message board it once carried. This has been, at least partially, replaced by The Unofficial Merlefest Forum, which provides for the discussion, but loses out because it hasn’t yet attracted the large group once posting at the Merlefest home site. Despite this loss, the official site of this great festival still provides most of the information you need in order to plan your four days in Wilkesboro.
Scene at Creekside Stage
Where to Stay – During our first four years at Merlefest, we stayed on campus in our trailer. Last year, when they raised the price, we migrated out to Fort Hamby on W. Kerr Scott Reservoir outside town. It worked for us. There are other campgrounds in the area, but by this time they are pretty well filled. The Merlefest web site gives a good overview of these. Unless you’re very lucky, you won’t find a motel room in the area, and if you do, it’ll be quite expensive. For next year, make your reservations early.
Doc Watson at Creekside
Seeing What You Want and Getting Around - Your first task, and do it today, is to download and print the Merlefest Schedule. Once you arrive at Merlefest, the pocket guide the festival provides will become your best friend, but until then you can use these Adobe PDF documents as a tool to guide your planning. The pocket guide will also be accompanied by a large, elaborate, and useful festival program describing all the performers as well as detailing the vendors and their locations. Until you get this booklet in your hands, the 2008 line-up will have to do. This listing has the advantage of providing links to most of the artists performing at Merlefest, allowing you to research them to your heart’s content and listen to samples of their music. Since one of the great joys of Merlefest is being introduced to new bands and sounds, this resource shouldn’t be overlooked. You can also find a festival map here. This recently updated map provides a much more accurate picture of the Wilkes Community College campus than earlier versions. The only missing element is a sense of the geography of the place, and this is important. At Merlefest you’ll do a lot of walking and climbing. The campus is quite hilly, the hills are steep, and two important stages (Walker Center and Hillside) require quite a hike. The final important resource is a list of stages. Click on stages on the Merlefest home page and you’ll be provided a list of each stage at the festival. Select each one and read about its focus. I’d prefer a more elaborate discussion, but combined with the map and the artists list, this link is helpful. Remember the reserve seating section at Watson Stage is open until 5:00 PM. Just go in and sit in an empty seat. If the owner returns, move somewhere else. Some people with strong bladders manage to stay inside into the evening, but once you leave, you won't get back. Once you have these resources in hand, you can begin to chart out a tentative schedule. But remember what Don Rigsby sang, “If you want to make God laugh, make a plan.”
Sam Bush's Annual Jam
Dressing for Merlefest is an important consideration. Remember a few things. It always rains at Merlefest. You won’t know when or how much, but count on rain. No matter how warm, sunny and pleasant the day is the evening is likely to be cool or even cold. The Watson Stage is set on a flat plain surrounded by steep hills. As the sun sets, cooling air begins to roll down from the hillsides and settle onto this main performance area. By nine or ten in the evening, everyone wishes they had more and warmer clothing. Bring several layers of clothes with you, including a fresh, dry, warm pair of socks. Remember that keeping your feet and head warm increases your chance of keeping the rest of you warm. As the evening progresses, layer up to stay warm. In the bottom of your pack, make sure you have a nylon shell to ward off dampness in either its drifting or falling form.
Reserve Seats at Watson Stage
Eating at Merlefest - A couple who have sat three rows in front of us ever since we began coming to Merlefest always carry a lot of food in with them. I suspect, in addition to hors d’oerves, they have the forbidden cocktails in a thermos. They carry fruit, salads…all they need for the day. Our seat neighbors always bring sandwiches as well as plenty of snacks with them. Both ways work well. We do some of that, too. However, we also believe in doing what we can to support the vendors at the festival. The massive food tent, to the left of the Watson Stage, offers a range of foods from hamburgers and hot dogs, through barbecue, to Thai, Italian, and Indian specialties. Meals are tasty and reasonably priced. There’s one problem: at meal times the lines are long and seats at the nearby tables are scarce. The best way to shorten your wait in line is to eat at off hours or during the performances of big headliners. You can hear from the food tent and see the huge television screen, and the lines seem to be shorter. Last year, several vendors of snack foods like hot dogs, hamburgers, and the ever popular funnel cakes were spread around the grounds. There were still long lines. I’ve been told that this year the festival has worked with vendors to increase efficiency and staffing at high traffic periods. They’ve also worked to make pick-up foods like hot dog, hamburgers, pizza, and ice-cream more available in high traffic areas. Coffee will be brewed on-campus making it more quickly available in larger quantities. Merlefest leadership is aware of the problems and has worked hard to alleviate them.
