The bluegrass music industry seems to find itself consistently behind the curve on technology, but more and more bluegrass artists are finding ways to make their music available for legal download. We’ve posted about artists that have downloads available here, here, and here. It’s not always easy or profitable, but it is the direction the entire music industry is heading.

Chris Burton, who we recently did a story about here, just alerted me to a new service being offered by CD Baby.

…you just lend us the right to be your digital distributor: to get your music to legitimate music services like Apple iTunes, Rhapsody, Napster, MSN Music, MP3tunes, AOL’s MusicNet, Yahoo MusicMatch, and more…

…We pay you 91% of whatever they pay us for the use of your music. (Usually around 60 cents per download.)

For an independent artist this may prove an accessible way to gain entrance into the catalogs of these download services. (more…)

This past weekend, I had the enormous honor and good fortune to perform at the 40th Anniversary Reunion of what has come to be described as the very first multi-day bluegrass festival, which had been promoted by Carlton Haney, and situated on Cantrell’s Horse Farm just north of Fincastle. VA. This reunion festival was only a one day event, and there is hope that it will become an annual one, held just a short distance from the site of the original 1965 festival.

Like the festival that followed in 1966 at Cantrell’s Farm, and subsequent Carlton Haney festivals in Berryville, VA over the next ten years or so, the original Fincastle event was partly a celebration of the music and the artists who played it, and partly a example of the missionary zeal and desire to educate people about the history of bluegrass music - and Bill Monroe’s central role in that story - that Haney took on as his personal crusade. Haney became famous for putting different groups of musicians together on stage, often using them to recreate the lineup of a previous version of The Bluegrass Boys, or to make some other point about the music in addition to entertaining his audiences. (more…)

This is the first in a series of Viewpoint articles I’m working on concerning digital technology and bluegrass. It is intended to be an introduction to the topics I want to discuss and to give you the opportunity to suggest topics I may have overlooked. Here’s a list of the topics for which I have planned discussions.

• File trading and bluegrass
• Legal music downloads and bluegrass
• Podcasting and bluegrass
• Digital video and bluegrass

Let’s save discussion about the specifics of each of these topics for it’s article, but for now feel free to ad comments suggesting areas digital technology has affected bluegrass (for good or ill) that you think ought to be added to my list.

My main goal is to answer the question:

How have the digital music revolution, file trading, peer-2-peer networks, iTunes type services, and other digital technology affected the bluegrass music industry?

Let’s hear your thoughts. Remember, you must be registered and logged in to comment. (The links are at the top of the page under the image)

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