Articles

The Henhouse Prowlers are international bluegrass troubadours in the truest sense of the word.  Over the past two decades, they’ve performed and held workshops in nearly 30 countries (from Pakistan and Saudi Arabia to Uganda and Kyrgyzstan)  on five continents, often under the auspices of the U.S. State Department. Yet there are no signs of…

From Brush Arbor To Bean Blossom And Beyond Within the expansive genre of bluegrass, gospel music is arguably more popular today than at any time in its history. Most of today’s bluegrass bands include gospel music on recordings and in stage shows, and some record all-bluegrass gospel albums. While the melding of bluegrass with spiritual…

New Single Resurrects a Lost Classic Bluegrass Song By Richard Hefner  The great 1970s Song “Million Lonely Days” by the Black Mountain Bluegrass Boys Becomes New Again The IBMA Award-winning duo of Kenny and Amanda Smith are no strangers to West Virginia. Amanda is a Mountain State native who was raised near Parkersburg. The husband…

In a bluegrass world where bands see regular turnovers, Mark Stoffel is an anomaly.  For the past 16 years, the mandolin ace for Chris Jones and the Night Drivers has been laying down a solid chop on tours across the country and with his creative innovations on sevenof the group’s CDs. After growing up in…

There’s more to harmony than simply playing the right notes. Some musicians have that special something, hard to name but impossible to overlook. Jason Carter and Michael Cleveland’s latest project Carter and Cleveland—their first collaboration of its kind—is Exhibit A.The friendship between the two fiddlers began back in their teens. When Cleveland was about thirteen,…

The Newest Punch Brother For many reasons, bluegrass music is a unique genre amongst the various forms of music performed and recorded in the United States.  One reason is that a relatively high percentage of the fans of the music also play the music.  At any given bluegrass festival, the main reason many of the attendees…