For a musician, there aren’t many things more fearsome than developing a tremor in your picking hand. Eddie Adcock decided not to sit idly by and live with a diminished skill level due to such a complication. During the month of August, he underwent a three stage surgical procedure at Nashville’s Vanderbilt Medical Center, intended to reverse the problem with his right hand.

Adcock celebrated his 70th birthday in June of this year. After years of playing in smoke filled venues, he suffers from emphysema and doctors say it’s possible that the medications he has taken for that have been a contributing factor in the development of his right hand tremor. After trying, unsuccessfully, to control the shaking via a dozen different medications over a period of several years, Adcock has now become the first non-Parkinsons musician to undergo the three stage procedure known as Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) at Vanderbilt Medical Center.

The procedure is so new that the Neurosurgery department at Vanderbilt videotaped the surgeries for their own instructional use, and possible PBS broadcast at some point in the future.

The three surgeries include the implantation of a pulse generator (IPG) inside the chest wall, an extension wire from the IPG to the head, and an electrical lead placed in the brain to stimulate brain activity with the electrical pulses.

During the brain implantation surgery, the patient is kept conscious so they may assist the doctors in properly placing the leads. They do this by experiencing its immediate effects on their fine motor skills. In Eddie’s case, this would be his right hand picking the banjo. Eddie took a Deering GoodTime banjo into surgery with him (see the picture at top). I’m sure that was first!

Eddie has related that this was not an easy process to experience.

I came up in music the hard way and learned to be a trouper fast.  Some of those early days were pretty rough, and I’ve been stomped, cut and kicked; but I never went through hell like this — it was the most painful thing I’ve ever endured.  And it was risky.  But I did it for a reason:  I’m looking forward to being able to play music the way I did years ago prior to getting this tremor.  It means that much to me.  I’m far from being done!

He has also expressed appreciation to his neurologists and neurosurgeons, along with all the staff at Vanderbilt. He also sends his thanks to those who sent cards and good wishs, and kept him in their prayers during the month of August. He’s in good spirits now as he recovers from not only the surgery, but also the pre-op hair cut he received.

I’m beginning to get used to wearing a do-rag, though.  The girls seem to like it.

The Bionic Banjo Player does ask for your continued prayer support as he is scheduled for a post-op checkup late this month, and then in early October the IPG will be turned on and the device will be programmed for strength and intensity of signal.

The Infamous Stringdusters were featured last week on Acoustic Cafe. They joined host Rob Reinhart in the studio to talk about their latest CD (The Infamous Stringdusters), their songwriting process, and how they work together as a band.

Several tracks from the CD were also featured in the September 2 program, which can be heard online.

It runs just over 25 minutes and offers a nice look at the closeness of this unique band - and their somewhat twisted sense of humor.

A recent post on JoshWilliamsMusic.com lists Greg Blaylock as the newest member of the band. Blaylock is a young resophonic guitar player I got in touch with Josh as asked him about Greg. He tells me Greg joined the band after filling in during a sold out show at the Station Inn in mid-July.

Josh expressed his excitement about the newest member of his band.

I have known Greg Blaylock for several years, since the time we met in my pre-teen years while playing the contest circuit throughout the south. I have always liked the way Greg played, and thought he was the best of all the young Dobro players in those days. After the night Greg filled in with us while Clayton was on tour with the Gibson Brothers, the band and I loved the way his playing fit our style so much that I invited him to become a full-time member, and was delighted when he accepted the position. I think he has become, and will continue to be a real asset to the Josh Williams Band. I’m especially glad he decided to play  with us in time to be with us at all our IBMA appearances.

If you will be attending the IBMA events later this month, be sure to catch on of the performances from this great young band.

Doyle Lawson in in a celebratory mood today. Help Is On The Way, the title track from his latest Gospel bluegrass release, has the #1 spot on the Top 80 Radio Airplay chart published in the September 2008 issue of Singing News magazine.

Not only is it Doyle’s first #1 in Singing News, but he believes that it is also the first time a bluegrass song has reached the pinnacle of this highly respected chart.

