Johnny Williams

  • Southport Songwriting Festival debuts this weekend

    | by

    Award-winning songwriter Louisa Branscomb and her non-profit, Front Porch Productions, will host the first Southport Songwriter Festival this weekend in the coastal town of Southport, NC. But unlike many similar events, this one isn't centrally located, but spread across a number

  • Going My Way – Johnny Williams

    | by

    When the top traditional bluegrass singers are named, you expect to hear Larry Sparks mentioned, and James King. Perhaps Danny Paisley as well, and Junior Sisk. But a name you don't hear often enough is Johnny Williams, who can throw

  • New single from Summer McMahan

    | by

    Summer McMahan, the talented lead singer for Mountain Faith, has struck out on her own with a new self-produced solo project, The Story Of My Life. In reviewing the band's last album, Battlefield, we offered high praise for her singing and

  • Close Kin follow-up to feature young pickers

    | by

    Karl Cooler of Mountain Roads Recordings and singer, songwriter and producer Johnny Williams have teamed up for a follow-up to their 2011 collaboration, Close Kin-A Reunion of Bluegrass & Old Time Music. That album was just what the title suggests,

  • Bad Girls and Banjos

    | by

    Louisa Branscomb didn’t, as Stephen Foster might have put it, come from Alabama with a banjo on her knee. She couldn’t. Girls didn’t play banjo. “I heard that a million times when I was girl,” Louisa told me the other night.

  • The ACMA announces a new musical gathering

    | by

    The Appalachian Cultural Music Association (ACMA) announced the creation of the Blue Ridge Acoustic Uprising at a press conference in Bristol, Virginia-Tennessee, last week. The new musical gathering, entitled ACMA’s Blue Ridge Acoustic Uprising, for bluegrass, old time and Americana musicians

  • Don Rigsby to tour with Big Country Bluegrass

    | by

    As they note the departure of long-time fiddler Jeff Michael, Big Country Bluegrass is pleased to announce that Don Rigsby will be working selected shows with the band in his stead. Bluegrass fans primarily know Don as a mandolinist and lead/tenor

  • Johnny and Jeanette back together

    | by

    Among the many friends who stopped by the Bluegrass Today booth during last week's World of Bluegrass and Fan Fest in Nashville were Johnny and Jeanette Williams. This husband-and-wife team have been picking and singing for many years, sometimes together and other