John Hartford Archives - Bluegrass Today

Hall of Fame introduces John Hartford Days with Sam Bush

The Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame & Museum in Owensboro, KY has announced a new event next month, a two-day indoor concert and workshop event honoring the music and legacy of John Hartford.

Billed as John Hartford Days, and running January 31 and February 1, 2025, the weekend will include jamming workshops, discussion panels on Hartford’s career and output, film screenings, and evening concerts with the Sam Bush Band and special guests.

Sam will perform both Friday and Saturday night, with different guests joining him each time. Guests booked to appear are John’s son, Jamie Hartford, Rodney Dillard, Mike Compton, Alison Brown, Jim Lauderdale, and Showman & Coole from Lonesome Ace Stringband.

An after party at the Museum will also be held both nights following the evening concerts, which will also feature an opening act.

On Friday afternoon they will screen Banjoes, Fiddles & Riverboats: John Hartford and the General Jackson, a documentary which John wrote and in which he stars, and on Saturday will show Ramblin’ with John Hartford, a live performance film from 1980.

All of this, both days, is included in the $99 ticket price for John Hartford Days.

The Hall of Fame has made arrangements with The Hampton Inn & Suites Waterfront, located next door to the Museum, to offer discounted room rates with your ticket purchase.

Full details and ticket purchase options can be found online.

Steam Powered Aereo Plane video from John Hartford Fiddle Tune Project Volume 2

Here’s some wonderful news for fans of the inimitable John Hartford, one of the giants of bluegrass and old time music, who left us with a wealth of songs and tunes when he died in 2011. Thankfully his daughter, Katie Harford Hogue, collaborated with fiddler Matt Combs to produce a book of John’s unrecorded music, John Hartford’s Mammoth Collection of Fiddle Tunes, and an all-star record, The John Hartford Fiddle Tune Project Volume 1.

Today we have news of a follow up, Julia Belle: The John Hartford Fiddle Tune Project Volume 2, which includes 13 more Hartford fiddle tunes, as well as five covers of his vocal contributions. The difference with Volume 2 is that all the featured artists are drawn from within the female community of old time and bluegrass players.

Co-produced by Hogue with Sharon Gilchrist and Megan Lynch Chowning, Julia Belle offers newly-recorded music from Rachel Baiman, Phoebe Hunt, Ginger Boatwright, Brittany Haas, Deanie Richardson, Allison de Groot, Della Mae, The Price Sisters, Uncle Earl, and Vickie Vaughn, among many others.

One of those others is country star Kathy Mattea, who has always shown respect and admiration for traditional music styles. She is highlighted in the album’s first single and music video, John’s classic Steam Powered Aereo Plane, supported by Sierra Hull on guitar, Alison Brown on banjo, Brittany Haas on fiddle, Megan Lovell on reso-guitar, and Missy Raines on bass.

Long time Hartford lovers known this song as the more-or-less title track to John’s 1971 album, Aereo-Plain, which cemented his reputation as a player and songwriter of particular merit in bluegrass, acoustic, and old time music.

Mattea says that she was among the many young people excited by this new strain of bluegrass John had created.

““I was one of those college kids, you know, when the bluegrass kind of crossed that line into ‘newgrass,’ on this record (Aereo-Plain), really, and so I was one of those kids that was just eaten up by it. And I learned most of these songs across a song circle, but it was a moment in my life when I began to realize that music and these songs, and the way they connected people, I felt them much deeper than…the physics and chemistry I was studding in college, and it’s really, this record is kind of…what finally got me to Nashville; it started that process for me, so it’s an honor to be here singing this song today.”

The ladies recorded this music video of the single, shot and edited by Kaitlyn Raitz and Dani Dimmel.

Check it out…

A complete track listing for Julia Belle: The John Hartford Fiddle Tune Project Volume 2 follows:

Irish Familiarity
The Julia Belle Swain
Grant Marsh & Joseph La Barge/Little Pig/Entertainment Tonight (medley)
Spirit of the South
Availability
I’m Still Here
Kenny and Mac
Merry Christmas
Learning To Smile All Over Again
Royal Box Waltz
Takes Her Clothes Off
Gasoline Alley No. 1
No End of Love
Living Up Stairs
Not Soft Enough
Don’t Throw Her Down
Steam Powered Aereo Plane
Champagne Blues

Katie Harford Hogue shared a few words about the song/tune selections.

