Reviews

Shefa Records You’ve probably heard of rock operas, but would you believe a Civil War banjo opera?  Once you hear that it’s a Tony Trischka project, you’ll probably think, “Oh, okay, yeah.” Trischka has been pushing genre boundaries since his first album nearly 50 years ago. Shall We Hope is 18 tracks of spoken word,…

MGPR0003 Martin Gilmore is a talented singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist from the Denver, Colorado area. He has performed around the U.S. and he recently returned from a two-year stint living in Cairo, Egypt, where he was able to perform in both Europe and Africa. He has performed with artists including Hot Rize, Uncle Earl, Infamous…

Miles in Blue, the latest album by Horseshoes & Hand Grenades, features a mature thoughtfulness that lends itself to introspective reflection. Not that the band has not shown their thoughtful side before, there is much in their catalog that would impart those feelings, but on Miles in Blue, they seemed especially mindful of the world around…

For bluegrass players, finding the right pick is crucial. Shape, thickness, material, bevel and tone all play a role in how a picker extracts the sound they seek from their instrument. In recent years, the introduction of new aerospace-grade materials and the demand for custom shapes has triggered an explosion in pick choices beyond the…

Maybe it tells you what you need to know when along with guest artists listed in the liner notes are the noted and vintage instruments used to make the music on the album. That’s what you get with this CD re-issue of the 1987 vinyl release from Ed Schaeffer & Rattlesnake Hill titled Scene from…

Hailing from the Big River area around SE Missouri, the aptly named Riverbend is a five-piece band with a style rooted in traditional bluegrass. Over 11 tunes here, the band shows a deft hand with high tenor lead voices and the driving Monroe-style mandolin of Andy Navara to bring a very traditional sound to their…