The magazine, billed as “The Voice Of Southern Gospel Music,” has published monthly for almost 40 years.

Congratulations to Doyle - and to bluegrass music - for this achievement.

If it seems like The Grascals are everywhere these days… well maybe it’s because they are. They are showing up TV and radio every few days, and there are two more chances to catch them coming up.

The guys will be on tonight’s Tuesday Opry (9/2), performing in the 8:30-9:00 segment along with Jean Shepard. The Opry show is broadcast over the air on WSM AM-650 from Nashville from 8:00-10:00 p.m., and via live streaming at wsmonline.com. The show is also carried live on on XM channel 11 (XM Nashville).

Then tomorrow morning (9/3) Friday morning (9/5), they will be the guests on Studio Special, which runs on XM Satellite Radio’s Bluegrass Junction (XM 14). The show debuts at 8:00 a.m. (EDT) with a number of rebroadcasts over the next week or so.

• Saturday, September 6 at 11:00 a.m
• Sunday, September 7 at 6:00 p.m.
• Monday, September 8 at 8:00 p.m.
• Tuesday, September 9 at midnight
• Thursday, September 11 at 3:00 p.m.

The show features a live, in-studio performance from The Grascals, along with interviews and discussion with Studio Special host Kyle Cantrell - who tells us that this show was one the final appearances of former fiddler Jimmy Mattingly with the group. Kyle also mentioned that when they recorded this show back in March, the band had not yet publicly performed a number of the songs from their newest CD, Keep On Walkin’, which serves as the focus of this program.

I had a chance to speak today with Jessica Lovell, the fiddling third of the sibling trio, The Lovell Sisters. She was making final preparations to leave for their European tour, which begins this Sunday (8/31) in Norway.

We talked in some detail about what the three young ladies have been doing for the past year or so, and got an answer to the question they have been hearing from their fans for the past two years… “When are you guys going to have a new CD out?”

The only studio recording they have released came in 2005 (When Forever Rolls Around), not long after they won the National Teen Talent Competition on Prairie Home Companion, and only a short time after the three of them embraced bluegrass music, leaving their classical studies behind.

Big things have happened for the girls since then, and their sound has matured as their professional life has expanded. A new album seemed like an obvious next step after being invited to showcase at IBMA in the fall of 2006, and by the middle of 2007, Jessica said that it looked like all their hopes were about to be fulfilled.

“We were working with a manager who was shopping us to labels in Nashville, and we had met with five of them who were serious about signing us. After a lot of thought and discussion, we decided to sign with Lyric Street Records, which is a division of Disney.

They had paired us up with producer Mark Bright, and everything seemed perfect. Mark had just finished producing Carrie Underwood, so we knew he could work well with female artists, and he had previously produced Mountain Heart, so we knew he was great with bluegrass and acoustic instruments.”

As they got closer to start recording, they started to get nervous about the direction things were taking. It was becoming clear that the label had chosen a path and a sound for the Lovells, and that the artist’s input wasn’t a high priority.

“It really hit me when Mark Bright mentioned one day that when he worked with Rascal Flatts, the biggest problem he had was convincing them not to record any of their original material. That hit me hard, as we wanted to do exactly that!

I don’t mean any disrespect to Mark or Lyric Street. They were great to us and treated us very fairly. It just started to look like we were heading into a place where we would lose control over our music.” (more…)

Del McCoury has always been hip to the younger crowd, and it seems he’s staying that way. While fans download and trade bootlegs of live recordings, many artists see this as detracting from their CD sales. Other industry people see it as stealing from songwriters who deserve a royalty for such recordings. Del has decided this situation isn’t a problem, it’s an opportunity.

McCoury has just announced the launch of the McCoury Music Club. It works like this. Fans pay $100 for a 12 month (if paid in full up front, you get 2 extra months for free) membership to the site. The membership benefits include one live show download each month. This amounts to $7 or $8 per show, depending on how you choose to pay for the membership. This looks like a win all the way around. That’s not a bad price for a recording, the band gets paid, and I’m assuming the songwriters will as well.

