AcuTab Publications has news of several new bluegrass instructional DVDs due during the summer and fall of 2008.

Just completed shooting is a fiddle project with Mountain Heart’s Jim Van Cleve which will go into editing shortly. Jim covered a number of his own compositions (#6 Barn Dance, Nature Of The Beast, Devil’s Courthouse) plus spent considerable time describing how to add rhythmically in a band setting, and how to find solos and backup in different keys.

Due to be shot next week is a banjo DVD featuring Ron Block and a mandolin video with Sierra Hull. Both will focus on these two stellar players and their individual styles. More details about these should be forthcoming soon.

A JD Crowe banjo DVD is also scheduled to be shot later this year.

If you would like to be notified by email when these new titles are released, you can make that request on the AcuTab site.

AcuTab is also pleased to note the reissue of two popular titles that have been unavailable for some time. JD Crowe – AcuTab transcriptions includes banjo tablature for all the songs on two classic albums by JD Crowe & The New South, and Kenny Smith – Tunes and Techniques offers 3 hours with this flatpicking master on two DVDs.

Ricky Wasson, long-time guitarist and lead vocalist with JD Crowe & The New South, will soon have his own solo project on Rural Rhythm Records.

Entitled From The Heart and Soul, the CD is due to be released on August 12. Joining Wasson will be J.D. Crowe on banjo, Ron Stewart on fiddle and banjo, Adam Steffey on mandolin, Harold Nixon on bass, Randy Kohrs on resonator guitar and Don Rigsby, Sonya Isaacs and Ben Isaacs on harmony vocals.

The first single from this release, Merle Haggard’s Losin’ In Las Vegas, is included in the recent Rural Rhythm sampler, Fresh Cuts & Key Tracks, and we have a brief audio sample you can hear right now.

Listen now:

This one we will certainly be looking forward to hearing in full.

J. D. Crowe and Charlie Cushman join Sonny Osborne, Alan Munde, Ned Luberecki, Bill Evans and Frank Neat to round out the teaching staff for the 8th Annual NashCamp Banjo Retreat, October 17-19th at the Hachland Hills Vineyard in Joelton, Tennessee – about 15 miles north of Nashville.

This event is hosted by noted banjo players Sonny Osborne and Bill Evans, along with Cindy Sinclair. They welcome beginning through advanced bluegrass banjo players for a weekend of small group instruction, jamming for all ability levels, a faculty concert and much more.

Evans shares a few thoughts about NashCamp…

“While folks come to learn banjo, the emphasis is also on making friends, hanging out with your banjo heros, having fun and eating lots of great food. We’ve had young and old attend each year, men and women – people from all parts of the United States and even Japan. I’m especially proud of the fact that we have a great group of women who attend each year – and that number grows with each camp. Sonny has been our guiding light with this event – his positive energy and enthusiasm along with his interest to stay involved with others who love the banjo inspires everyone around him. This camp has a great spirit. This is the camp to attend if you’d like comfortable surroundings, great food and tremendous fellowship in the company of some of the best banjo players and teachers in the world.

And with Sonny and J. D. in one place, who knows what will happen?”

Students are grouped according to ability level – from beginners with one year of playing experience to the most advanced players. Small group instruction is mixed with full group interactive sessions and the Friday night jam features some of the best Nashville musicians sitting in with students. (more…)

Wayne Fields, most recently the banjo player with The Charlie Sizemore Band, passed away from complications associated with cancer on March 21.

The deminutive Fields was born in Hazard, Kentucky, and moved to the Lexington area at a young age. He started playing a guitar in his church at the age of eleven and grew up listening to Flatt and Scruggs on the radio.

Wayne and his brothers, Larry and Bill, plus a couple of friends put a band together and began performing all over Lexington. Although they performed all types of music, Field’s heart was always with bluegrass and the banjo.

Mostly self-taught, Fields had three lessons from a fellow employee at the local Holiday Inn, J.D. Crowe, who was playing there at the time along with Larry Rice, Tony Rice, and Bobby Sloan.

In 1977, he got his first job playing banjo for The Boys from Indiana, replacing Noah Crase. While he was a member of the band, they made an appearance on the Grand Ole Opry and on The Porter Wagoner Show.

Four years later Fields took a job with Renfro Valley regular John Cosby and the Bluegrass Drifters, with whom he won the first SPBGMA band contest in 1984.

Later that year, Wayne, his brother Bill, Ricky Wasson and Rick Johnson formed the group Southern Blend with whom he recorded and toured for 9 years. He also played with another Renfro Valley band Wilderness Trail. Other members included Dave Osborne & Jeff Parker (who played with Lonesome River Band and is now with Dailey & Vincent).

Later Fields joined J.D. Crowe, playing mandolin and singing tenor vocals for The New South.

During the last 10 years he has performed with various groups including the family band Driftwood, Gary Strong & Hardtimes, Rick Bartley & Blackwater, as well as with The Charlie Sizemore Band.

Fields is featured playing banjo and singing harmony on the stellar Charlie Sizemore album Good News that was released last year.

Wayne Fields leaves Tina, his wife, two daughters, Christina and Tiffany, and two sons Scott and Charles, both active bluegrass musicians. (more…)