Reviews

Englehardt Music Group Deanie Richardson is one of the better kept secrets in bluegrass music.  Can you write that about someone who has won two major awards? After the release of her album Circle Up, it may be an irrelevant question as the fiddler’s latest effort won’t escape notice as it is tight top to…

SEA COW RECORDS Bill Christophersen is a fiddle player from the New York area and is steeped in the traditional style of the music, having been influenced by such traditional groups as the New Lost City Ramblers, and others. Since 1971 he has performed with the Lazy Aces, Fly By Night String Band, the Rock-House…

In the course of three albums and seven years, this immensely talented New York-based band has carved out a unique and remarkable niche. Nefesh is led by singer-banjo player Eric Lindberg and his partner, singer Doni Zasloff. Relying on the couple’s exquisite songwriting, Nefesh has refined a stylistic integration of bluegrass, Celtic and Eastern European…

OMNIVORE RECORDS OVCD-423 New York City’s Cole Quest (Rotante) is the grandson of Woody Guthrie and has assembled The City Pickers, who are a group of like-minded friends who also have a love for acoustic and bluegrass music. Quest, who sings lead vocals and plays guitar and resonator guitar, is joined by Larry Cook (bass),…

Patuxent Music Some albums grab a listener’s attention from the get-go and don’t let up. Sometimes, in a first listen of a CD, you just know “this is something special.”  Tennessee Heart, the debut from Shannon Bielski & Moonlight Drive checks both of those boxes and then some. Bielski and her band bring some bonafides…

Patuxent Music If you were to listen to this album from Five Mile Mountain Road, you’d find yourself moving, thinking it was different, knowing you like it, but also thinking “Someone should name this style.” They did—it’s called “swingbilly,” a term Charlie Poole’s son James used in the 1930s. Hailing from Franklin County, Virginia—the self-proclaimed…