The site is promising that most shows will be from recordings made within 60 days of the upload, with the occasional archival show being offered. It also promises to reward members with extra tracks, and even exclusive studio tracks from time to time. McCoury Music Club members will be the first to hear songs from a new box set scheduled for release a few months from now.

Don’t want to pay for a membership? Don’t worry. McCoury is also planning to offer individual shows for sale to non-members. This won’t happen for a few more months, but it’s coming. If more than one show is made available during any month, members will have to pay to download the additional concert. The member price will be discounted from the non-member though.

Another feature of the site that I noticed was a non-working button that reads “Give The Club“. This button is located just under the “Subscribe To The Club” button, and appears as though you will be able to purchase a club membership as a gift at some point in the near future.

This is an exciting new business model for a bluegrass band to adopt. I like the approach, but only time will tell if it works.

Our friends at ukbluegrass are looking forward to the appearance of one of the hottest new groups in bluegrass today, Cadillac Sky, at this year’s Didmartin Bluegrass Festival at the end of the month. The 20th iteration of this event takes place between August 29th and 31st at Kemble Airfield, near Cirencester, and will feature a line-up of bands from the USA, Europe and Great Britain.

Headliners this year are Texas five-piece Cadillac Sky, who released their second album, Gravity’s Our Enemy, on August 19. ukbluegrass spoke to the band’s singer and mandolin player Bryan Simpson about the new record and their upcoming visit to England.

In addition, there are appearances at the Didmartin festival by Growling Old Men (USA), and UK groups New Essex Bluegrass Band, Thunderbridge Bluegrass Boys, Down County Boys, Rabbi John and more. There is a full band listing and schedule at the festival’s website.

The full interview can found here.

Recently, the West Virginia Music Hall Of Fame announced the names of those to be inducted into the West Virginia Music Hall Of Fame this year. Among them are the Clear Creak, Raleigh County, bluegrass trio the Lilly Brothers and Don Stover.

Also named are Wilma Lee and Stoney Cooper, but more of them another time.

Michel Burt ‘B’ Lilly (born December 15, 1921, died September 18, 2005) and Charles Everett Lilly (born July 1, 1924) began performing together as a brother duet act, Everett playing mandolin, banjo and fiddle, and ‘B’ playing guitar. While still only teenagers they made their radio debut in 1938, playing a guest spot as the Lonesome Holler Boys on the Old Farm Hour on Charleston’s WCHS.

In 1939, they began performing regularly at the newly-established WKLS Beckley, where they performed together and with other musicians, such as ‘Speedy’ Krise. In the summer of 1945 they moved to WNOX Knoxville where they worked with Lynn Davis and Molly O’Day for a while and then formed the Smiling Mountain Boys with fiddler Burk Barbour and Paul Taylor, a banjo player who was also from West Virginia.

Three years later the Lilly Brothers moved to Wheeling’s WWVA where they were the star turn in Red Belcher’s Kentucky Ridge Runners group. Everett and ‘B’ cut a single for Page Records and ‘B’ and the recently befriended fiddler ‘Tex’ Logan helped Belcher do a couple of sides for the same label. Also, at about this time the brothers cut four songs for the Cozy label.

They remained in Wheeling until 1950, when a dispute with Belcher led to Everett and ‘B’ to leave Belcher and, eventually to return home. In the early 1950s, Everett spent about two years playing mandolin and singing tenor with Lester Flatt & Earl Scruggs, participating in two recording sessions that produced 14 songs in all.

Early in 1952 the brothers were persuaded by Logan to move to Boston where they were joined by banjo player Don Stover (born March 6, 1928 - died November 11, 1996). They got their first job playing on WCOP’s Hayloft Jamboree and from there the Confederate Mountaineers, as the quartet was known, worked at various clubs such as the Hayloft Jamboree and the Boston Jamboree, but most notably at the Hillbilly Ranch. For 18 years, with only a brief interlude when Everett re-joined Flatt & Scruggs and Stover toured with other bands, they played constantly in Boston area. As a result they have been credited with bringing bluegrass to New England and with influencing such future bluegrass artists as Peter Rowan, Jim Rooney and Bill Keith, among others. (more…)

Mountain Heart is scheduled to play three shows with southern rock legends Lynyrd Skynyrd in September.

