Here’s the introduction.

It’s been more than 60 years since Bill Monroe, the Father of Bluegrass, unleashed the genre on the world with his Kentucky band the Blue Grass Boys. But a new crop of acts are paying tribute to the style, updating the old-time-and-country-music hybrid with contemporary rock and pop styles. Below are five acts to watch with commentary from bluegrass legends Del McCoury and Sam Bush:

The article, titled The New Bluegrass: Five Acts to Watch, presents a short profile of five bands RollingStone thinks are the up and coming face of “new bluegrass,” whatever that means. The five bands are: O’Death, Avett Brothers, Uncle Earl, Those Darlins, and Old Crow Medicine Show.

I don’t think these are the bands I would have picked.

How about you? Do you think Rolling Stone knows what it’s talking about?

[poll:14]

Some of the submissions were for the same recording. Some were for a band name and not a recording. We took the time to merge the applicaple submissions before taking the top ten. Punch and Punch Brothers got merged together and are represented on this poll as Punch Brothers – Punch. All options are that way, band name – recording name.

So here they are, let’s vote and see what the readers of The Bluegrass Blog liked in 2008.

[poll:13]

We did state that the poll would be limited to those recordings released in 2008.  Unfortunately we had to remove two names from the list because they were released prior to 2008. We also removed two other names for which we could find no information online. These four were all in the top 10 except for the technicalities which disqualified them. We give them honorable mention below (in descending order based on the number of votes they received in the original poll).

• Frank Solivan II – Selfish Tears (2006)
• Rain Check – Confluence (2007)
• Danny Clark & The Martha White Boys (no info)
• Type Your Choice Here (no info)

Below we’ve included a poll allowing you to contribute the bluegrass recording you’re most thankful for this year. Please limit your entries to recordings released during the 2008 calendar year.

We’ll let this run for a week or two then we’ll take the top 25 vote getters and present another poll where we can narrow it down the Bluegrass Blog Top Ten Bluegrass Recordings of 2008.

UPDATE: Please submit recordings, not just artist names. Dailey & Vincent is both the artist name and the recording name. Grascals is just the artist name, Keep on Walking is the recording, and should be the submission.

[poll:12]

Take a look at all the Fiddle Faces and then place your vote for the Fiddle Face you think best represents

The demanding art of disfiguring your face like a rock guitarist

Options in the poll are not necessarily presented in the order in which the thumbnails appear above. Please consult the image pop-up caption for the name if you aren’t sure.

[poll:11]

So here’s the question. Did you watch the recent videos we posted? Did you enjoy them? Would you like to see more? (OK that was three questions!)

[poll:10]

If you have any ideas for video features you’d like to see, we’d be interested in your ideas (just leave a comment on this post). We can’t promise you we’ll do them, but if there is enough interest, we’re considering making videos a regular feature here on The Bluegrass Blog.

Like previous years, it mirrors the IBMA final ballot in structure and form.

Five nominees in 17 categories. You may vote only once.

We do require that you be a registered user to participate. Registration is quick, easy, and mostly painless.

Have fun, and spread the word.

Vote now!

UPDATE: If you’ve already voted, or are just interested, take a minute and check out the poll results.

Now that we’re in the middle of the festival season we thought it would informative to run that poll again, asking if you are, in fact, attending fewer bluegrass events this season.

[poll:9]

Filling up your vehicle, whether it’s a small car or a motor home, is going to cost more this summer than it did last summer. Will festival attendance be diminished as a result?

You tell me.

[poll:8]

The real question yesterday was this: Is iTunes the #2 retailer of music to bluegrass fans? It seems it may be #1 among those who took our poll. “Direct from artist” took the number one position in the results, but that’s not one single retail outlet. It is encouraging though to see that bluegrass fans still prefer to support the artists in this way. “Other” was the second most popular choice, and here’s where the emails come in. Some of you wrote in to share specifics of your “Other” choice.

I realize we are a self selecting group, in that we are all already online (you’re reading this on a computer right?), so we don’t represent those bluegrass fans who aren’t online. What that percentage is I don’t know. Nationally it’s about 30%.

iTunes we know to be digital downloads, let’s call this “virtual product.” Amazon could be virtual product, or physical product (CDs) either one. What percentage of “Direct from artist” and “Other” is virtual? I don’t know, though I suspect it’s quite low. What percentage is purchased online, even if it is physical? That number is probably higher.

So let’s try two more polls. I’ll put them both below and ask that you participate in both. The first will be a very simple choice, asking your preference between virtual (digital downloads) and physical (CDs) product. The second will be an experiment. Let’s see if we can find the most popular retail outlet. For our purposes I’m bringing back several of the most popular options from yesterday’s poll, combining Wal-Mart and Wal-Mart.com into one option, dividing Direct from artist into two options, adding a couple new ones suggested in your emails, and (here’s the experimental part) allowing you the option of adding a new choice. If your first choice of retailer isn’t already there, just select “other” and then type in your choice.

So let’s here it bluegrass fans!

[poll:7]

[poll:6]

* UPDATE: I went in to “fix” the title for an option and wiped out the first 12 votes. Sorry guys! If you choose “other” please specify by changing the text to the name of the retail outlet you use. Thanks.

We’re in the process of doing some research and will be sharing our results with our readers soon. I thought we’d go ahead and do a little informal research right here on The Bluegrass Blog.

To that end I’ve put together this little poll so we can see where we’re all buying our music. Go ahead and participate, no registration is required. The poll will reload right in place without the need for a page reload.

Variety.com is reporting that CD sales during the Christmas shopping season were down 21% from 2006.

From the week of Thanksgiving up through the day before Christmas Eve, 83.9 million albums were sold, a decrease of 21.38 million from 2006’s 105.28 million.

What this doesn’t take into account is the sale of gift cards for downloads. I received an iTunes gift card for $25 as a Christmas gift and have yet to spend it. That’s the equivalent of 2-2.5 albums depending on how you count. The thing is, I won’t spend it all at once, and I most probably won’t purchase entire albums when I do spend it.

These declining sales numbers don’t necessary represent the current state of affairs for the bluegrass industry, though I have heard a number of artists speak of drooping CD sales in the last year. The decline of major label CD sales will affect our little niche in the industry though.

As sales continue to decline, at some point retailers will decide they have a better use for floor space than CDs. When retailers like Wal-Mart start shrinking the amount of shelf space dedicated to CDs, the sales will slip even further since the consumer won’t be able to find the CD they’re looking for in the store. My guess is, this will drive even more people online in their search for music to purchase.

A good selection of bluegrass music isn’t readily available in most retail stores as it stands, and when they start cutting shelf space, bluegrass will probably be one of the first genre’s to get pulled. The downside for our industry is that the music might not be available online either, which means it simply doesn’t get purchased.

If a large and varied selection of bluegrass were available online from retailers such as iTunes and Amazon, we’d still have to compete for the consumer’s attention, but at least we’d have a chance.

So let’s have a poll. How many of us received a CD or download gift card for Christmas?

If you feel I’ve left an important category off, feel free to contact me requesting I add it to the poll options.

[poll:3]

Last year we live blogged the Thursday evening award show from backstage. We had a great time and are considering doing so again this year.

What we don’t know, is if our readers enjoyed following along on The Bluegrass Blog as the show unfolded, or if you would simply prefer to have us announce the winners after the event has concluded.

To that end we are asking for your participation in the following poll. Let us know if you enjoyed last year’s live blog, and if you would like to see us do it again this year. Thanks!

You don’t have to be registered to participate, and the results will show right here without reloading the page.

[poll:1]