Bluegrass at CMA Fan Fair

CMA Music Festival 2008There will be some bluegrass offered during this week’s big CMA Music Festival and Fan Fair in Nashville.

Though the event officially begins on Thursday (6/5) and runs through Sunday (6/8), there is a kickoff concert tonight (6/4) at 10:00 p.m. hosted by Marty Stuart which will feature sets by The SteelDrivers and Old Crow Medicine Show.

On Thursday there will be a stage dedicated largely to bluegrass music. From 11:00 a.m. until 5:00 p.m. (local time) the Chevy Plaza stage will include performances by Sierra Hull, SteelDrivers, Dan Tyminski and Mountain Heart.

Jim Van Cleve, fiddle man with Mountain Heart, passed along a few of the public and media events where they will be involved this week.

“We are really excited, and feel very fortunate to be involved with something of this magnitude, especially on so many different levels. CMA Music Festival is a giant affair, and Mountain Heart is going to be a very visible presence there!

We’ll be performing on the Chevy Music Stage, set up just outside the Sommet Center on Broadway, on Thursday afternoon at 2:45. We’ll be doing lots of TV and radio interviews, including XM and several country radio stations. We’re also signing autographs in the GAC and Grand Ole Opry booths in the truTV Fan Fair Hall at the convention center. To start it all off on Wednesday, we’re going to be riding in the Chevy Kickoff Parade that travels right down Broadway. We’ve all been practicing our ‘Princess Waves,’ too, so we should be ready to roll. lol.

From Nashville, we’re heading to Enterprise, Alabama, for the first-ever BamaJam Music & Arts Festival on Saturday. The festival runs Thursday through Saturday and has a ridiculously great lineup of artists from country, bluegrass, acoustic and Americana. We’re talking about everyone from Ralph Stanley and Ricky Skaggs, to Lynyrd Skynyrd, ZZ Top and Hank Jr., to Trace Adkins, Little Big Town, Yonder Mountain String Band and Old Crow Medicine Show. It’s going to be a blast!”

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About the Author

John Lawless

John had served as primary author and editor for The Bluegrass Blog from its launch in 2006 until being folded into Bluegrass Today in September of 2011. He continues in that capacity here, managing a strong team of columnists and correspondents.