Articles

The Legendary Pete Kuykendall Brought To Life By Peter Rowan When it comes to featuring artists who are honored at the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame & Museum, located in Owensboro, KY, our goal here at Bluegrass Unlimited Magazine is to look deeper than what you may read on their wall plaque. We will continue…

Master mandolin player Nate Lee of the Becky Buller Band (B^3) is flying sky high with the debut of his full-length album, Wings of a Jetliner. But before we board the plane to find out more about his new release, let’s soar back in Lee’s history. Pre-Flight Check List Growing up in Texas, Lee was…

A Perfect Fit Between Nashville and Baltimore “I wanted to help bridge the connection between Nashville and Baltimore,” explains fiddler Patrick McAvinue about his latest album, Perfect Fit released in 2019.  For many the relationship between the two cities might seem odd at first, but for Baltimore native McAvinue—who first cut his teeth as youngster…

The D-MA from Preston Thompson Guitars in Sisters, Oregon has almost no interest in impersonating a vintage D-18. And that’s exactly what makes it such a compelling and distinctively modern flatpicking guitar. Even though it shares the basic D-18 DNA of a mahogany dreadnought body with a forward-shifted, scalloped-braced, tap-tuned Adirondack top, the Thompson D-MA…

Joanne Gardner, John Lowell, and the Virtual 2020 IBMA Bluegrass Awards Show The performance centerpiece of the annual IBMA conference is the IBMA Bluegrass Music Awards show, where – selected by the membership – the IBMA showcases and celebrates the best performers of the year. In a year of social distancing and facemasks, Paul Schiminger…

If you look at any photo of Bill Monroe holding his mandolin taken between 1950 and 1980, you will notice that the company name, which usually graces the instrument’s headstock, is noticeably missing.  Most die-hard bluegrass fans will know that very early in the 1950s, Bill Monroe shipped his mandolin to the Gibson company for…