• Camp Springs reopens for 50th Anniversary

    50 years ago on Labor Day weekend, the first bluegrass festival in North Carolina was held at Camp Springs Bluegrass Park. This past weekend, the inaugural event resumed, following the labor of its new owners, Cody and Donna Johnson of

  • Mansfield Jamfest 2019 shares the wealth

    Last weekend saw the 3rd annual Mansfield Jamfest in Mansfield, Ohio. Festival promoters Chris and Missy Smith took over the festival from Missy's dad in 2017, and the event has seen record growth in the last 3 years. The crowd

  • 2019 Fly In Festival report

    I have been attending Bluegrass Festivals since the early seventies both as a band member and a spectator. When my friend Tim Corbett invited me to the Fly In Festival 2019, the fourth one, I decided to invite my friend Melinda

  • Somewhere Far Away – Blue Highway

    All too often, critics, pundits and the public as a whole seem intent on defining music by genre, opting for generalization simply for the sake of confining certain sounds to a comfortable niche. That, of course, isn’t only unfair, but

  • Roots To Rise Live – We Banjo 3

    Ireland’s exceptional We Banjo 3 have carved out a unique niche for themselves, courtesy of the fusion of styles they fondly refer to as “Celtgrass,” an astute combination of bluegrass, Celtic music, folk sounds, and both new and old world

  • Notes From Gettysburg, August 2019

    It’s no secret to regular readers that the Gettysburg Bluegrass Festival is one of my two favorite stops of the year, the other being IBMA’s World of Bluegrass in Raleigh every fall. The festival is just an hour from home, features

  • The Butcher Shoppe – Della Mae

    It would be understandable if the uninitiated mistakenly mistook Della Mae for a sister ensemble. Their close-knit harmonies and astute arrangements have a cohesion and confidence that ensures a compact fit and an air of authenticity that recalls an old