Fiddler Jim van Cleve tells us that show promoter Kent Martin was so impressed with the band that he started talking with them about performing in other venues.

Martin knew Mountain Heart vocalist Josh Shilling before he joined the band, and Jim said that he was blown away when he saw Josh with them on stage.

“The promoter saw the high energy presentation of their show and ‘had to have us’ on these shows in front of Skynyrd.”

All three concerts are in the southwest VA and northwest NC areas in mid-September.

• September 11 – Danville, VA - Carrington Pavilion – 8:00 p.m.
• September 12 – Boone, NC – Appalachian State University – 8:00 p.m.
• September 13 – Elizabeth City, NC – Coast Guard Support Center – 7:00 p.m.

Shilling is especially excited about having this chance to open for such industry legends so close to his hometown of Martinsville, VA.

“These shows are going to be a blast! Lynyrd Skynyrd has always been a huge influence on us as musicians and in general, Skynyrd is just a huge group in these areas. Jason Moore and I know this first hand because the Danville show is right in our backyards. We couldn’t be more excited to share the stage and meld our acoustic sound with these southern rock icons!”

Mountain Heart has a show with country act Diamond Rio this next weekend (8/29) and has also been scheduling a number of shows with Tony Rice. All the guys are looking forward to getting their brand of high energy bluegrass before some new audiences.

You can find details on all their live appearances on the band’s web site.

CMT will soon begin their 3rd annual Music City Madness, where artists compete in head-to-head video competition online. Video entries can be submitted until October 6, 2008 and in-person auditions will be held in several locations over the next few days.

The format follows very closely to the “bracketology” of the NCAA basketball tournament. 64 contenders will compete for viewer votes in subsequent rounds of online balloting until just four finalists remain, from which one will chosen.

The winner will be flown to Music City (Nashville, TN) to tape a segment of Unplugged at Studio 330 for CMT.com and a showcase with Warner Brothers A&R execs. A mentor session with country star Randy Travis is also included.

Bluegrass acts are specifically invited to enter, and have done quite well in the competition in the past, though not yet reaching the finals.

To submit a video online, or by mail, you need to submit your information online. Live local auditions will be held on August 23 in Pittsburgh and Atlanta, and in Nashville on August 27. At least one act will be chosen at each live audition site.

Full rules and competition details can be found at CMT.com.

Blue Moon Rising is celebrating last month’s release of their 4th recording, One Lonely Shadow, with a CD release party tonight (8/22) at The Shed in Maryville, TN.

The new album has been getting strong airplay from bluegrass radio, and the band is hoping to meet a lot of fans and friends at this evening’s show.

There are no audio samples up on the band or the label (Lonesome Day) web sites, but they have created a video to introduce the guys and the music from the new CD.

Longtime readers of The Bluegrass Blog will recall the story of Kylie Chapman which we covered earlier this year. She is the infant daughter of John Chapman and his wife Vickie, who was born on March 22, 2008.

John, Vickie and all of The Chapmans soon saw their joy turn to grave concern as when it became clear that Kylie had suffered complications that required an emergency C-section and a flight to a hospital where she could receive specialized treatment.

Fortunately, she came through just fine and is growing strong and healthy at home with her family.

A video has been posted on The Chapman’s web site, Chap-TV, which chronicles the family’s ordeal, and the final very happy ending. Mixing still and video footage, it offers a personal glimpse of the nearly two weeks between Kylie’s birth and her homecoming. Fans and friends of the band will find solace and comfort in this poignant presentation, as will anyone who can identify with this sort of family health crisis.

While visiting Chap-TV, check out a video on the opposite end of the emotional spectrum, the hilarious Chapmans Pretzel Challenge.

