The Venue

IBMA World of Bluegrass 2023 Photos by Ricky Davis “I hear banjos.” Even Sir Walter Raleigh was wielding one. But music lovers sought no deliverance. The sound was coming from the streets of downtown Raleigh, North Carolina that were bursting with bluegrass during the last week of September for the IBMA conference and World of…

Joe Mullins and The Radio Ramblers enjoyed a most memorable weekend September 1 and 2, 2023.   Our band was very fortunate to host the Hall of Fame Homecoming for the Bluegrass Hall of Fame and Museum, Owensboro, Kentucky. Let us never forget the importance of the leadership in the City of Owensboro, Daviess County and…

Traveling to a “bluegrass roots and branches” music festival in Kentucky is like ordering lobster at a restaurant in Maine or gumbo in Louisiana. Expectations are high. If they don’t know bluegrass music in Owensboro, Kentucky—less than 40 miles from Bill Monroe’s birthplace—then who does? And how could an event named “ROMP” (an acronym for…

Photo by Ed Henry When Bill Monroe reportedly said, “Bluegrass has brought more people together and made more friends than any music in the world,” he could have been describing the history of the Seven Mountains Bluegrass Association (SMBA), which is celebrating its fortieth anniversary this year in York County, Pennsylvania. As Monroe’s quote continues,…

Photos by Ricky Davis Smack dab between Murphy and Manteo, where Carolina clay colors the soil and the landscape can’t quite make up its mind whether to be rolling or flat, is an idyllic patch of ground where the world passes by in Jim Reevesque fashion. When the stream of traditional bands start arriving leading…

The Blue Ridge Parkway is one of America’s great tourist attractions. The word ‘attraction’ might not be a proper description, however, as it is simply a beautiful drive on a road built almost a century ago on top of the Blue Ridge Mountains that exposes the beauty of the Appalachian Mountains, considered the second-oldest mountains…