The Sound
Rob’s Reso Room and Reso Summit
If you are learning to play the Dobro and are having trouble finding quality instruction, you need look no farther than Rob’s Reso Room. Rob’s Reso Room is an internet-based teaching platform developed by fifteen-time IBMA “Dobro Player of the Year” Rob Ickes and his business partner Craig Spinney. Launched two years ago, Rob’s…
Tradition & Innovation
Covering All—Or at Least Some Of—the Basses Once upon a time the A. P. Carter Family and Jimmie Rodgers were revolutionaries. A traditionalist scholar once complained that—by introducing guitar into songs that had been previously sung unaccompanied—the Carters just ruined them. Jimmie Rodgers featured jazz players and Hawaiian musicians on some of his recordings, and…
Tell Me You’re Not Leaving
Photo by Joe Worthem It’s been a few years since Volume Five cut the poignant “Tell Me You’re Not Leaving” for Milestones, the band’s seventh record for label Mountain Fever. Far from a traditional bluegrass barn burner—something this band can get around—the slower, reflective song reached #2 on Bluegrass Today charts. Lead singer Glen Harrell…
Bill Evans and the 5-string Banjo
Photo by Snap Jackson Photography One constant in Bill Evans’ 40-plus-year banjo career is helping others learn to play and listen to music. He began teaching in his hometown, Norfolk, VA in the 1970s, while still in high school, not long after he picked up the five string. Evans remembers sitting in the living room…
Andrea Roberts
Leading Others to Bluegrass Success Photo by Shelly Swanger Longtime performer turned business owner Andrea Roberts lived an enviable existence as a bluegrass musician the first part of her life. Her impressive resume includes fronting one of the first all-female bluegrass bands Petticoat Junction and playing alongside some of the genre’s most legendary figures including Bill…
Ben Surratt Living His Dream
Photo By CarsonPhotography Young kids are often asked, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” I would guess that a fairly low percentage of adults actually end up fulfilling those childhood dreams. For musicians it might be different though. I have interviewed many bluegrass musicians who became enamored with a musical instrument at…