Sheri Easter, daughter of Polly Copley, the middle of the three Lewis daughters, has posted an open letter to their friends and fans on The Lewis Family web site. In the letter, she shares the fact that her mom has just been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease.

She asks for prayers as Polly enters treatment.

You can read the letter here.

The Colorado Playboys are planning a December tour in, of all places, Colorado! And just who are the Colorado Playboys?

The band is comprised of pickers who have or do play in other bands, and have gotten together just for this tour during the holiday season. Andy Thorn, formerly with Larry Keel & Natural Bridge, will be playing banjo. Travis Book of the Infamous Stringdusters will be holding down the low end on bass. John Frazier of Hit and Run Bluegrass will be playing mandolin. And Jon Stickley of The Biscuit Burners will be playing guitar.

Thorn, Book and Stickley have played together previously in the Rockygrass winning band Broke Mountain (has nothing to do with any movie) so they have quite a bit of experience playing together and this will kind of be a reunion for them in a sense.

A number of dates have already been booked and can be viewed at either Andy Thorn’s Myspace or Travis Book’s Myspace pages.

CMT.com has a very nice feature up on Bradley Walker, written by Craig Shelburne. Unlike the recent review of his Highway Of Dreams CD on NPR’s Fresh Air program, the CMT piece accurately reflects Bradley’s love for, and interest in bluegrass music.

Shelburne describes how Walker first experienced bluegrass about ten years ago when a fellow member of a country band in Athens, AL popped JD Crowe’s classic Rounder 0044 album into the CD player. His subsequent investigation into bluegrass developed into his current penchant for combining the older sounds of country music with the instrumentation usually found in a bluegrass ensemble.

From the CMT article:

“I’ve always incorporated traditional country music with acoustic instruments,” he says. “Doing something like ‘Today I Started Loving You Again’ with a banjo, guitar, fiddle and mandolin, you can do those songs acoustically and they sound pretty good. And nine times out of 10, most of your bluegrass fans are also going to be fans of traditional country music because they’re a lot alike. I think there’s room for both styles and a mesh of both styles in one. That’s what I wanted to do with this record, to show my love for traditional bluegrass — the straight-ahead, pure bluegrass stuff — but also go along the lines of traditional country and showcase the two together.”

The entire piece is available at CMT.com.

We mentioned a few days ago that IIIrd Tyme Out banjoist Steve Dilling had assembled a band of his fellow bluegrass professionals to perform on a brief tour in early December. We just got word that one of the tour dates, which will also include a show by Lonesome River Band, will be recorded by WAMU for eventual broadcast over the air, and on BluegrassCountry.org.

The show will be held this Sunday, December 3, at The Cultural Arts Center in Frederick, MD as a part of their Sunday Bluegrass concert series. Two shows will be held that day, a matinee at 3:00 p.m. and an evening performance at 7:00.

Ticket information can be found on the Sunday Bluegrass web site for folks in the area who may want to attend the show. Everyone knows how much fun it is to be present at the recording of a live show, right?

BluegrassCountry.org’s Katy Daly tells us that they don’t have a clear broadcast date in mind for this LRB/Dilling concert, but she promised to let us know as soon as it is set.

Katy also passed along that she and Jen Hitt, BluegrassCountry.org’s Production Director, are planning a series of specials intended to introduce their listeners to the art and technology involved in producing bluegrass instruments. We’ll keep you posted as those plans solidify.

Gibson has posted a video on their web site featuring their top bluegrass endorsers playing a lively version of Jingle Bells. The All Stars consist of Earl Scruggs on banjo, Sam Bush and Ricky Skaggs on mandolins, and Phil Leadbetter on dobro. They are accompanied by Randy and Gary Scruggs on guitar and bass, respectively.

Each of them takes a break on Jingle Bells - except the bass - and Earl Scruggs is in fine form. All of them seem to have been enjoying this very much.

The video runs for just over three and a half minutes, and the site shows a link to download a free iPod version of the video. When I followed that link and tried to save the file, the “Save As Source” option was not available. You may need to use the right click (ctrl click for Mac) “Download Linked File” option from the main video page in order to get the video file, in the .M4v format.

This is something new that we’re real excited about. I’ve been delving into rss and javascript and come up with a handy little way for you to paste one line of code into your own website and display the 10 latest headlines from The Bluegrass Blog in a stylish box that reflects the design of this site. Here is an example of what it looks like.

This little thing is pretty flexible and will resize itself to fill whatever space you give it. You’ll want to enclose it inside a tag of some kind that has a fixed width applied to it. A table, div, span, or even p tag will work. If you don’t constrain this thing with a width, it becomes a monster and will fill the whole page. The example to the right is constrained inside a div tag that has a width set to 200 pixels.

John has built a nice page with further explanation of how to implement it. That page contains examples of the Syndibox, that’s my name for it, sized in different ways, along with the code necessary to include it on your page.

