With so much of the world focused this week on the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing, it seems fitting that a video of Chinese bluegrass has been posted on YouTube.

Here is Mei Han’s Red Chamber picking a solid version of Katy Hill along with John Reischman and the Jaybirds, taken from a concert this past spring.

Han is a noted master of the Chinese zheng, though she is performing on the liuqin in this video, posted by her record label, ZaDiscs.

Banjoist Jayme Stone and mandolinist John Reischman each received a JUNO nomination from The Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences last week. The awards, which celebrate the work of Canadian musical artists, will be announced at the 37th annual JUNO Awards gala on April 6, 2008 in Calgary, AB.

Stone is nominated for his CD, The Utmost, in the Instrumental Album Of The Year category and Reischman in the Roots & Traditional Album Of The Year: Group category for the Stellar Jays project with his group, The Jaybirds.

Congratulations and best of luck to them both!

John Reischman & The Jaybirds have a new CD, which given the high praise the group has earned from both peers and critics, seems aptly named. Stellar Jays was released in mid-May, and audio samples are available at CD Baby.

This is their fourth release as a band, with members actively involved in various musical projects along the US west coast and Canadian Pacific Northwest. Jim Nunally is on guitar, Trisha Gagnon on bass, Nick Honbuckle on banjo, Greg Spatz on fiddle and Reischman on mandolin.

You can find out more about The Jaybirds, and check their tour schedule, on the official web site.

Greg Spatz, fiddler with John Reischman and The Jaybirds, is more than just a talented musician. He is also a published author with two novels and a collection of stories to his credit, who serves as a professor of Creative Writing at Eastern Washington University. His most recent book merges both of his artistic pursuits, and carries a special appeal for followers of bluegrass and acoustic music.

Fiddler’s Dream, published in April 2006 by SMU Press, is the story of a prodigious young fiddler, who makes the move to Nashville at 19 to pursue his dream of working in a professional bluegrass band. Though the story isn’t wholly focused on the musical side of his quest, it has been praised by critics for the degree to which Spatz fuses the details of a musician’s thoughts, dreams and frustrations with a more common coming of age literary theme.

The book combines these two threads throughout, as the young fiddler searches out his estranged father, with whom he has had no contact in years, and who was himself a famous bluegrass artist.

Here is snippet of a review by David Flood that appeared recently in The Seattle Times:

The novel “Fiddler’s Dream” is not just a coming-of-age story but a poetic insight into the world of the musician. Don’t expect a history of bluegrass music but rather a tightly focused chronicle of one fiddler’s odyssey, down to the throbbing fingers. Although the dramatic build up just prior to Jesse meeting his father seems to go on too long, Spatz cuts this novel off on just the right notes, creating one of most inspired final sentences I have read in a long time.

Find more details on the book, or order online, at the SMU Press site.