It stars former bass player Jamey Booher (now with Grasstowne) and is not to be missed.

To see the videos, just visit chapmansonline.com, click the Chap-TV link, and scroll horizontally to find the various clips.

Like most bands, Cadillac Sky has some special events lined up today to commemorate the release of their new CD, Gravity’s Our Enemy. Unlike most bands, however, they will perform on The Grand Ole Opry, and then host a CD release party live online.

Tonight (8/19) at 8:00 p.m. (EDT) the guys will be on the Tuesday Opry which airs in the Nashville market on WSM AM 650, on XM channel 11 (XM Nashville), and simulcast worldwide via online streaming at wsmonline.com.

Then, at 10:00, their official CD release party begins at The Rutledge, hosted by XM Satellite Radio’s Kyle Cantrell. Everyone in attendance will get a free copy of Gravity’s Our Enemy, and C-Sky fans outside of the Nashville area can watch the proceedings live online at skaggsfamilyrecords.com.

Sounds like a big day in store.

Our friend Frank Solivan has announced he will be leaving the Navy Band, Country Current, in the spring and turning his attention to his own band. For 5 years Frank has been playing electric guitar, mandolin and fiddle with the Navy Band. It’s a stable, paying gig and it wasn’t an easy decision to make.

It has been a great job and sense of financial security for sometime, but I have decided to move on and focus my energy on my own music. I’ll be leaving the Navy Band at the end of my enlistment, April 14th 2009. This has been a difficult decision, but I know I have made the right choice for me.

Focusing on his own music means fronting his own band, Frank Solivan & Dirty Kitchen. The name is taken from an instrumental on Frank’s first solo project, I Am A Rambler. The band has already been performing on a limited basis, working around Frank’s Navy schedule. Most recently, they just returned from a short tour in Alaska, Frank’s original home state, and enjoyed an enthusiastic response from the crowds there.

The band is basically the core group of musicians who were on Frank’s last recording project, Selfish Tears. Band members include: Mike Munford on banjo, John Miller on guitar, Stefan Custodi on bass, and Frank on mandolin and fiddle. Frank is excited about the group of musicians he’s put together.

They are a bunch of extremely talented musicians and close friends. A winning combo if you ask me!

The band will be performing at a number of late night showcases at IBMA this year and are currently booking dates for 2009.

Frank tells me he has been composing some new material for a recording project and hopes to get the band in the studio sometime this fall or winter.

Visit Frank’s website for schedule/booking info, and to hear mp3 samples from his two solo records.

Bluegrass music isn’t confined any longer to the rolling hills of western Kentucky or the peaks and valleys of Appalachia. It is acknowledged and enjoyed world-wide.

One person who has helped to foster interest in the music in the wider sense is the Nashville correspondent for the Japanese language bluegrass music journal, Keishi Shikata. Sadly, we have learned that he passed away on Sunday evening, August 3, near his home north-east of Nashville.

The Publisher and Editor of MoonShiner, Saburo ‘Sab Watanabe’ Inuoe spoke emotionally about his friend and colleague ……

“I have to report a sad news. My friend, Keishi Shikata who made the bridge between Japan and Nashville passed away last night while jogging near his home in Hermitage, Tennessee.

He worked for Gruhn Guitars in the 1970s and made friends in (the) bluegrass community both in Japan and Nashville. He organized the Japan tours for late Vassar Clements, Cluster Puckers (March 1995) and others; the Japanese TV-CM for Nissan by using (the) Blue Sky Boys’ song Sunny Side of Life with Chris Sharp, Ronnie Bowman and others.

He wrote ‘Keishi’s Nashville Report’ every month for my MoonShiner magazine to let Japanese bluegrass fans know what’s going on in Nashville bluegrass scene.

I just want you to know that we lost a great person who loved people, music and bluegrass.”

Shikata contributed his column for MoonShiner for over 12 years. MaryE Yeomans remembers him as always being friendly and he laughed a lot.