The Great Tut Tayler - Honoring the Pioneers
Chances to connect with band members are smaller, briefer, and less intimate than at typical festival settings. Merlefest is too large and complex for much meeting and greeting or shake and howdying. If you want to get to know members of a band, this isn’t the place, but you can say hi and get autographs either at scheduled signings at the entrance to the Watson Stage or get a chance for somewhat closer contact at the smaller stages spread about the campus. The map, the schedule, and the stage descriptions, taken together, will help you make these choices. It’s not as frequent at Merlefest as at other festivals to see band members around the grounds, but that happens sometimes, too. Often, however, they seem to be with friends and give off a vibe of preferring not to be interrupted.
Instrument contests and the Chris Austin song writing contest are central elements of Merlefest. The recognition coming to a musician who wins an instrument contest or the visibility a songwriter gains from having a song sung from the cabin stage can serve as important boosts to a career. Contest winners get to sing their songs from the Cabin Stage on Saturday night, and it’s a pretty big deal. Sometimes you hear new songs that end up in major albums a year or so later. Lorraine Jordan had a song take second place a couple of years ago. Grasstowne selected “Devil’s Road” which Brink Brinkman won with for recording and performance. It’s a great showcase. Another feature of Merlefest is the organized jams happening almost every day. These jams bring musicians from different bands, but often with a musical affinity, together for an extended extemporaneous performance. Last year, at one point, the members of New Grass Revival were on stage at once for the first time in years. Such jams take place at a variety of stages. Another opportunity to see musicians jamming occurs at the area sponsored by the Wilkes Acoustic Society both during the festival and during the three evenings preceding it.
I thought maybe I’d put up a list of bands I particularly wanted to see and hear during Merlefest. I went through the 2008 Merlefest lineup, looked at my choices, and decided they were mine. Merlefest is actually 20,000 different festivals each day. As such, it’s up to each person who attends to decide who they want to see, and how much effort they want to make to see them. I showed the list to my wife and her concern was our ability to stay in touch when not at the same performance. Lots of people carry walkie talkies. I recommend not bringing them and relying on cell phones instead. There are just too many people clogging up too few channels to make the family radios very good communications tools. Be sure, however, to keep your cell phone on vibrate so your ring tone doesn’t bother others.
In the end Doc Watson and his friends established and maintain the spirit of Merlefest. The festival is a celebration of his son Eddie Merle, but it’s a recognition of Doc’s accomplishments, his taste, and his friends. As long as that remains, the festival will continue to be one of the great musical events in America. Doc’s spirit pervades the entire event.
For a different perspective focused on specific musicians and coming from a somewhat differently nuanced place, read Derek Halsey’s Merlefest Preview here.
Wednesday, April 02, 2008
Indoor bluegrass is fine at Carolina Road
Ted Lehmann posts his usual in-depth review and photo gallery from the Southeast circuit, this time from the second Carolina Road Homecoming last weekend in Burlington NC.
Here's an except. Visit Ted's site for the full report.
Wow! What a weekend of music, jamming, getting together with old friends, and making new ones. Usually, we prefer to take our bluegrass music outdoors, come rain or shine. The festival scene works great when RVers pull in from all parts of the country to congregate for a few days before returning home or moving on to the next event. On this, the last weekend in March, however, North Carolina is an unlikely place for an outdoor festival. While it was quite warm on Friday, Saturday turned chilly and wet; even a pretty tough and committed festival goer would have been challenged to stay outdoors for the music.
