Miscellaneous bluegrass news

Butch Baldassari has released a new old recording of jazz mandolin music on his Sound Art label. The Vespa Love Festival sessions was recorded in 1997 with Butch on mandolin, Jim Hoke on soprano sax, Byron House and Andy Spicher on

Asheville, NC paper, the Asheville Citizen-Times, ran this story over the weekend about Woody Platt. The story, concerned with fishing as the main topic, appeared in the Outdoors section of the paper. Woody is best known to bluegrass fans as the

Here's something fun for you. Someone set up a quiz on GoToQuiz.com that will test your knowledge of bluegrass music. It's not terribly tricky or anything, only ten questions and I got 100%. If you're a hard core bluegrass aficionado

The Tennessean, Nashville's hometown paper, ran a story yesterday (1/18) that Gibson Guitar Corp. will merge with TC Group, a Danish pro audio firm. The merger was announced at the NAMM Winter Show in California, and according to The Tennessean, the

Here's a cautionary story for those bluegrassers who prefer the tone of tortoise shell picks. Agents of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service have indicted 10 people after a multi-year investigation for smuggling hawksbill tortoise shells as well as finished guitar

Jon Glik, 56, one of bluegrass music's top fiddlers, is fit enough able to play again after a year where he almost died, according to a report on Baltimore's Eyewitness News a few days ago. Regular readers will recall our previous

It's official... The Guinness Book has declared that Brit Johnny Butten is the World's Fastest Banjo Player, besting the record established last year by Todd Taylor. There is no mention of the record yet on the Guinness Records web site,

Our UK correspondent, Richard F. Thompson, put together this report on an important event we missed last fall. In November the legendary folk/bluegrass singer, songwriter and activist Hazel Dickens was honored as one of the inaugural inductees into the West Virginia

In an earlier post, Casey Henry mentioned what a kick she got from knowing that she and Steve Martin played the same kind of banjo, referring to her recent signature model Kel Kroydon banjo. I asked KK owner Tom Mirisola to

Dollywood, the entertainment theme park co-owned by country star Dolly Parton and located near her childhood home in Sevierville, TN, has announced open auditions in four US cities starting later this month. They will be looking for singers, actors, specialty