“I realize there’s a lot of instrumental music in this recording, but here’s the thing; Dad knew this, every fiddler knows it, people who listen to fiddle and instrumental music probably know it… You can say profound things without using words. And I think that’s what’s happening here, so I would encourage folks to sit with it and see what it says to them.”

Julia Belle is set for a February 28 release, and pre-orders are enabled now online.

This will be one for the archives.

John Hartford Fiddle Tune Project, Volume 2 on the way

Following on the success of the John Hartford Fiddle Tune Project in 2020, a recording featuring top fiddlers playing tunes found in the massive collection of the late John Hartford, the family of the hugely influential musician has announced that work has commenced on a Volume 2.

Hartford was like a force of nature during his performing career. Playing both banjo and fiddle, and accompanying himself and his distinctive baritone voice with foot percussion, John was a headline artist at festivals and shows all over the US. His solo appearances at festivals were so powerful, and affected audiences so intensely, that other acts would write into their contracts that they not be booked to follow him on stage.

For those who never saw him live, words fail in trying to describe the way that he mesmerized a crowd, speaking very little, and letting his music do the talking in an hour-long show. On top of that, his deep and ongoing study of both his instruments, and the players that came before him, only added to his artistry. Oh… and he was a songwriter with few peers, whose catalog lists a number of true classics, some so Hartford-esque that they are quite rarely performed by others.

Since this second volume of the Fiddle Tune Project is primarily a labor of love, the Hartford family is asking fans for their assistance in funding the album. They are offering pre-orders for both the CD and vinyl editions of Volume 2, and have established a Patreon page for those who want to be clued in on the progress. And it appears that the recording will specially feature female artists interpreting John’s tunes.

Like the first, this effort draws on tunes published in the book by Matt Combs, Greg Reish, and Katie Hartford Hogue, John Hartford’s Mammoth Collection of Fiddle Tunes, containing 176 of his tunes, along with drawings the great man scribbled out during his life.

Produced by Sharon Gilchrist and Megan Lynch Chowning, with John’s daughter, Katie Hartford Hogue, announced participants include Rachel Baiman, Phoebe Hunt, Missy Raines, Ginger Boatwright, Natalie and Brittany Haas, Allison de Groot, Della Mae, The Price Sisters, Uncle Earl, and Deanie Richardson, with others to be named as well.

The producers have scheduled a concert for October 7 to help fund the album, where Brittany and Natalie Haas will play through all 176 tunes in the Mammoth Collection, assisted by a house band. It will be held at Nashville’s American Legion Post 82, with all proceeds going to the recording fund.

Here’s a video produced to help promote the project.

Full details and pre-order links can be found on the official John Hartford web site.

My Memories of John Hartford by Bob Carlin

University Press of Mississippi has announced the release of a new book by old time banjo master Bob Carlin, entitled My Memories of John Hartford.

It’s a memoir of the friendship between Carlin and the late John Hartford, one of the most influential bluegrass or old time artists of the 20th century. A fiddler, banjo player, singer, and songwriter, John was at once both a fierce defender of traditional ways, and a pioneer of what became newgrass music in the 1970s. Television made him a star, alongside Glen Campbell who recorded Hartford’s Gentle On My Mind.

The song was a career-defining moment for both men, and when Campbell was given a summer replacement TV series in 1968, he invited Hartford to join him for a recurring two man acoustic segment with John on banjo and Glen on guitar. The Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour became a permanent series and ran until 1972.

After leaving Campbell’s show Hartford recorded his own breakout album, Aereo-Plain in 1971, which has been described as the first newgrass album, released the same year that Sam Bush formed New Grass Revival.

Hartford became the biggest draw on the bluegrass festival circuit throughout the ’70s, and performed his one man shows as a headlining act at colleges and theaters as well. He would bring out a piece of birch plywood, with a pickup mounted to it, which he use to amplify his dance steps as accompaniment to his banjo, fiddle, and vocals. These shows were absolutely riveting in their intensity, and no one ever wanted to follow John Hartford to the stage.

University Press included this thumbnail description of Bob’s book.

Carlin and Hartford first met when Carlin interviewed the entertainer for Fresh Air with Terry Gross. From this first meeting over microphones developed a sixteen-year affiliation. Six years into their friendship, a working collaboration grew between the two.

My Memories of John Hartford opens with an overview of the years before Hartford and Carlin’s friendship, then details the last fifteen years of John Hartford’s life. Included are in-depth descriptions of Hartford’s lifestyle, as well as his philosophies about music, performing, recording, and living as he expressed them to the author or to those around him, with some road stories thrown in for good measure.