Inside the Burlington, NC Ramada Inn, however, it was warm and toasty, the bands ran from quite good to outstanding, the jamming reached heights I hadn’t heard at many other festivals, and Lorraine Jordan, one of the hardest working people in bluegrass, aided by her very competent staff and a herd of committed volunteers, kept things running smoothly and people involved and having fun.
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Great Southern shows great potential
Promoter Ernie Evans and park owner Pat Tillman courageously took on the task of creating, promoting, and presenting a bluegrass festival in only six weeks after the unfortunate demise of the Spirit of Suwannee Bluegrass festival. While too few people came, this festival bodes well for the future if they decide to continue to build the lineups offered here as well as to develop the site.
Read the full review by Ted Lehmann.
If You Go: Festival Internationale de Louisiane
Tips for festival-goers: Tiny Lafayette Regional Airport serves only a few airlines, requiring a stop in Houston or Dallas. But good interstates make Lafayette a long and hard but possible drive from much of the South and Southwest. Festival Preview has never heard of anyone camping out for this event—not the best idea in alligator country. The local motels, most on the borderline seedy Evangeline Throughway, are cheap and plentiful. You do need a car to get around, but you can use it to visit local tourist attractions such as the Evangeline Oak (so you can say you did it), the McIlhenny plant where Tabasco sauce comes from (underwhelming but the grounds are nice) and dozens of alligators lounging, yawning and occasionally munching on nutria at Lake Martin in the Cypress Island Preserve (awesome).
Preview: Festival Internationale de Louisiane
Festival Internationale—funky, free regional alternative
By Donald Frazier
As the best-kept secret in Louisiana music, the Festival Internationale has presented music of southern Louisiana and the rest of the French-speaking world for the last 22 years to a loyal local audience, plus an increasing number of fans who make the 135-mile drive from the more famous New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival on the same weekend.
The year’s event, taking place April 23-27 in downtown Lafayette LA, marks a well-rounded Louisiana-based program, with headliners such as slide guitar bluesman and local hero Sonny Landreth, The Blind Boys of Alabama, the Preservation Hall Jazz Band Horns, Geno Delafose and Steve Riley and the Mamou Playboys. Others include The Duhks, Burning Spear, Terrence Simien & The Zydeco Experience, Yerba Buena, Ivan Neville’s Dumpstahunk, hailed by The New York Times as “the best funk band from New Orleans,” and a score of other acts from a music-rich local region offering zydeco, blues, and even the more electric kind of Cajun.
What you won’t hear is the strong focus on the Francophone world of previous years. Word-class French-speaking superstars such as Salif Keita (Mali), Baaba Maal (Senegal), Boukman Experyans (Haiti), Angelique Kidjo (Benin), Kanda Bongo Man (Congo) and Ali Farka Toure (Mali) made this event a unique annual must-see for the burgeoning world music crowd in the 1990s. But civil war in Zaire (now Congo) plus post-9/11 travel restrictions reduced the trans-Atlantic traffic to a trickle.
The program still has decent representation from Africa and the French West Indies, if not of the same level. Guitarist Habib Koite, one of the most accessible of Mali’s musicians, heads up an African contingent with lesser known entries from Niger and Togo. Among Caribbean performers, the program includes Cuba’s Javier Garcia and acts from Martinique, Jamaica and Belize.
What the Festival Internationale does not have in African music it makes up in street-party vibe. Most of downtown Lafayette is blocked off for the festival with its four main stages, food courts, and a much better than usual retail pavilion with a strong selection of funky world-beat gear. A number of arts organizations conduct exhibits, erect street art, and perform street theater. The food – this is Louisiana – is anywhere from pretty good to downright memorable, and mostly quite cheap. Much drinking on the street, with no designated stumbler required. As the high point of the season in a sleepy Southern town, this festival draws locals quite heavily, diluted only when students from Louisiana State University in nearby Baton Rouge flood in starting Friday afternoon.
