News of new music from Niall Toner always raises expectations; what historic characters, events or creative stories has he woven into his songs since the last album? So, you go to Delphi .. sorry, the oracle, Niall Toner, himself. On this occasion
Author: Richard Thompson
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Young Uns – Mackenzie Bell
Being raised in Rosine, Kentucky, perhaps means one has a pre-ordained musical direction. Sometimes. Certainly, 13-year-old traditional bluegrass and classic country fiddle player Mackenzie Bell is inspired by the great Bill Monroe. She started playing in public when she was eight;
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Travers Chandler and the Lonesome Truck Driver
Bluegrass music’s own truck-driving man, Travers Chandler, is working on a new album of recordings and shared a video teaser to whet the appetite. Having worked in the trucking business all his working life Chandler is ideally placed to speak
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50th Anniversary Labor Day Bluegrass Festival at Camp Springs
Last Fall we shared news that there is to be a bluegrass festival at the famous old Camp Springs site where music impresario Carlton Haney held Labor Day festivals from 1969 onwards. Developments are now well advanced to the point of
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West Virginia bridge to be renamed Hazel Dickens Memorial Bridge
The locally known Montcalm Bridge, carrying County Route 11 over the Bluestone River in Mercer County, West Virginia, is to be named the Hazel Dickens Memorial Bridge. On March 9, 2019, the West Virginia legislature voted in favor of Senate Resolution
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Bill Monroe’s Sons of Bluegrass at Mountains of Music Homecoming
It’s 23 years since Bill Monroe passed away, and over the years since there have been a few Blue Grass Boy reunions. However, they’re not commonplace. So, Jack Hinshelwood, The Director of the Crooked Road, has assembled five former Blue
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Tom Adler on Bill Monroe and Bean Blossom
In 2011 Bean Blossom historian Thomas A. Adler gave a presentation at the International Country Music Conference in Nashville, during which he spoke about the possible reasons why Bill Monroe bought the Brown County Jamboree site at Bean Blossom in
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The Story Behind the Song – Black Flowers
Songs about coal mining have been a part of folk music from the time when major commercial production began in earnest in Appalachia in the 1870s, as exemplified by John Wallace Crawford’s Only a Miner Killed, composed in 1877. Later, Florence
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Saline Fiddlers to open for Ricky Skaggs
East, west, north and south, bluegrass music has its young musicians in many different regions. Some found off the beaten track are the Saline Fiddlers who open for bluegrass music legend, 15-time Grammy winner, and newly-inducted member of the Country
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Happy 80th to Dave Freeman!
Happy Birthday to David Freeman! We hope that you have a wonderful day. Dave Freeman’s life has been reasonably-well documented in these pages; with this reflective article in February 2008, and an overview of the 50 years of County Sales published