• IBMA Songwriter Showcase applications now open

    The International Bluegrass Music Association is accepting applications through the end of this month for their World of Bluegrass Songwriter Showcase. It is hosted each year during the organization's annual convention, and will be held on Thursday, September 29 in Raleigh, NC. Ten

  • Raymond Fairchild recovering at home

    Bluegrass banjo icon Raymond Fairchild is doing well, recuperating at home after undergoing surgery last week. Some complications arose following the surgery, but he is out of the hospital and resting comfortably. At nearly 77 years of age, Raymond has been

  • John Treadway to Big Country Bluegrass

    John Treadway of Taylorsville, NC has been announced as the newest member of Big Country Bluegrass. He will be playing banjo and singing harmony with the southwest Virginia band, filling the spot vacated recently when Lynwood Lunsford left after nine years

  • Cleo Lemons passes

    Cleo Lemons, an early promoter of bluegrass music in north/central North Carolina, died on Saturday, March 5. He was 94 years old and had suffered a major stroke just a week prior. Lemons was among the first promoters to book Lester Flatt

  • Congratulations Emily and Mo!

    There was a bluegrass wedding in Illinois over the weekend, as Emily Bankester married Mo Pitney. The happy couple, surely both among the finest young vocalists of their generation, tied the knot at the Bankesters home church, Hope Church, in

  • Frank Solivan Cooks Up a Good One

    Frank Solivan just keeps getting better, as a songwriter, arranger, singer and, not the least, instrumentalist. Recent years have seen a string of solid recordings, IBMA nominations and awards, and growing recognition for Solivan and his band. His newest recording is,

  • A Dream video from Ashleigh Caudill

    Here's another new video released today. It's a song from Ashleigh Caudill's upcoming album, Looney Bird, one she wrote called A Dream. She's followed a familiar path for today's most promising string musicians and songwriters. From her home in Colorado Ashleigh moved

  • The Banjo – America’s African Instrument

    Laurent Dubois says he thinks of his new book, The Banjo - America's African Instrument, as a biography of the banjo. Tracing this uniquely American instrument from its West African roots, through its emergence in the folk and popular music of the Caribbean