And, those last fifteen years of his short life, while tempered by available information, are viewed here through the impressionist lenses of the author’s own experience.

John was an extremely complicated man who avoided the limelight. He spent a large portion of his later years working as a river pilot, not because he needed a job. He owned property all over the country bought with song royalties. The life and the experience of being a river pilot just appealed to him that much, as did the arduous training required to learn the skills.

My Memories of John Hartford is available now from University Press of Mississippi, in either paper or hard back editions.

No true fan of Hartford’s will want to miss this book.

Sam Bush honors his friend John Hartford with Radio John

It’s hard to believe that Sam Bush is now among the venerable oldsters of contemporary bluegrass music, at least for those of us who remember him as a brash young rebel with Bluegrass Alliance or New Grass Revival in the 1970s. But time does march on, and Sam has reached 70 years of age, though you’d never guess it watching him on stage.

His legacy is secure in the history of our music – already a member of the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame with New Grass Revival – as a mandolinist, fiddler, and vocalist as well as band leader, recording artist, and concert performer. So perhaps this is an appropriate time for some looking back and reflection on Sam’s part.

For his next project Bush has teamed up with Smithsonian Folkways Recordings for Radio John, an album dedicated to and in honor of Sam’s close friend, John Hartford. It includes some of Sam’s favorites from John’s vast catalog of songs, plus ones he enjoyed playing when he and Hartford performed together. Bush plays most of the instruments on the project, his first since 2016.

The record closes with the title track, one Sam wrote with John Pennell, which was cut with the current Sam Bush Band, Wes Corbett on banjo, Stephen Mougin on guitar, Todd Parks on bass, and Wes Brown on drums.

Though it isn’t a Hartford original, the song really captures his spirit, which Sam says was a blast.

“It was a joy to write and record with the Sam Bush Band, doing what I love the most, jamming with the band. Thanks to Béla Fleck for the loan of John’s D banjo for Wes Corbett to play on his first recording with the band.”

Check it out…

Radio John is set for a November 11. Pre-orders and pre-saves are enabled now online.

There is a debut single available, Tall Buildings, Hartford’s imaginings of what it would be like to cut his hair and take a job in the big city. It comes as a free download with pre-orders for the full album.

Nicely done. We can never hear too many John Hartford songs.

FiddleStar offers John Hartford’s Fiddle Device cards

Here’s an interesting new instructional/motivational item for fiddlers and fiddle students. And fans of the late, great John Hartford.

Though many people think of Hartford as a banjo player, which he certainly was, he had also dedicated his life to the study of the fiddle. It was passion project for him, and he delved deep into the lives and music of many an early bluegrass fiddler. John befriended many of those who were still around, and gave over many hours of his time to understanding the nuances of their playing.

Those who knew him best recall that Hartford always kept index cards with him, blank ones to capture any sort of inspiration that might strike, and others onto which he had written ideas and techniques gleaned from his conversations with his fiddle idols. This latter batch he refried to as his Fiddle Devices, and these cards have been preserved by the curators of his estate.

Now a set of 50 cards from this collection has been reproduced and packaged for sale, and they are available for purchase through Megan Lynch Chowning and her FiddleStar store. The set comes beautifully packaged for gift presentation, and includes a Hartford Index Card Manifesto, with John’s explanation of the reason behind his cards, and how you can use them in your own journey with the fiddle.

The John Hartford Fiddle Device Cards are sold for $23, shipping included, to US addresses, and $41 to Canadian addresses.

Any serious Hartford fan will want these in their music room, and aspiring fiddlers will find much to enlighten them in John’s musings.

Megan has only a limited supply of these cards, which she secured following a Kickstarter campaign, and is happy to offer them for sale as long as they last.

On The Road: A Tribute To John Hartford

John Hartford, a four-time Grammy award winner, is fondly remembered in the music community, influencing scores of musicians across generations through his country-folk song-writing, old-time /early bluegrass music, as well as his dynamic live performances. There have been many Hartford tributes, and another comes in the form of the album, On The Road: A Tribute To John Hartford (LoHi Records 420), to be released on June 26, 2020.