Visit the SyndiBox page here.

I’ll just add that if it’s a blog you are running, you can probably just drop the script right into your sidebar and it’ll resize itself to the width of your sidebar.

Earlier this year, Rebel Records reissued a pair of classic Ralph Stanley recordings as iTunes download exclusives. Now comes word of two others, recently available again from the iTunes Music store.

Down Where The River Bends was first released in 1978, and marked the Clinch Mountain Boys debut of Charlie Sizemore as a lead vocalist and Junior Blankenship on guitar. This pair remained with Stanley for the next ten years, and were also featured on the other new Rebel iTunes reisuue, Memory Of Your Smile, initially released in 1982.

These two Stanley reissues are only available in the iTunes Music Store, where audio samples of each track can be heard, with instant download purchase enabled.

Rebel announced this summer that they would be making many of the out-of-print titles in their catalog available as download-only reissues, and have a pair of albums from the Forbes Family as well as the prior Ralph Stanley projects now up on iTunes. No further download reissues are expected this year, but more will be announced in January 2007.

Phil Leadbetter has announced his resignation from Wildfire, the band he helped create in 2001. Since the band’s inception, Phil along with Curt Chapman, Robert Hale, Barry Crabtree and Darrell Webb have recorded 3 CDs for the Pinecastle record label. Phil has expressed his deep appreciation for his fellow band mates, but says he feels it’s important for him to move in a new direction.

I feel it is important in my career to begin a new page. I am ready to pursue a new path, and have no desire to hold any of the guys in Wildfire back or jeopardize their band. Therefore, I decided it was time to move on.

Phil is leaving the band on good terms and Wildfire will be honoring all commitments for show dates currently on the books. The band also has plans to move forward. I spoke with Curt Chapman and got this comment from him.

We will continue on with the same people, minus Phil. We are looking at some players now. Phil left on very good terms, he just wanted to go in a little different direction & we all understand. Unfortunately, change is a part of the business. We were very lucky to have kept the same 5 people for 6 yrs. Hopefully we won’t make another change for 6 more. Wildfire will be going into the studio this winter & get another CD out. Everything remains the same . We are looking forward to seeing our fans next year on the road!

Phil has also teased us all with the promise of an announcement on December 1st as to what his future plans are. Sounds interesting…look for the news here on Friday!

AcuTab Publications has released their first fiddle instructional DVD, for JD Crowe & The New South fiddler, and celebrated session player, Ron Stewart. Entitled Playing Fiddle In The Bluegrass Style, it features Ron demonstrating ten songs and tunes he has recorded in recent years.

The material covered in this 90 minute DVD include both fiddle breaks on vocal numbers and instrumental tunes. On the vocal-oriented songs, Ron demonstrates how the fiddle might play the plain, unornamented melody - as a singer might deliver it - and then how he approached it for a fiddle break.

Ron teaches several of his own original instrumentals (Twister, Blue Fiddler, Stewart’s Dream) plus his take on popular fiddle tunes like Soldier’s Joy and Whistling Rufus. A printed booklet with standard notation for each of the solos is also included with the DVD.

More details - including screen shots and sample video clips - are available on the AcuTab web site.

Earlier this month we brought you news that Wichita Rutherford had announced his campaign for the office of Mayor of Bluegrass. We’ve been carefully watching his campaign, along with that of competitor Trent Dobbins. Wichita recently visited Washington to share his plans for bluegrass, should he win, with the powers that be.

Neither candidate has suffered from any controversy at this point in the election cycle and both are running clean campaigns. That sure makes me proud of bluegrass!

Wichita seems to be a little more accessible to the bluegrass populace, while Mr. Dobbins has been unreachable for the last week. Early polling results show Wichita with a slight lead, but it may be to soon to call it.

Voting is very simple, just visit BluegrassMayor.com for instructions on how to cast your vote.

In a stroke of campaign brilliance, Wichita is associating himself with bluegrass stars by directing attention to his interviews with such fan favorites as Sam Bush. What impact this will have on likely voters is yet to be seen, but I think it’s a good move on his part.

Jer Boon just wrote in to tell us about a blog that has just launched for British bluegrassers. UKBluegrass.com aims to provide all the information bluegrass musicians and fans in the UK might need.

They plan to post news about gig and festival dates, local jam sessions, reviews, and jamming/performing tips. The site also features a forum intended to build community and help pickers in the UK stay in touch with one another.

ukbluegrass aims to act as a web portal to link all the existing online information together and help those who wish to find out more about the British bluegrass scene.

In the interest of promoting bluegrass music in Britain, they are also asking that any US bluegrass acts that are planning a tour in the UK contact them so they can help spread the word about your tour schedule.

Good luck Jer, and welcome to the world of blogging!

