Danny Paisley at Jenny Brook

Danny Paisley always gives his all, never a let down, high energy all the way. He did four sets over the weekend,all of them sensational. From heartbreakers like "The Room Over Mine," which is the title of his new Rounder release,and "The Convict and The Rose," to lightning fast tunes such as "I'm Leaving Detroit." Dan and his superpicking sidekicks deliver raw bluegrass with soul and deep felt emotion that keeps the audience either on the edge of their chairs or dancing in place. After inviting Danny on stage during their set and having him sing one, Adam Steffey remarked,"I think I just lost my liver or something," alluding to the pure power of his voice on the high parts. This band always leaves you wanting more even after four sets in two days. Danny's band mates are: Donnie Eldreth Jr. playing mandolin and lead or harmony vocals. Donnie is a gifted player and fine singer; The talented Bob Lundy on banjo and harmony vocals; Fine fiddle player Brother TJ Lundy, and Dans brother Mike Paisley holding it all together and Man, he can play the fire out of that bass. After the final set folks were screaming for more, just one more, Please.Danny Paisley
Donnie Eldreth
Bob Lundy

Dan Paisley sings with DTB

Dan Tyminski at Jenny Brook

The DTB performed before a loving crowd in Dan's home state of Vermont this weekend and they were even better than anticipated. He was totally at ease before these folks and as he said himself he had probably jammed with half of them many times on his way to the top. The audience was loving it and they showed it with rounds of ear splitting applause. Adam Steffey, Justin Moses and Ron Stewart provided stunning solo's with Barry Bales providing perfect rhythmn to the mix. Dan Tyminski
Adam Steffey
Barry Bales
Ron Stewart
Justin Moses

IBMA Awards

The first round nominations for various categories of performance for the International Bluegrass Music Association (IBMA) awards show,(to be held this fall, September 29 through October 5, 2008, in Nashville, Tennesee) are in the hands of the accountants (Riney Hancock and Co.)
From this first batch of candidaates, those receiving ten or more votes will be placed on the second round ballot list to be voted on and submitted to the accounting firm by July 31
The third round in September will have the top five vote getters in each catergory with the winners announced at the IBMA Awards show on October 2, 2008.
I'm hoping some of my picks will make it to the second round. For "Entertainer of the Year" one of my picks was Danny Paisley and The Southern Grass, others are: The Gibson Bros; The Grascals; Seldom Scene; Rhonda Vincent and the Rage. For vocal group of the year: Gibson Brothers; Seldom Scene; Jerry Salley; Claire Lynch and The Grascals. Male vocalist: Eric Gibson; Danny Paisley; Lou Reid; Steve Gulley; Terry Eldredge. Female vocalist: Rhonda Vincent; Dale Ann Bradley; Carrie Hassler; Amanda Smith and Claire Lynch. It's too bad that you're limited to five choices because there are so many talented people in bluegrass today, many not named here are on the same level as those mentioned. To continue on. Song of the year: Pickers Blues by Eric Gibson; The Day Lester Died by Claire Lynch; Alisons Band by Charlie Sizemore; Through The Window Of A Train by Blue Highway and Cabin Down Below by Eric and Leigh Gibson. This is only a partial list as there are other categories.
In about twenty days I'll have the pared down list of nominees to comment about.
Please continue to support your local bands, that's where it all started.

Bluegrass is my Second Language

I've just finished a fascinating book by John Santa called "Bluegrass Is My Second Language". Santa hails from Bluegrass Heaven, North Carolina that is, and he knows what he's talking about when it comes to explaining the atmosphere of the jam session. He made the transition from a long history of playing the blues to the frenetic world of bluegrass sorta" cold turkey" when asked by a new friend that he had only just recently jammed with to help out at a benefit for a large group of important people. The other players were complete strangers to him. In the book he humorously explains the emotions he has on the ride to the gig and how he gets thru it all.
The rest of the book takes the reader on many long rides to magical places where the people are warm and wonderful. You get to meet folks that are sometimes a bit different, maybe even quirky and some of the surroundings where the jams take place are almost mythical. Santa tells us about the many emotional relationships he develops with folks at the jams and shows us the basic goodness found in all of them, how they help him get through sad times as when his beloved dog passes or when a particularly bad winter puts him into a depression. Santa has the ability to put the reader right into the middle of a jam with his vivid recollections of how each player takes his turn on a solo or backs up the group and the audiences reaction to the music. This turned out to be a fun read and I know I'll go back and reread chapters just to enjoy the books characters.