Several acclaimed artists, including Jamie Hartford, Todd Snider, Sam Bush, John Carter Cash, Leftover Salmon, The Travelin’ McCourys, Keller Williams, Yonder Mountain String Band, Jerry Douglas, Norman Blake, The Infamous Stringdusters, Railroad Earth, The Band Of Heathens, and Fruition celebrate Hartford’s legacy with the June 26, 2020 release.

All net proceeds from this special tribute will be donated to MusiCares – the charitable foundation organised by the Recording Academy – in order to benefit artists and musicians to help mitigate the hardships and effects of the COVID-19 pandemic. With all live performances and tours being halted, an enormous number of artists and musicians are without any source of income. Since the early 1990s MusiCares has been finding ways to help thousands in the music industry and community by providing assistance during crises such as that being experienced at the moment.

Three tracks from the album have recently been released. The first being The Infamous Stringdusters’s a soulful arrangement of the country-folk-pop masterpiece Gentle On My Mind, one of Hartford’s most enduring songs that has become a standard previously covered by Elvis Presley and Aretha Franklin among so many others …..

Also available already is the first track on the album, Sam Bush’s version of On The Road, a song that Bush performed live with Hartford as far back as 1977.

Another early release is the Leftover Salmon’s funky rendition of The Category Stomp …..

On The Road: A Tribute To John Hartford, for which the full track listing is shown below, will be available on CD, vinyl as well as for digital download.

All 14 songs / tunes are John Hartford originals….

Sam Bush – On The Road
Fruition – Back In The Goodle Days
Yonder Mountain String Band – Holding
The Infamous Stringdusters – Gentle On My Mind
Leftover Salmon – The Category Stomp
The Travelin’ McCourys – No End Of Love
Railroad Earth – Delta Queen Waltz
Keller Williams with The Travelin’ McCourys – Granny Woncha Smoke Some Marijuana
The Band Of Heathens – Up On The Hill Where They Do The Boogie
Todd Snider – I Wish I Had Our Time Again
Horseshoes & Hand Grenades – Let Him Go On Mama
John Carter Cash and Jamie Hartford (featuring Norman Blake and Jerry Douglas) – In Tall Buildings
The High Hawks – Waugh Paugh
Greg Garrison – Tear Down The Grand Ole Opry
Danny Barnes – On The Road

John Hartford passed away on June 4, 2001 after a long battle with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

John Hartford Fiddle Tune Project in June

We recently got word that that Volume #1 of the John Hartford Fiddle Tune Project, produced by accomplished Nashville-based fiddler Matt Combs and John’s daughter Katie Harford, is available in vinyl and CD from the John Hartford website. The project is the followup to the book, John Hartford’s Mammoth Collections of Fiddle Tunes, and will be up on your favorite streaming service June 26.

The album was recorded in part at the legendary Cowboy Arms Hotel and Recording Spa in Nashville, home of the late Jack Clement, where Hartford recorded his 1984 album, Gum Tree Canoe.

Matt and Katie have enlisted a stellar lineup to pay tribute to John’s previously unreleased fiddle tunes and songs from the book including Matt Combs, Brittany Haas, Tim O’Brien, Megan Lynch Chowning, Kate Lee O’Connor, Forrest O’Connor, Sierra Hull, Mike Compton, Tristan Scroggins, Ronnie McCoury, Dominick Leslie, Jan Fabricius, Alison Brown, Shad Cobb, Noam Pikelny, Chris Eldridge, Chris Sharp, Jordan Tice, Mark Howard, Rachel Combs, Paul Kowert, Dennis Crouch, Mike Bub, and Kristin Andreassen.

The Hartford family saw the project as a new way of showing John’s musical genius and enchanting personality, and Matt spent months sifting through John’s journals to find the most compelling material. Matt put it this way:

“We knew we had to bring these tunes to life and record them so that others can learn and play them. John felt a great sense of accomplishment when his tunes were accepted into the fiddle tune vernacular, and his greatest hope as a composer was that they would get mixed in with all the old tunes that he loved so much. This record is our attempt to do just that.”

It’s no secret that Katie and the Hartford family have invested a lot of time and effort in continuing John’s significant musical legacy. As executive producer, Katie Harford Hogue observed:

”What I love the most about this record is that each artist’s DNA comes through, and Dad is the unifying spirit that brings it all together. He pulled inspiration from every moment, every sound, every sight he encountered, and his journals were a place to explore all of his ideas.”

Details of the following CD track origins can found in the book.