Noted dobroist and vocalist Randy Kohrs has just signed a multi-project deal with Rural Rhythm Records.

The first release in this new collaboration will be Old Photograph, Randy’s fourth solo effort, due in the Spring of 2007. A single, Rockwell’s Gold, will be released in January on the next Prime Cuts Of Bluegrass (Volume 85).

Randy is especially excited about the new CD, as he will be listed as author or co-author on nine of the twelve tracks. Guest artists include Scott Vestal, Tim Crouch, Jim Hurst, Stephen Mougin - and a duet with Rhonda Vincent - along with contributions from his band, The Lites.

Sammy Passamano with Rural Rhythm tells us that they have been talking with Randy for several months about bringing him into the family of artists, and are delighted that things have worked out so quickly.

Randy’s last CD, I’m Torn, saw significant chart action in 2004 on the Bluegrass Unlimited National Bluegrass Survey, on both the album and single charts.

We’ll keep an eye out for Old Photograph audio samples online, and will update when we find them.

Bob Webster at BluegrassCountry.org had a chance to talk with Chris Stuart and Janet Beazley before their performance at Luckett’s Schoolhouse last month. That interview is being aired this week on WAMU and online at BluegrassCountry.org.

Aspiring songwriters should take note at Chris describes the thought process he uses to write songs like Dear Friends & Gentle Hearts, Julia Belle, and Mojave River. There is also a preview of the title cut from Chris’ upcoming release, The old Road to Jerusalem. The song was written by Chris and is performed by Eric Uglum & Sons, Austin and Christian Ward.

I’m listening to the show online as I type, but if you miss it today it will air everyday this week. Here’s the schedule:

• Monday, November 27 - 10:00 a.m.
• Tuesday, November 28 - 9:00 p.m.
• Wednesday, November 29 - 7:00 a.m.
• Thursday, November 30 - 5:55 a.m.
• Friday, December 1 - 11:00 p.m.
• Saturday, December 2 - 8:00 p.m.
• Sunday December 3 - 6:00 p.m.

Pete Seeger’s banjo recently ended up in the International Bluegrass Music Museum. Back in the mid 1960’s Seeger had a television show that aired on WNJU-TV in New York. 38 episodes of Rainbow Quest were aired, during which Seeger interviewed and picked with many of the artists considered leaders of the 60’s folk revival. Of interest to bluegrass fans are the episodes that included interviews with The Stanley Brothers, Doc Watson, or even June Carter and Johnny Cash.

There are 6 or 7 short clips available on YouTube for you to preview, and Amazon has DVDs available which contain two episodes each. I’m not sure which banjo of Pete’s it is that now resides in the IBMM. In the clip with Johnny and June you can see Pete playing both a fretless and a fretted banjo.

We posted last week about the upcoming project from Tony Trischka, Double Banjo Bluegrass Spectacular, which will feature Tony in duets with Earl Scruggs, Béla Fleck, Steve Martin, Alison Brown, Tom Adams, Bill Emerson, Kenny Ingram, Scott Vestal and Noam Pikelny. It is due for a January 23, 2007 release on Rounder.

At the time, we noted that no audio samples were available online, but Rounder now has snippets from all 14 tracks on their site, in both RealAudio and Windows Media formats.

I had a chance to discuss this new CD recently with Tony, and was especially interested in how he decided on a twin banjo project.

“After doing two electric band albums, I’d approached Rounder about doing a bluegrass album, a la my Hill Country record from the early ’80s. Ken Irwin thought it might be more fun, and have more of a commercial hook if I turned it into a double banjo album. And that’s what it became.

All the duets were recorded live except for the one with Scott Vestal. I was going to have JD on one cut and at the last minute something came up and he wasn’t able to make it, so I cut the track by myself as part of the Sam Bush sessions. After a week or so I decided to have Scott add the double part. He did it at his home studio and when he emailed it back to me, I flipped. His playing is ridiculously amazing.”

Tony told me that the project was exciting, both putting it together, and recording with so many of his favorite players, but that it took a long time to complete, given the difficulty of scheduling nine different banjo players. Still, he says the whole thing was a thrill, and well worth the trouble in the end.

“The biggest treat was getting to record with Earl. It was a huge honor and more than that, a gift. Sitting across from him while running it down I was impressed with the power of his right hand. I’ve heard him live on various occasions, but hearing him from three feet away is another story.”

Another highlight for Tony was working with Steve Martin. (more…)

Also due from Rounder in January is a new release from Peter Rowan and Tony Rice, which Brance mentioned earlier this month. Entitled Quartet, it features the group that has been performing on tour: Rice and Rowan on guitars (with Peter doing lead vocals), Bryn Davies on bass, and Sharon Gilchrist on mandolin. Both ladies share singing chores with Rowan.

