The Sound

The ToneSlabs Story At some point in their musical life—after acquiring a basic chord vocabulary and conquering the down-up picking pattern—most mandolinists or guitarists who play with a pick begin to think about how a pick’s shape, thickness and composition contribute to the sound they want to create. It’s just another worrisome concern if you…

An Interview with Randy Lanham, Education Director, Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame & Museum How do people learn to play bluegrass music, or any type of music for that matter? Is it handed down from generation to generation?  Do they teach it in school? Private Lessons? Group Lessons? Jam Sessions? Or are today’s options for…

By Jody Stecher Beautiful and unusual instrumentation, rare points of view, and intricate, natural imagery come together to create “The Only Sunshine,” an atypical love song written by Jody Stecher and released in December 2023 on his album Mile 77.  The writer behind this powerful statement song has a musical career that spans decades and…

Putting The Fun In Banjos All Photos Courtesy of Eric Sullivan “Banjos = fun” is the lifelong philosophy of one American luthier. “Sullivan Banjos is fairly recent,” its current proprietor, Eric Sullivan of Alabama, shared during a recent interview. “It started in 1970 when Dad (Bill Sullivan) was working at General Electric in the tool and…

The Doctor Is In To say that there are a lot of people providing guitar instruction on YouTube is an understatement…there are thousands…maybe tens of thousands.  Refine your search to bluegrass and fiddle tunes and the numbers drop, but there are still hundreds.  Refine the search again to look for someone who has taught bluegrass…

We all have days when we could use a good-humored song with a classic feel. If that’s you today, I recommend “End of the End of the World,” written by Adam Wright, which fits that bill with playful perfection. As the title suggests, it takes a run-of-the-mill phrase, end of the world, and gives it…