Articles

A New Guitar Brand From China Kepma Guitars is a Chinese company fresh to the New World that aims to compete in the hotly contested global market for quality acoustic guitars selling for around 2,500 US dollars, in addition to models under $500. The company claims to be the best-selling acoustic guitar brand in China,…

By Liz Hengber, Tammy Rogers, Jerry Salley Some songs demand to be written. That was the case with “The Falling Man,” cut by The Steeldrivers (Bad For You, 2020) and written by Liz Hengber, Tammy Rogers, and Jerry Salley. Inspired by the famous 9/11 photograph also titled “The Falling Man,” the song describes the haunting…

It’s every picker’s nightmare scenario: having a treasured instrument stolen. That happened to me back in 1972. My basement-level Chicago apartment was broken into while I was away from home, and when I returned, I immediately discovered that my 1947 Martin D-18 guitar was missing (along with some valued audio equipment). I called the police,…

SCENIC NORTH CAROLINA CAMPUS STRIVES TO KEEP APPALACHIAN MUSIC, DANCE AND CULTURE ALIVE IN BRASSTOWN, NORTH CAROLINA The traditional Morningsong music program is offered several days a week at 7:45 a.m., and Friday performances are streamed live on the Folk School’s Facebook page. A socially distanced and masked crowd filled the historic Keith House Community…

For Dewey and Leslie Brown, seven is a lucky number. They wed in 2007. After seven years of marriage, the former Clinch Mountain Boy fiddler and his wife started their own business, Brown Entertainment, and opened their first musical venue, the Liberty Showcase, in Liberty, North Carolina, in 2014. Then, seven years later, they opened…

Any dyed-in-the wool fan of bluegrass fiddling will instantly recognize the names of such legendary fiddlers as Chubby Wise, Jim Shumate, Fiddlin’ Arthur Smith, Kenny Baker, and Bobby Hicks. The list goes ‘On and On,” as Bill Monroe would say.  One name you might not yet be familiar with is Aynsley Porchak. This young Canadian…