Here is Frank Baker’s first installment of photos from the 2016 Delaware Valley Bluegrass Festival. Much more to come.
Photos from Delaware Valley 2016
Tag: Uncle Earl
Ricky and Andy at Tablet
This week’s podcast takes a look at Andy Statman, known for his triple passions for bluegrass, klezmer and jazz, and his collaboration with inveterate grasser Ricky Skaggs on his latest album, Old Brooklyn. In particular, the podcast examines the two working together for the recording of The Lord Will Provide, with Statman an observant Jew and Skaggs an evangelical Christian.
It’s a fascinating discussion, and independent producer Stephanie Coleman with Twangbox put together a teaser for Bluegrass Today readers:
[http://traffic.libsyn.com/thegrasscast/bnc_Statman_Teaser.mp3]
You can hear the entire ten and a half minute podcast online.
They also created a half hour audio documentary about Monroe that aired on The Story in September 2011. It focuses on the songs Bill wrote – his “true songs” – which includes archival audio of Monroe interviews as well as comments by some of his contemporaries.
Stephanie tells us that they have a mission to keep stories about bluegrass and old time music in the media, and in the ears of public radio listeners. By all means!
Follow all of Klein and Coleman’s work online at twangbox.com.
American Revival Tour—The Home Stretch
Here is Casey’s report.
Do you remember the song that Madeline Kahn sings in Blazing Saddles: I’m Tired? It has the bit about “coming and going and going and coming and,” well, I’ll stop right there. But if I had to pick a theme song for the last few days of this tour, that would be it. It seems like FOREVER since I wrote my last post about the tour, but it was only a week and a half ago!
Since then we’ve been to Baton Rouge, Houston, Fayetteville, AR, Springfield, MO, Bowling Green, KY, and Knoxville, TN. We’ve had two computer crashes (Sierra Hull’s and KC Groves), one lost wallet (Sierra’s), one minor van repair (when Cory Walker’s computer blew one of their van’s fuses), and one case of laryngitis (Kristin Andressean), but no major disasters.
There have been some great moments as well, like when Uncle Earl pulled together and rearranged all their songs when Kristin couldn’t sing (the show must go on…). Uncle Earl also wrote and recorded a theme song for the daily tour blog (which is over on the Murphy Method Blog). They even sang it on stage one night!
At a coffeeshop called Coffee and Chocolate in downtown Knoxville we discovered that they had Kopi Luwak, a kind of coffee beans harvested from the forest floor in Sumatra after having been eaten and excreted by cat-like creatures called Luwaks. They roast the beans just like regular coffee, but they are highly prized for their unique flavor. We’ve been talking about this kind of coffee for years and we could not pass up the opportunity to try it. A two ounce package cost us $60 and we split it eight ways. The coffee (which they brewed in a french press) was very good. It had a very earthy flavor. But… It was so not worth paying $480 a pound.
Oftentimes on tour the best moments occur serendipitously. In Bowling Green Jeremy Darrow and I were walking around near the theater and we ran across a micro-distillery called Corsair. Their door was open, so we went in, met one of the owners, and he gave us an impromptu tasting and a little history of their business. A great find.
In Knoxville I ran across Morelock Music, which which was right around the corner from The Square Room, where we played. Matt Morelock has put together a charming store that combines instruments, LPs, consignment vintage clothing, and music lessons. This huge banjo, which reached from floor to ceiling, made me feel right at home.
In Arkansas we drove right by Janet Davis Music. Unfortunately it was on a Sunday, and they were closed, but one of the guys who worked there had come to the show the night before and offered to let us in if we wanted to stop by anyway. We didn’t have time, but I’ve always wanted to see her store.
Adam Steffey and his wife Tina came to the show in Knoxville. I’m glad I didn’t know that until after our set or else I would have been more nervous.
We have three more shows to go on our tour. When it’s over it will be one of those sad/glad moments: sad for such a great time to come to an end, but very glad to be going home!
American Revival Tour Week 2: Drive, Play, Drive, Play
Casey Henry has agreed to send us occasional updates from The American Revival Tour, where she is performing with Dixie Bee-Liners. Also on the tour are Sierra Hull & Highway 111 and headliners Uncle Earl.
The hotel in Newberry is directly across the street from the Opera House, and I cannot express how awesome it is to be able to walk from one to the other. We carried our instruments across the street, soundchecked, then came back to our rooms to change, so we didn’t have to haul all our suitcases into the dressing rooms. The Opera House is really old, has been beautifully renovated, and is the only theater I’ve ever seen that has individual chairs for the side seating. Someone commented, “It looks like a president could be shot here,” somewhat morbidly referring to its resemblance to Ford’s Theater. The crowd was disappointingly small, but it was a Wednesday night, after all.
I’m getting the feeling that this tour is a well-kept secret. Those who know about it and come just love it, but not that many people know! I talked to a local banjo-player friend of mine after we played the Orange Peel in Asheville and she said she only heard about the show two or three days before, when it’s been booked for months!