Tennessee Politics
Calhoun County
Old Beveled Mirror
Running Board Waltz
Little Country Town
Don Brown And The Boys
John Rice
On Guitars, The Ends Of New Fingers Get Sore
Long White Road
The Old Man’s Drunk
Heartache What To Do
How Can We Love
Just Enough Room To Turn Around
Every Hour On The Hour
The Half-Price Hornpipe
Over At The Side Of The Road
Evening Farewell

Here’s a Hartford gem capturing the spirit of this release.

Copy Editing by Debbie Benrubi

BanjoFest 2019 – Hall of Fame presentations

Annually, the American Banjo Museum in Oklahoma City holds a 3 day extravaganza of talent, recognition, and pure love for America’s instrument, the banjo.

Banjo Fest 2019 kicked off with its traditional BBQ, including the grand-opening of the new exhibit, Reflections of Our Past. Live music was provided by Hall of Fame banjoists, Debbie Schreyer and Lee Floyd, and also the four time national five string banjo champion, Gary “Biscuit” Davis. The evening was topped off with the presentation of the American Banjo Museum Awards of Excellence. Recipients of the 2019 American Banjo Museum Awards of Excellence wer : Don Dempsey, St Louis, MO; Joe Feager, St Louis, MO; and Devon Tower of Palm Beach Gardens, FL.

Friday afternoon held a special Q&A session with collector Jim Bollman. Bollman, donning his “gator playing banjo shirt,” took the audience on a virtual walk-through of his home via the historic banjos and unique artifacts on display. Items in this one-of-a-kind tribute to the banjo were anything banjo… from coffee mugs, tin signs, to Silver Belles. This collection is a must see, and will be on display in OKC until December 2019.

Everything has a main event. For BanjoFest 2019, the main event was the Hall of Fame induction ceremony, which took place atop the Devon Tower in historical downtown Oklahoma City. As always, each nominee for the Hall of Fame has significant lifelong contributions to the banjo, and has modified the way the world sees and hears America’s instrument. A formal event, black ties, tuxedos with tails, and formal evening gowns, were flowing upon the red carpet. After a scrumptious dinner, as we sipped our coffee, the ceremony began. The categories of the inductees each year are:

Five String Performance
Four String Performance
Historical
Promotion
Instruction and Education
Four String Performance

This year’s inductees included:

Alison Brown: Five String Performance – Brown born in Hartford, CT, began playing the banjo at the age of ten. After winning the Canadian National Banjo Championship and an appearance at The Grand Ole Opry, Brown attended Harvard University. In 1987, a personal invitation to join Union Station was presented and without hesitation, Alison took the gig, and played with Alison Krauss & Union Station for 3 years. During her tenure, Alison was also named International Bluegrass Music Association Banjo Player of the Year in 1991. Brown has also won a Grammy for the 1990 Album, I’ve Got That Old Feeling, where she plays her instrument of choice, the banjo. Brown set her trail and her path ablaze with her gravitation toward a blend of bluegrass with a taste of jazz, and a feel of folk. Alison Brown is a co-founder of Compass records and has established an excellent repertoire of artists she has produced.

Jimmy Mazzy: Four String Performance – One of the best known traditional tenor banjoists and vocalists, Mazzy has remained a familiar face on the traditional jazz circuit since the 1970s. Performing worldwide and throughout the United States, he appears at major jazz festivals including Sacramento, San Diego, Essex, and many Connecticut festivals. Jimmy still performs with the Paramount Jazz Band, the Wolverine Jazz Band, and takes the time to freelance with others such as the Yankee Rhythm Kings, the Magnolia Jazz Five, and the Back Bay Ramblers.

John Hartford: Historical – Internationally known multi-instrumentalist, singer, songwriter, and entertainer John Hartford became the face of the banjo in the 1960s. He won Grammy awards in three different decades, recorded over 30 albums, and wrote one of the most popular songs of all times, Gentle On My Mind. John became a regular guest and contributor on the Glen Campbell Good Time Hour and the Smothers Brothers Show. John plowed through his two loves, music and the Mississippi River where he learned to be a steamboat pilot. An American original, John was a musician, songwriter, steamboat pilot, author, artist, disc jockey, calligrapher, dancer, folklorist, father, and historian. Born John Cowan Harford (T added later in life) in New York on December 30, 1937, John grew up in St. Louis. He was a descendent of Patrick Henry, and cousin of Tennessee Williams. His grandfather was a founder of the Missouri Bar Association and his father was a prominent doctor. Hartford was a co-founder of the newgrass movement in the late 1960s and remained passionate and faithful to his roots in traditional music. Hartford danced along to his tunes on the banjo and fiddle, and entertained all who saw him perform. In 2001, with many songs left unsung or played, Hartford passed away at the age of 63.

