I’ve known The Infamous Stringdusters’ banjoist Chris Pandolfi and his music for the past 6 years. Over that time I’ve seen him develop musically and professionally into one of the brightest lights in the modern banjo world.

In fact, before I met Chris – or Panda as he is know to his Infamous brethren – or even heard him play, word of his exploits had preceded him, and in a manner eerily similar to that of another hot young banjo picker 20 years earlier.

When I was a journeyman banjoist in the early 1980s, everyone was buzzing about this amazing banjo player named B?©la Fleck. This was well before YouTube and the internet, so he was like a phantom picker that we had all heard about, but never seen or heard. We just knew that he was hanging out around Boston and blowing everyone’s mind who saw him play. It wasn’t until he started performing with Tasty Licks that the rest of the banjo world got to hear his music.

When word of Pandolfi’s banjo playing came to my attention, he was also hanging out in Boston, studying at The Berklee College of Music. He had not yet been recorded, and I only knew of him by reputation. Bill Evans had been teaching him over the summers, and Dave Hollender at Berklee was helping guide him through the system there. Both were effusive in their praise of Chris’ skill and his work ethic.

I suppose I really shouldn’t burden Chris with a B?©la Fleck analog; that isn’t fair on multiple levels. Still, any time a young player gets a rep before they record or perform widely, it’s a safe bet that they have something special to offer.

He and I met at IBMA shortly after he had graduated from Berklee, and I was immediately impressed by his seriousnes and passion for the banjo. What I had always heard was that he was an amazing technician and a master of progressive banjo wizardry, but when we met, Pandolfi was completely engrossed in becoming more familiar with traditional roll-based playing, and focusing on tone and feel.

The excitement I saw in his eyes when he was describing what he was studying told me that, without a doubt, this young man was a banjo player. (more…)

Chris Pandolfi, of Infamous Stringdusters fame, has put together another of his “On The Road” videos, this time from a show the band did with Larry Keel earlier this year in New Jersey.

He catches the band in the van, backstage and onstage with Keel. It’s a wild – and sometimes psychedelic – ride.

We’ll have a preview of Chris’ upcoming solo project early next week, as soon as the CD arrives in the mail.

Sugar Hill Records has announced a number of new albums set for release during the spring and summer of 2009.

Already this year, they have a solo project from The Infamous Stringdusters’ Jeremy Garrett, I Am A Stranger, which hit on March 31. Next week, they have a new CD from The Greencards, Fascination, with a number of others on deck.

Here’s a partial 2009 Sugar Hill release schedule (with more to be announced soon):

• 5/19: Chris Pandolfi – Looking Glass
• 6/16: Sarah Jarosz – Song Up In Her Head
• 7/14: Bryan Sutton and Friends – Almost Live

Chris Pandolfi, the talented banjo player with The Infamous Stringdusters, has created a clever video promotion for the band’s upcoming show at The Belcourt Theatre in Nashville on April 30.