The funeral service will take place today, Sunday, August 9, from 4-6 p.m. at Oceanway Studio A, at 1200 17th Avenue South in Nashville, Tennessee (at the corner of Edgehill and 17th Avenue). The number at Oceanway is 615-320-3900.

Earlier this week, Rhonda Vincent & The Rage took time out from their busy tour schedule to catch a baseball game in St. Louis. The Cardinals were hosting the Los Angeles Dodgers at Busch Stadium on Thursday, August 7 when the band stopped in, but lost in part thanks to a home run from freshly minted Dodger, Manny Ramirez.

They took some photos at the ballpark to remember the event.

The Rhythm Road is currently seeking ten, four-piece bands for its American Music Abroad program. The acts chosen to participate will tour in Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America, or the Middle East for roughly a month under the auspices of the US State Department.

Auditions will be handled by personnel with Jazz at Lincoln Center and are open to any US citizen 21 years or older with a valid US passport. Selected quartets are expected to perform some form of American music, and bluegrass is specifically mentioned in the audition criteria.

These tours promise adventure and a chance to share uniquely American music forms with audiences who may have no familiarity with them. Remuneration is said to be modest, and tour conditions are described as challenging.

Applications must be submitted by September 15, 2008 for the upcoming tours, which include trips to Senegal, Indonesia, Guatemala, Turkmenistan and Honduras.

More details and an application form can be found at The Rhythm Road’s web site.

Pinecastle Records has formed a new company and is launching a new business to provide marketing and publicity support for bluegrass artists.

MountainRidge Music Marketing was created to assist both up-and-coming and established, mid-level acts with a package of services at predictable, a la carte prices. These services include tour support, promotional material design and production, online press kits, radio distribution, CD duplication and a premium release package that includes all of these services.

Essentially, MountainRidge can offer for a fee the same promotional assistance that Pinecastle artists receive for their new releases and ongoing activities.

To help get the ball rolling, MountainRidge is searching for one talented band to receive these services for free. The selected act will have tour support for 15 dates of their choosing, a free online press kit, and will be included in all initial marketing and promotion when the company is launched in September.

To be considered, an artist must submit a press kit and recording by September 1 to:

Full details can be found online.

Ethan Burkhardt with Pinecastle and MountainRidge told us that this competition and the services of MountainRidge Music Marketing are available to unsigned bands as well as artists under contract with a label.

“We’ll gladly work with artists who have a label and feel like they need some extra help with tour support. Some small labels don’t send out promos for their artists, so we would be glad to help a signed band in that way also.”

Ethan also made plain that the two companies will be kept as discrete entities.

“MountainRidge and Pinecastle are going to be kept separate. MountainRidge Music Marketing is not being set up as a stepping stone to Pinecastle Records. We are simply providing another tool for bluegrass artists.

If a great band comes through MountainRidge Music Marketing and we feel that both the artists and Pinecastle could benefit from a relationship, we will move forward.”

Big Al Johnson has gone postal. No, not like that. He’s working for the US Postal Service. That doesn’t mean he’s not playing music though.

Alan has a solid background as a fiddle player and bass singer, having toured with a number of bluegrass and country artists, including Doyle Lawson, BlueRidge, Larry Cordle, Lorrie Morgan, Pam Tillis, Terry Clark, and Doug Stone. After leaving Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver, Johnson took a job at the post office, while quietly getting involved in bluegrass music in new ways.

He’s been filling in with various artists who need a fiddle player when touring the Western part of North Carolina and Eastern part of Tennessee. He’s been teaching fiddle workshops at regional festivals. He’s also been helping his brother Kenny Johnson with the promotion of the High Country Bluegrass Festival in Boone, NC. The festival is coming up in early September. They have a stellar line up of bluegrass artists, including a fiddle workshop taught by, you guessed it, Big Al Johnson, along with Adam Haynes.

In addition to his work with the festival, Alan tells me he’s putting together his own band. This is something new for him since he’s always played the part of the sideman previously. He’s considering band names and players at this time, but expect an announcement soon, and look for them next summer at your favorite bluegrass venue.

In the meantime, you can keep up with Alan on his MySpace page.