In an era of increasingly corporate musical events, this one is friendly, community-based and unlikely to ever become part of a national circuit. As such, it can be somewhat ragged around the edges, but there's a big upside. While JazzFest becomes more and more of a mainstream, pop-flavored event, the Festival Internationale will always retain a vibrant regional identity.
And did we point out – it is entirely free.
Attendee tips
Monday, March 24, 2008
Commander Cody & The Lost Planet Airmen
Commander Cody & The Lost Planet Airmen
Yes, the feel-good swing-rockers from the '70s--think "Hot Rod Lincoln"--are back on the circuit with Commander George Frayne leading a lively new unit. The band has its roots in Ann Arbor but hit it big as part of the San Francisco scene with a sound that set the stage for other bands like New Riders of the Purple Sage and Asleep At the Wheel.
Personnel: George Frayne (keyboard, vocals), Steve Barbuto (drums, vocals), Rick Mullen (bass), Mark Emerick (guitar, vocals)
Commander Cody Plymouth MA 2006
Video by 50174.
Suwannee Springfest
March 27-30, Live Oak FL
Spirit of the Suwannee Music Park
Magnolia Music enters its 12th season presenting a tasty mix of Americana and roots music.at Suwannee Springfest this month and MagnoliaFest in October. The idyllic north Florida music park boasts five festival stages and two campground stages, plenty of camping hookups and primitive camping. The festival adds a magic circus, song writing contest, healing arts, and low-power FM broadcasts from the Amphitheater stage.
Headliners: David Grisman Quintet, Peter Rowan, Donna the Buffalo, Railroad Earth, Guy Clark, Commander Cody, Jim Lauderdale, The Greencards, The Waybacks, The Infamous Stringdusters
Springfest 2007 slide show
Video by chrisowenvt.
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Lots to like as RockyGrass lineup firms up
Planet Bluegrass announced the final slots for the 36th Annual RockyGrass Festival (July 25-27) in Lyons CO—virtuoso string duo Mike Marshall & Darol Anger and Infamous Stringdusters fiddler/vocalist Jeremy Garrett in a solo gospel set.
Highlights of the lineup are the all-new Dan Tyminski Band, old-time string band Carolina Chocolate Drops, the folk operatic Punch Brothers with Chris Thile, plus seminal newgrass pioneers Sam Bush, Béla Fleck, Jerry Douglas and Edgar Meyer.
Younger bands are well represented with Chatham County Line, The Steeldrivers, Infamous Stringdusters Bearfoot, Stairwell Sisters and Spring Creek Bluegrass Band. Other big names are Peter Rowan, Natalie MacMaster, Sparrow Quartet, J.D. Crowe, Adrienne Young, and Psychograss.
The complete day-by-day RockyGrass lineup:
Friday, July 25
Sam Bush, Jerry Douglas & Edgar Meyer * Dan Tyminski Band * Béla Fleck & Friends * John Cowan Band * Russ Barenberg & Bryan Sutton * The Steeldrivers * Mike Marshall & Darol Anger * Spring Creek Bluegrass Band
Saturday, July 26
Natalie MacMaster * Punch Brothers featuring Chris Thile * Abigail Washburn & The Sparrow Quartet featuring Béla Fleck * Psychograss * Infamous Stringdusters * Bearfoot * Chatham County Line
Sunday, July 27
Sam Bush Bluegrass Band * Carolina Chocolate Drops * Peter Rowan * JD Crowe & The New South * Adrienne Young & Little Sadie * Stairwell Sisters * Gospel Set featuring Jeremy Garrett
For complete information, visit the official site.
