Author: John Lawless

We posted earlier this week that Mountain Heart fiddler Jim VanCleve had recently celebrated the birth of his first child, Ryaan. When the nominations were announced yesterday morning for the 49th Grammy Awards, it turned out that Jim has something

The Grascals have just announced that Aaron McDaris will be their new banjo player. He has been working this past six years with Larry Stephenson, and has a solo project, First Time Around, on Pinecastle Records. He takes the spot of

Just in time for holiday picking, BluegrassBooksOnline.com has added a new free lesson to their web site. This month, they have both mandolin and guitar lessons for Deck The Halls and It Came Upon A Midnight Clear. Each lesson contains a

We posted back in October about several new bluegrass instruments which Gibson debuted at the IBMA trade show. At that time, we mentioned the Ricky Skaggs signature mandolin, and indicated that no further information was available on the Gibson web

We have posted a few times recently about both management and membership changes in Pine Mountain Railroad. With one last announcement, it appears that the new band is fully formed. Yesterday, we got word from the band that they have hired

Brance and I recorded interviews today with Phil Leadbetter and Alan Bibey, where they each discussed their new band venture with Steve Gulley, Grasstowne. We'll release the interview with Phil as a GrassCast later this week, and Alan's the following. One

We posted last week that Cherryholmes would be Dennis Jones' in-studio guest on WNCW this Thursday (12/7), but suggested at the time that the show would not be available on the station's internet stream. Dennis now tells us that the show

Continuing with a Bill Monroe/Neil Rosenberg theme... I recently had occasion to correspond with Neil about his upcoming book, The Music Of Bill Monroe, written with the late Charles Wolfe, and due for a 2007 release by the University of Illinois

Chris Thile and Edgar Meyer will spend two weeks touring together in mid-January, 2007. The tour will take them primarily through the southern and central parts of the US, from 1/13-1/28. Thile has long been known as a startlingly gifted young

We just got word that Jim VanCleve and his fianc?©, Desneige, welcomed their first born child on November 21, 2007. Ryann Yvonne VanCleve weighed in at 8lbs., 6oz. and 20 inches long. Congratulations to all the VanCleve's as they welcome Ryaan