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The UNCA Bluegrass Band // Photo by Isabella Giambusso

Asheville and Bluegrass Music

Asheville, North Carolina is located deep in the heart of bluegrass country.  There has been a long tradition of bluegrass music in that area and many of the heroes of bluegrass music have called, or still call, Asheville home.  However, the guy who is responsible for teaching bluegrass at the college level in Asheville started…

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The Bennington College Mandolin Class

Bluegrass in Vermont

Bennington College Bennington College in Bennington, Vermont started as a women’s college in 1932 and transitioned to a co-educational institution in 1969.  One of its claims to fame is that the college was “the first to include visual and performing arts as an equal partner to the liberal arts curriculum.”  As a performing art, bluegrass slowly…

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Fathers & Sons

Mike Mitchell’s first album with Turnberry Records was released just before Mother’s Day and Father’s Day and the timing couldn’t have been an accident. Fathers & Sons is about family relationships and strikes more than one personal note. Mitchell, a native of Canada, lives and runs a music school in Floyd, Virginia, part of the…

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House Of Axes

For many of us with a fascination with both the tonalities and the designs of vintage instruments, a visit to a place like Gruhn Guitars in Nashville, with its collection of guitar rarities, is like to a visit to the Louvre in Paris or the Boston Institute of Fine Arts. In a virtual sense, this…

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The Osborne Brothers—From Rocky Top to Muddy Bottom

Reprinted from Bluegrass Unlimited Magazine December 1977, Volume 12, Number 6 Alot of things have transpired with the Osborne Brothers and their innovations and contributions to bluegrass music. While they have been the subject of many comments about going electric, adding drums, and basically experimenting within the general framework of the music, Sonny and Bobby,…

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The Lost & Found

Reprinted from Bluegrass Unlimited Magazine March 1978, Volume 12, Number 9 Together only four years, The Lost and Found of southwest Virginia is rapidly cutting a favorable swath across the bluegrass entertainment field with a Duke’s mixture of traditional and modern bluegrass sounds, all arranged in a distinct, creative style. In addition to bringing musical…

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