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Jewish Music Festival to honor trumpeter
The co-founder of the seminal American klezmer band The Klezmatics, trumpet extraordinaire Frank London, will be honored at this month's Jewish Music Festival with the first annual Shofar Award, given to musicians who have made a significant contribution to Jewish music.
“Frank is without par the most prolific composer, player, and bandleader on the international Jewish music scene,” says festival director Ellie Shapiro. “Deeply rooted in klezmer, he has done more than anyone else to bend the genre in ways that connect across cultures."
London is also known for performing with artists as diverse as Itzhak Perlman, David Byrne, LL Cool J and They Might Be Giants.
The 23rd annual Jewish Music Festival runs March 22-30 in venues around the Bay Area. London performs his score for 1907 Yiddish play by I.L. Peretz A Night in the Old Marketplace in a opening night performance March 22 at Berkeley Repertory Theatre in Berkeley CA.
Monday, March 17, 2008
Strawberry looking sweet for Spring
Maybe a theme for Strawberry 2008 is artists playing with different configurations. Today, Ricky Skaggs was announced for Spring, where he will join old parter Emmylou Harris on the bill, along with Tim O'Brien, Peter Rowan, john Cowan and lots more. Skaggs is playing many festivals this year together with piano great Bruce Hornsby, but that is presumably not the case here.
Similarly O'Brien seems to be appearing solo, while he is a part of Hot Rize/Red Knuckles reunions at several other festivals this summer. Rowan will appear at Strawberry and other festivals with his Free Mexican Airforce instead of the quartet he has mostly toured with in recent years.
Regrettably, FP's dispute with Strawberry Music Festivals continues and we will not be at Camp Mather for the 2008 festivals May 22-25 and August 28-31. Both lineups are about half done and both offer a lot to look forward to. For Spring, I would expect a powerful debut for Cadillac Sky and I'm interested in hearing the comeback tour for Carlene Carter.
The Fall festival leads with Sam Bush, but has a number of younger bands with big-time buzz--The Avett Brother, The SteelDrivers, Spring Creek Bluegrass Band and local favorites Belle Monroe & Her Brewglass Boys. Stand by for more announcements for both festivals.
Our disagreement aside, Strawberry remains one of the very best roots festivals going. We hope to be back in future years.
Friday, March 14, 2008
Aoife in Wonderland
Crooked Still vocalist Aoife O'Donovan narrates a photo montage from Wintergrass 2008. She discusses the band's personnel changes and upcoming album, the dynamic Boston music scene and the fun of playing among friends at Wintergrass. Festival Preview presents.
Wintergrass notebook
I had been told that the Nordic roots trio Väsen, especially joined by two heros of the American progressive acoustic scene, Mike Marshall and Darol Anger, would be a special performance. But I had no idea how special.
With Olov Johansson on the traditional Swedish nyckelharpa, a multi-stringed bowed instrument that produces an amazing range of sound, and Roger Tallroth on 12-string guitar and Mikael Marin on viola, they transform traditional Scandinavian folk music (somewhat akin to traditional forms from the British Isles) into sweeping improvisational sound scapes. With Marshall and Anger inciting more experimentation, their performance was my pick of must sublime set of the festival.
The band delivered its hits "Born Lonesome" and "You Can't Trust the Weatherman," and offered some material I didn't know. To me, the key differentiator in Cadillac Sky is the song-writing. Simpson has had some success on Music Row as a writer for country artists. That personal perspective plus the rock riffs give C-Sky the potential to cross into the mainstream, as suggested by the airtime it gets on country video channels.
One tidbit that may not fit with that analysis but is fascinating. Simpson said the band is set to do a record with Mike Marshall, which would imply a more musically ambitious and less poppy direction for the new project.
A word about the reconfigured setup of the festival stage in the Marriott ballroom. The room was set up more conventionally with the stage at one end of the horizontal room. Previously the stage was set up along the side wall with bleachers in a semicircle around the stage. That was an intimate setup that works well for workshops, but the new layout seems to work better for a concert set.
