Michelle Canning Archives - Bluegrass Today

What started as a way to memorialize her grandfather has become a permanent part of Michelle Canning’s annual musical calender.

The Nashville-based songwriter and bandleader will host her 11^th annual fundraiser for the Alzheimer’s Foundation of America, A Night On The Edge, this Saturday night. For the third straight year, the event will be virtual, and she’s bringing in some bluegrass all-stars to help push the total she’s raised over the years past $50,000.

The Michelle Canning band will host the event. Guests will include Darrin Vincent, Rhonda Vincent & The Rage, Williamson Branch, and the Amanda Cook Band, among others. There will also be a special video performance featuring the late Aaron “Frosty” Foster, who was a member of both The Michelle Canning Band and the Amanda Cook Band.

“It is so important to me that we support the efforts of the AFA so that families going through this horrible disease can get the help and support that they need,” Canning said. “Music has such a positive impact on the lives of Alzheimer’s patients. It is truly an honor to use our music to support the foundation.”

Canning started the event in 2012 to honor her grandfather, Ken Canning Sr. Since then, her efforts have brought the foundation more than $47,000.

This year’s show will be available online Saturday at 7:00 p.m. Central time at on the Michelle Canning web site. Donations can be made there, or by sending a check to:

Alzheimer’s Foundation of America
PO Box 160834
Nashville, TN 37216

One longstanding feature of the evening, carried over from the pre-COVID days when the event was live, is a photo montage of people with the disease, both living and deceased. This year, the soundtrack for the photo display will be Better Left Unsaid, a recently completed song that Canning co-wrote.

Help if you can, either by donating yourself, or by helping to spread the word. Then remember to tune in to hear some terrific bluegrass from some of the best in the business.

The Po’ Ramblin’ Boys join Dreamcatcher in remembering Frosty at Jenny Brook – photo by String River Studios

The is past weekend’s Jenny Brook Bluegrass Mini-Fest included an emotional remembrance of Aaron “Frosty” Foster, who passed away suddenly this February. Frosty was a friend to everyone he met, and was playing guitar and singing with The Amanda Cook Band when we lost him at 28 years of age. Jenny Brook was his home festival, where he attended as a teen, and where he returned every year to assist with the Kid’s Academy.

Sunday’s lineup featured a special set, with all the bands there for the show joining in to honor Frosty. The Foster family was on hand, and festival promoter Candi Sawyer tells us that there plenty of tears, but laughter too, as was appropriate given Frosty’s fun-loving personality.

Etta Crawford, Frosty’s grandmother, spoke to Sawyer after the event, and she said, “It was his festival, that’s what he always called it!”

And Candi herself always saw him as part of the festival.

“He truly was the biggest Jenny Brook ambassador. All of his friends keep telling me that everywhere they went, he bragged about Jenny Brook. He was a huge part of all of our lives and will never be forgotten.”

Participating were The Po’ Ramblin’ Boys, The Amanda Cook Band, The Michelle Canning Band, and a reunion of Dreamcatcher, a group Frosty played with in support of his original music, consisting of his friends from ETSU. Many were wearing the T-shirts made and sold in February to raise money to help the Foster family pay for Aaron’s funeral, and the shockingly high cost of transporting his body back home from Tennessee.

Michelle tells us that it was truly bittersweet, given their close relationship, but that it left her feeling better about her missing friend.

“I met Aaron at Jenny Brook when I was 12 and he was 13, and we became instant friends. Words cannot express the close bond that we had. The highlight of our year was always getting to spend every waking moment together at Jenny Brook. I knew going into Mini Fest that being there without him was going to be tough. As expected, a lot of tears were shed, but there was also a joy in the air that could only come from Aaron. Sunday at Jenny Brook Mini Fest was a perfect tribute, and I know that Aaron would have loved every minute of it.”

Candi also shared a number of photos from Sunday’s memoriam. Only someone truly special would be so well remembered.

Tag: Michelle Canning

Michelle Canning adds big guns for Alzheimer fundraiser

Frosty Foster remembered at Jenny Brook Bluegrass Festival