Tony Trischka wins Independent Music Award
Tony Trischka was recently awarded for his CD, territory. The CD won the award for Best Americana Album at the territory was released in 2008 on Smithsonian Folkways Recordings. The CD contains 21 tracks including both 3-finger style and clawhammer style banjo playing. Many of the tracks are performed solely by Trischka, while others consist of fiddle/banjo duets or other duel banjo numbers with a variety of accompanying instruments.
Guests include Pete Seeger, Bruce Molsky, Bill Keith, Paula Bradley, Mike Seeger, and Bill Evans.
The CD contains extensive liner notes by Bob Carlin covering Trischka’s background and bio (titled: Tony Trischka Territory), and A Short History of the Banjo. Also included are Trischka’s notes on each of the 21 tracks. His notes detail the many alternate tunings represented on the recording, give background info on each song’s history, and stories of the collaborative efforts with his guests.
One highlighted quote from the liner notes is Tony’s explanation of why he plays the banjo.
It’s like the banjo chose me…
I didn’t really have a say in the matter.
territory is available from Smithsonian Folkways Records as a physical product or a download. The notes are provided as a free PDF download on the same page, along with audio samples of each track.


This Sunday NPR's Weekend Edition will feature Tony Trischka in an interview and performance segment. The segment will air at 9:40 AM ET on Sunday January 21, 2007. It will be repeated at 11:40 AM and 1:40 PM the same day. I'm told the segment may also include Steve Martin and Bela Fleck.
We told...
Tony Trischka's latest banjo venture is now live online. It's the Tony Trischka School of Banjo, an interactive instructional video course for banjo players at any level.
The site offers prepared banjo lessons from Tony, with students invited to submit videos of themselves playing the lesson material,...
The Tony Trischka piece on NPR's Weekend Edition which Brance mentioned on Saturday can now be heard online. It ran earlier today on most NPR radio affiliates.
Tony appeared along with Steve Martin and Bela Fleck to discuss his new Rounder CD, Double Banjo Bluegrass Spectacular.
Hear the segment...
I'm delighted that my old friend Tony Trischka went three-for-three at IBMA 2007. His latest Rounder CD Double Banjo Bluegrass Spectacular may be his greatest album ever, and this is an artist whose recordings are consistently superb. Double Banjo's double win of Best Instrumental Album and Recorded...




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