Wednesday, March 05, 2008
With latest additions, Telluride lineup touches all the bases
The latest adds are prolific songwriter Ryan Adams & the Cardinals, legendary folkie Arlo Guthrie, and progressive bluegrass pioneers Hot Rize, the latter in a second booking for the legendary band's 30th anniversary reunion. They supplement a deep lineup of talent that crosses many genres beyond the one--bluegrass--mentioned in the festival's name. Among the lineup trends:
First-time performers: Adams and Guthrie are first-timers in Town Park. Other debuts are Scottish soul-pop singer Paolo Nutini, sweet-voiced country singer Tift Merritt and country-soul pioneer Solomon Burke.
Reunions: Beloved festival favorites Leftover Salmon and Hot Rize (with Red Knuckles and the Trailblazers) reunite for special Telluride performances.
Falling slowly: Recent Oscar winners Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova from the film Once perform both as the stripped-down acoustic The Swell Season and with one of the only 2008 dates for the Irish rock band The Frames.
Collaborations: Ricky Skaggs and Bruce Hornsby with Kentucky Thunder, Darrell Scott and John Cowan, “Duos with Friends” by banjo virtuoso Béla Fleck.
The Telluride House Band: King of Telluride Sam Bush performs for his 34th straight year. Other house band regulars are Fleck, Jerry Douglas, Edgar Meyer, and Bryan Sutton.
New generation: The younger generation of stringband musicians is well-represented, including Punch Brothers featuring Chris Thile, Uncle Earl, and The Duhks.
The complete lineup:
35th Telluride Bluegrass Festival - June 19-22, 2008 – Telluride, CO
http://www.bluegrass.com/telluride
Ryan Adams & the Cardinals * Sam Bush Band * Ani DiFranco Band * Ricky Skaggs & Bruce Hornsby with Kentucky Thunder * Telluride House Band featuring Sam, Béla, Jerry, Edgar & Bryan * Arlo Guthrie * Yonder Mountain String Band * The Swell Season: Glen Hansard & Marketa Irglova from the film Once * Hot Rize with Red Knuckles and the Trailblazers * Paolo Nutini * Béla Fleck, Duos with Friends * Tim O’Brien * Del McCoury Band * Punch Brothers featuring Chris Thile * Peter Rowan & the Free Mexican Airforce * Leftover Salmon * Jerry Douglas Band * The Frames * John Cowan & Darrell Scott Band * Edgar Meyer * Brett Dennen * Tift Merritt * Uncle Earl * The Emmitt Nershi Band * Solomon Burke * The Duhks * Cadillac Sky * Steep Canyon Rangers * Spring Creek Bluegrass Band
Tuesday, March 04, 2008
Great Southern steps up to replace cancelled Suwannee fest
Here's an excerpt from Ted Lehmann's latest on the winter bluegrass circuit. The full report is here:
It’s a sad event when a scheduled festival has to be postponed or cancelled. The Spirit of Suwannee Bluegrass Festival had been scheduled for the weekend of March 20 – 22, but it was cancelled. Promoter Don Miller tells me the cancellation was necessary because of inadequate pre-registrations and lack of sponsorship. My hunch says that Spirit of Suwannee Music Park was less than enthusiastic about this event, scheduling a large canoe festival for the same weekend and putting its emphasis onto Springfest coming the following one. Beer sales for Springfest are huge! Thus a fine festival with a varied lineup and a quality venue has gone down the tubes.
Fortunately, Miller’s co-promoter, North Florida’s Ernie Evans has stepped into the breach and arranged for a festival called “The Great Southern Bluegrass Festival” and held at Picker's Paradise Park in Ochlocknee, GA (near Thomasville) on March 21 – 22. The headliner will be Grasstowne, a band only a little over a year old, but creating a buzz across the nation at concerts and festivals as well as through its hit CD “The Road Headin’ Home.”