While on tour there are always unexpected things that need to be taken care of, errands that need to be run, fires that need to be put out (metaphorically speaking!). Sierra experienced a computer crash leaving her out of touch for a few days, and seriously hampering her doing her school work while on the road. She and her manager Claire Armbruster took off early one morning so that they could stop by a Mac store before load-in time. Her computer required a new hard drive, which the warranty covered, but it’s back up and running.
Monday night’s show got moved from the Variety Playhouse in Atlanta to the much smaller Red Light Café. When we heard we were a bit disappointed to be in such a small venue. But as it turned out, I think it was a good move. The Red Light was full of people, but the same number of folks spread out in theater seating would have looked like fewer and wouldn’t have created the same sense of energy. There were certainly disadvantages, like no dressing rooms and no backstage area, but the advantages outweighed them. And it was fun trying to squeeze all sixteen people on the small stage for the finale.
We’re just over the half-way point for the tour and, so far, we’re still going strong. We were all sad to say goodbye to Ron Block, whose last show was in Atlanta. Sierra’s regular banjo player Cory Walker will be taking over from here on out (except that Ron will be back for the Knoxville gig on Nov. 18th). You can read daily tour blogs over on the Murphy Method blog.
In case you want to catch the show, here are the remaining dates:
- Wednesday, Nov. 11th – Baton Rouge, LA – Manship Theater
- Thursday, Nov. 12th – The Woodlands, TX – Dosey Doe Coffee House
- Saturday, Nov. 14th – Fayetteville, AR – Baum Walker Hall Walton Arts Center
- Sunday, Nov. 15th – Springfield, MO – JK Hammons Hall for the Performing Arts @ MSU
- Tuesday, Nov. 17th – Bowling Green, KY – Capitol Arts Center @ WKU
- Wednesday, Nov. 18th – Knoxville, TN – The Square Room
- Friday, Nov. 20th – Glen Ellyn, IL – McAninch Arts Center, Mainstage
- Saturday, Nov. 21st – Hamilton, OH – Parrish Auditorium @ Miami University
- Sunday, Nov. 22nd – Pittsburgh, PA – Byham Theater
American Revival Tour – Week 1
Here is Casey’s report.
The arrival of November saw The Dixie Bee-Liners, Uncle Earl, and Sierra Hull and Highway 111 burning up the roads of the southeast in the first week of our much anticipated tour – American Revival: Celebrating the New Stars of American Roots Music.
When three bands of young-ish people get to travel together for four weeks, hi jinx will ensue. We have a long-running tour game involving sausage, but I’ll leave that for another time. Our most fun show, by far, was Halloween at the American Theater in Hampton, VA. Buddy Woodward, Bee-Liner mandolin player, is great at zombie makeup and we took full advantage of his talents. He also helped out Sierra’s band, giving fiddler Christian Ward a slash across the face, bassist Jacob Eller a bullet hole in the head, and transforming guitarist Clay Hess into a very convincing wolf-man. Ron Block went as Ron Howard—no makeup needed! Uncle Earl was four bad witches and one good witch.
Punch Brothers Chris “Critter” Eldridge and Noam Pikelny came for the night’s show. Critter dressed as a Christmas party guest, complete with battery-powered lights. Noam borrowed a spare witch hat and grey wig from Uncle Earl. They joined the Earl girls on stage to sing Happy Birthday to their fiddler, Stephanie “Pumpkin” Coleman, who turned 24.
Our post-show Halloween celebration took place at a little martini bar down the street—Six—where we had tapas and cocktails and played with the motorized witch hat KC Groves had found at the grocery store. It played Ding, Dong, The Witch Is Dead, and wagged its bell-adorned, pointed tip merrily back and forth.
Monday night we played at the Birchmere in Alexandria, a legendary bluegrass venue. For most of the Bee-Liners it was the first time we’d played there and we were honored to get to take the stage where the Seldom Scene ruled for so long. I actually had my fifteenth birthday party at the Birchmere. My parents took me and a group of my friends to see the Johnson Mountain Boys play. My friend Nancy Peterson, who came to the show last night, was at that party. She said it was like coming full circle, getting to see me play on that same stage.
Today is a travel day—more than 500 miles down to South Carolina. The Bee-Liners are stopping by WAMU this morning to play a little in-studio music and then hitting the road.
For more pictures and anecdotes, see Sierra Hull’s blog. I feel this must be the most-blogged-about bluegrass tour ever!
American Revival Tour
Billed as The American Revival Tour – Celebrating The New Stars Of American Roots Music, this road show will include 19 shows in 25 days, each with performances from Dixie Bee-Liners, Sierra Hull & Highway 111, and Uncle Earl.
The tour starts in Raleigh, NC on October 29 and wanders through NC, VA, SC and GA until the second week on November, when they head down to Louisiana and Texas. After a swing through the middle of the country, the road show concludes in Pittsburgh on November 22.
All three bands are female fronted – at minimum. Uncle Earl is comprised of five talented women, Dixie Bee-Liners is half-and-half, and Sierra Hull manages a quartet of fellas in her band.