The material includes some familiar songs which Rowan has recorded previously, like Dust Bowl Children, Walls Of Time, Cold Rain And Snow and Midnight Moonlight, as well as songs by such unexpected writers as Townes Van Zandt and Patti Smith, and a cut of Jimmy Martin’s Sunny Side Of The Mountain.

Rice and Rowan are surely familiar to most fans of bluegrass and acoustic music, but their Quartet cohorts perhaps less so. Gilchrist has a long pedigree in the music, having performed as a teenager with Martie and Emily Erwin of Dixie Chicks fame, and more recently as a member of the acclaimed old time band, Uncle Earl.

Davies is a relative newcomer to bluegrass, discovering it while studying jazz at the Berklee College of Music in Boston. She performed as a member of the Two High String Band before coming aboard as a member of The Tony Rice Unit and the Rice/Rowan collaboration.

The official Tony Rice web site indicates that Tony has described Quartet as “one of his favorite albums to date.” No faint praise, that.

Audio samples from all 11 tracks can be found on the Rounder web site.

January 23 is listed as the official release date for Quartet, and the group will be touring in support of the CD throughout 2007.

As a member of IIIrd Tyme Out, Steve Dilling is accustomed to having the month of December free each year. The band has long blocked the last month of the year off their tour schedule, both to allow for time with their families around the holidays, and to get rested and re-energized before starting up again in the new year.

A few years ago, Steve came up with the idea to put a group together with members of other groups, to perform shows during December. The idea has since grown into a mini-tour, with this year’s edition featuring Clay Jones from Mountain Heart on guitar, John Wade from The James King Band on bass, Ron Stewart from JD Crowe & The New South on fiddle, Darrell Webb from Wildfire on mandolin, and Dilling on banjo.

Steve says that the holiday tour grew from a single show, with interest in the band expanding as the word goes out.

“The idea of this band is something that I started a few years ago. Back then, it was just for one night on a local basis here around the Raleigh area. In 2005, I had the idea of seeing if I could take this on the road, and quickly booked a few gigs. After the success of last years shows, I thought that I would try it again. Now I am actually getting promoters wanting us to do a few festivals. I don’t know if that will happen, because we are all so busy with our individual bands… but it is kind of nice to be in demand.

I hope to record this band at some point, because I feel strong about the music that we are playing, and it would be nice to have something to sell on the road when we do play. Most of the guys have individual solo recordings, so we have worked up some material form each of those, we also do a few Christmas songs, as well as some standards, but most of all, we have a great time. It is a time to enjoy playing, and get out of the normal band routine situation. I hope that everyone will come out and see the band.”

They will do four shows over the next week or so in Galax VA, Grayson KY, Bradshaw WV and Frederick MD. You can find details on these shows on Steve’s web site.

The folks at the International Bluegrass Music Museum and the River of Music Party, both located in Owensboro, KY, passed along notice that they recently received the 2006 Dorothy Mullen Arts and Humanities Award.

This award is given to honor innovation in humanities and arts programs by the National Recreation and Park Association. Five awards are given each year, with competition among localities of equivalent population.

From the NRPA site comes this description of the award:

Dorothy G. (Dotti) Mullen, a pioneer in the field of recreation and parks and its diversified applications, pursued her many interests with vigor and enthusiasm. Among these pursuits was establishing a program to recognize excellence in arts and humanities programs throughout recreation and leisure. The Dorothy Mullen Arts and Humanities Award program selects national winners from five population classes. The program aims not only to recognize those who demonstrate excellence in art and humanities, but also to inspire others who may be interested in developing similar programs.

The Dorothy Mullen Arts and Humanities Award program exists to honor the most innovative and effective arts and humanities programs across the nation. Through the national awards, recognition is given to the importance of arts and humanities programs and to the leisure service agencies that provide them. Winners are announced annually at the NRPA Congress and Exposition.

Congratulations to the staff of the Museum and the ROMP festival for this recognition.

Yesterday’s edition of The Knoxville News Sentinel published an interview with Ralph Stanley, written by Wayne Bledsoe.

The initial thrust of the piece is Stanley’s recent receipt of a National Medal of Arts Award. Continuing from there, the article also delves into the early days of bluegrass when Ralph was performing with his brother Carter, and his belief that the folk and bluegrass festivals that sprang up in the 1960s may have kept bluegrass music from sliding into obscurity.

Bledsoe gets Stanley to share a number of refections on his life in bluegrass music.

“When we started, we didn’t know if it was gonna last a week or a month or years,” says Stanley, “but I never dreamed I’d still be doing it after 60 years.”

You can read the entire article on the News Sentinel web site.

Our friends at Mandolin Cafe have a unique item in their online store sure to please mandolinists on your holiday gift list.

It’s a coffee mug with a mandolin chord chart printed around the cup surface - it’s two gifts in one!

See larger images on their Cafe Press store site.