Articles

This exquisitely conceived and rendered third solo project by Jeremy Garrett, best known for his membership in the award-winning band The Infamous Stringdusters, is chock-full of finely textured and nuanced arrangements and original songs informed with sometimes urgent emotional intensity. Garrett, who wrote or cowrote all but one of these twelve cuts, of course serves…

Hatfield Delivers the Real McCoy It’s an age-old conundrum for anyone trying to learn a new instrument.  You first buy a cheap banjo, guitar or mandolin to see if you even enjoy playing it. The further you progress, and the more time you put in, the more your instrument’s shortcomings become apparent. Pretty soon you’re ready…

Bob Minner Pays Tribute to Norman and Nancy Blake Although Bob Minner has spent the majority of his musical life over the past thirty years performing as a member of country star Tim McGraw’s band, he is still a bluegrass flatpicker at heart.  By the time he was twelve, Bob was studying the guitar playing…

DobroSinger Photo by Neale Eckstein You may think that DobroSinger must be a typo, however rest assured it is not.  Not only is it the title of Abbie Gardner’s new release, but it also serves as an excellent description of the style she has carved out for herself.  Dobro is an instrument that is largely…

Photo by Laura Ridge On the cover of the May 1976 issue of Bluegrass Unlimited there appears a group of unknown bluegrass musicians along with the words “Bluegrass Cardinals.”  The title of that cover story, written by Frank Godbey, was “Who in the World are the Bluegrass Cardinals?”  The world would soon find out. The…

Tad grew up in a suburban area of Philadelphia. At a young age he heard music playing inside his head without the aid of a radio or phonograph. He recalls that as a child he would skip along the sidewalk, avoiding the cracks, and hum the tunes he was hearing. He is sure that he…