We asked Tobias Tumarkin, who is producing this tour for Columbia Artists Management, whether they had planned to make this a spotlight for the ladies from the start.
“We didn’t plan for it to work out that way, but when it looked like that was the way it was headed, we liked it, and even considered making a reference to that in the title before deciding to go with American Revival.
What we wanted was to find groups that were up and coming and whom we felt would do a great job in appealing to theatre crowds who are often different than fans that you would usually find at Bluegrass Festivals. We wanted to expand the audiences of the band and introduce great new bands to audiences that might not already know these groups.
In coming up with the specific bands we worked closely with Michael Jaworek of the Birchmere. Michael has a vast knowledge of bands from all over the country and acted as an advisor and helped us reach out to make contact with the bands we wanted to work with.”
Uncle Earl will be headlining the show, and KC Groves, who plays guitar, mandolin and bass with the group, is raring to go.
“We’ve so excited be a part of this series and hope that we can, by playing to some new audiences, spread the joy that we know bluegrass and old time music can bring.”
Brandi Hart of Dixie Bee-Liners explained how they came to be a part of this tour…
“We were selected for the American Revival tour after a representative from Columbia Artists Management saw our official showcase at World of Bluegrass 2008. Of course, we were thrilled to be chosen, and we immediately began working with Pinecastle Records to fast-track the release of Susanville. We are always thinking 2-3 albums ahead, and we’d been writing Susanville for about five years. However, when the CD release was accelerated to coincide with American Revival, we jumped into high gear. We’ve also been saving back a special bonus track for the American Revival tour. For the time being, this track will only be available to American Revival concertgoers who participate in our ‘Textual Activity’ promotion. Fans should bring their cell phones to shows (in silent mode, please!) and be prepared to get textual with The Dixie Bee-Liners this fall. More information is coming soon at www.dixiebeeliners.com!”
Susanville will be released on November 3, and audio samples from all 19 tracks can be heard online. It’s a concept album about life on the road, with a very creative packaging theme.
You can find all the details about The American Revival Tour online as well.
Vote bluegrass on CMT Pure
These two beat out Dolly Parton and Toby Keith for the top spots, so we know that it was bluegrass fans that put them in. They are both in the running again in this week’s voting, along with Rhonda Vincent’s I Gotta Start Somewhere, which debuts in the competition this week.
You can see all the videos on the Pure 12-Pack Countdown web site, where you can also cast a vote for your favorites. Voting ends on Wednesday night, with weekly winners announced on Friday evening during the Pure 12-Pack Countdown show on CMTP.
Vote for Mountain Heart again on CMT.com
Uncle Earl’s clever Streak O’ Lean video is also on this week’s ballot, and deserving of your vote as well.
The ballot for this week’s show closes tonight (4/30) at 9:00 p.m. (EDT), and the top 12 videos will be announced and aired on CMT Pure (CMTP) Friday evening at 9:00 p.m., with rebroadcasts over the weekend.
You can watch the Road That Never Ends video here on Bluegrass Today, or on the Countdown site.
HINT: The voting process allows you to select up to 12 videos from a list of 30 plus, so selecting only one of two from the list increases the chances of your favorites scoring high. Multiple votes are allowed if you are so inclined.
Folk Alliance Award winners
We have already mentioned the Lifetime Achievement Award Recipients:
- Mavis Staples
- Tommy Jarrell
- Rounder Records
Other winners that may be of interest to bluegrass aficionados include …
- Legacy Recording – Woody Guthrie The Live Wire (Woody Guthrie Archives)
- Emerging Artist – Carolina Chocolate Drops
- Album of the Year – Uncle Earl – Waterloo, Tennessee
- Small Folk Venue – Freight & Salvage, San Francisco, California (Tied with Cafe Lena – Saratoga Springs, NewYork)
- Large Folk Venue – The Ark, Ann Arbor, Michigan
Unsuccessful Nominations include ….
- Legacy Recording – Various Artists – People Take Warning: Murder Ballads and Disaster Songs (Tompkins Square)
- Traditional Artist – Uncle Earl and David Bromberg
- Large Folk Venue – The Birchmere – Arlington, VA, and Kennedy Center Millenium Stage – Washington, DC
The award for Album of the Year was chosen based on Folk-DJ Chart airplay.
Led Zep and the G’Earls
The article largely centers on their having worked with former Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul Jones, who produced their latest CD, Waterloo, Tennessee.
How did you guys hook up with John Paul Jones? Were you already a fan?
I started listening to Zeppelin in junior high when my first boyfriend ever made me a complete set of cassette tapes, each with the cover drawn by him as a representation of the real Zeppelin album cover.
The next I really thought about Zeppelin was when we met John at Rockygrass in ’04. We had a six-hour bar gig at Oskar Blues in Lyons, Colorado. Abby [Washburn] had left that morning because her grandfather was sick, and we’d only been a band about four months so the truth is, we didn’t have a banjo player and we barely had enough material to cover three hours of a gig. We saw [Nickel Creek’s] Chris Thile in the audience and begged him up on-stage and John came with him.
Read the full interview at Gibson.com.