To learn more about the book click here




EIGHTwentythree


John Santa

L-R John Santa Keith Carroll Jeff Wiseman Gregg Eldred

Gibson Brothers Iron & Diamonds

You know you've got a good audience when your marketing table is swamped long before the start of the show. And it proved to be a great audience for the Gibson Brothers "Iron and Diamonds" CD release party at the Bull Run Restaurant in Shirley, Mass. The energy was very high and the band seemed to feed off it performing a sensational set starting with "Cabin Down Below" which got the folks in the groove and continuing with the title cut, "Iron and Diamonds," about the lives of hard working miners and how they came alive on sunday to play ball. The Brothers played most of the new self written material as well as some requests of tunes from their previous release "Red Letter Day". My favorite of the night was "Pickers Blues", this song starts with a powerful guitar solo and wonderful rhythm and it's easy for a picker to relate to the lyrics. All in all it was a great night of music, the band was tight and right with Rick Hayes on mandolin, Clayton Campbell on fiddle and of course Mike Barber on bass , they played nearly two hours and probably would have played even longer but they had to stop in order to get bass player Mike Barber home by morning so he could get to the fishing hole.

Bluegrass Millionaire

A recent study indicates there are over 18 million bluegrass consumers around the planet buying CD’s, attending concerts and spending money supporting the artists. The minute I read that I thought that’s wrong. No way is there that many fans following bluegrass. How’d they come up with that figure? I’ve been to concerts of some of the best BG performers around and watched them play to a few dozen believers. That’s just the nature of our music, feast and famine. Of course the big festivals can draw thousands but the general rule is if you want to get rich, don’t choose bluegrass as the vehicle. Were the survey accurate most bluegrass bands would be rolling in dough, riding in their own busses, own houses in luxury spots around the globe. Furthermore you would be able to see your favorite bands on morning TV shows singing their latest hits, on late night shows chatting happily about their kids and their latest “project.” Wouldn’t that be nice?
I’ for one would like to see this happen. I’d like to see the artists enjoy fame and fortune. But wait! If that happened would they become like the stars of other genre’s , isolated from their fans, surrounded by bodyguards, segregated, aloof, somewhat arrogant. I don’t want to see that happen. I like it the way it is now, where you can sit down and chat with your favorite band members just as though they were school buddies or neighbors, no pretensions, just regular folks, willing to teach you some licks or give you some insight about performing and traveling place to place, interesting stuff that you’ll never be able to experience your self. I guess I’m really torn because on the one hand I want the musicians to be successful but I wouldn’t want to lose the closeness and sharing and the community spirit of the present bluegrass community.

Bluegrass Addiction

I really love bluegrass music, I think I may be obsessed with it. I think about it most of the day. I read about it, write about it, and whenever I have a spare moment there's a guitar in my hands. I even take a guitar to work so that I can play during my lunch break. I've been into it since 1985 but it seems it's more consuming now than ever before. Over the years I've developed a repertoire of probably two dozen songs/tunes that I seem to repeat over and over, much to the chagrin of my wife Meg. In fact she said to me just today "if you could sing and play like Eric or Leigh Gibson I'd say why don't you play for me." I responded "oh," she said, " but you don't, so take a break." So I figured, maybe she's tired of the same old tunes, maybe if I learn some new stuff she'll come round. So I jumped on the internet and searched for bluegrass music. I found one publication that sounded interesting. It was titled "Parking Lot Picker's Songbook," put together by Dix Bruce. He's someone I'm familiar with seeing how I learned to play from one of his books some years ago, It was bluegrass/ old time music, but I can't remember the title. Well anyway the new book has 200 of the most popular tunes played by grassers. Many of the tunes I have heard and liked but never got around to learning the music or the lyrics so this should be fun for me. I'm hoping Meg will like the new sounds and encourage me to play on for hours, oh what bliss that would be. One of the tunes in the book I particulary like is "Katy Dear," a traditional song which tells the story of two young lovers who weren't allowed to marry so they ended their lives with a silver dagger, some real cheery stuff but a scenario that's been repeated throughout history. There are many more that tell stories of hard times, sad times, loss of homeplace and feats of daring and strength. They all must have some truth in them and if we had lived during the period when they were penned we could quickly relate. I'm sure I will never learn to play or sing all of these tunes but I will have a grand time trying. "Without music, life would be a mistake." Freidrich Nietzsche.