Bob Snow/Rosie O’Grady’s: Promotion – In 1972, former Navy pilot and Dixieland jazz trumpet player, Bob Snow, opened a jazz club called Rosie O’ Grady’s in a derelict area of downtown Pensacola, FL. Rosie O Grady’s Goodtime Jazz Band set the tempo for jazz on the Panhandle for years to come. Snow featured the banjo in tens of thousands of shows at Rosie O’Grady’s, as well as in advertising, promotion, and imagery. Bob Snow’s vision allowed people to enjoy the music and good time entertainment associated with the banjo.

Johnny Baier: Four String Performance – Well known as the Executive Director of the American Banjo Museum, Baier has been entertaining audiences since 1971, when he began leading the sing-a-longs at Shakey’s Pizza Parlor in Oshkosh, WI. It was his exceptional passion, study, and countless hours of practice that led Baier into a unique solo tenor banjo style. Johnny continues his quest for excellence in performance, and the elevation of the perception and musicality of the banjo. Note also that despite Johnny’s own ruling prohibiting such an award to American Banjo Museum employees and directors, as Doug Parsons related, the board made an exception.

Janet Davis: Instruction and Education – Davis is most associated with the retail music business, but it is in her role as a musical educator that she has made her most lasting legacy in the banjo world. In 1978, Davis began selling self-produced instructional publications, at the same time that she and her husband, Jim, also began a music instrument and accessory business. Davis has been a regular contributor to the Banjo NewsLetter, and one of the world’s most published authors of banjo instructional books with over 100 titles published by Mel Bay alone.

After an evening of jams and socializing, one would think that there isn’t much more to be offered. However, Saturday night, Oklahoma City Community College was all abuzz as BanjoFest offered its final hoorah for the weekend. IBMA Banjo Player of the Year, Ned Luberecki, hosted the event, which was held at the Performing Arts Center. The concert featured Grammy Award winner, Allison Brown and her Quintet, The Grascals (featuring IBMA Banjo Player of the Year and 2018 Steve Martin Prize Winner, Kristin Scott Benson), and jazz banjo virtuosi Buddy Wachter and Johnny Baier.

BanjoFest provided an elite performance from each artist, blowing the glass ceiling off of the weekend. What a better way to share America’s instrument, by allowing over 30 banjo players to grace the stage and perform Oklahoma native Woody Guthrie’s, This Land Is Your Land.

Hartford Festival 2019 – It’s a Wrap

As the ninth annual John Hartford Memorial Festival (JHMF) was wrapping up, I took in some final shows, saw the band competition, and chased down some members of the festival team who reflected on their histories of running the festival. The final days of the festival saw perfect weather which allowed for lots of late night jamming, especially in the artists’ camping area.

I took some time to tour backstage and take some photos, gazing at the pictures on the wall, and imagining the history of people who have passed though this historic site. Their names are etched seemingly forever in what is a living, breathing, working museum dedicated to bluegrass music and beyond. It is a testament to the team that attendees never witness the complexities, time, and dedication they put in to make this festival such a success. The JHMF organizers are obviously thinking about something special for next year’s tenth annual festival, but they aren’t ready to spill the beans just yet.

There were many other highlights, such as the young Nolan singing Tall Buildings during the opening ceremonies, and Dan Andree killing it on John’s Austin Minor Sympathy. I didn’t get a chance to see and talk to all of the bands, but the love comes through in the stories below from those that I did.

Upon arrival, Tim O’Brien shared a few words from his van — plus a little advice John gave Hot Rize.

Members of Irish Bluegrass band JigJam talk about their U.S. tour and favorite bluegrass bands.

Minnesota-based Good Morning Bedlam was still reeling after winning the band completion.

Festival Director Tom Burhart talks about talent selection, the band competition and what it means to be a “laid back festival.”

Festival Operations Manager Bob Riley talks about the early days and challenges of running the artist hospitality tent.

Festival artist relations manager and jack-of-all trades Randy Kilper talks about fighting fires.

Media writer and songwriter workshop coordinator Ernie Hill talks about the songwriting competition and more, with the Laurie Lewis sing-along workshop in the background.