THE CICADAS WERE OUT in full force, buzzing in celebration as the August summer heat had mercifully subsided, at least for a few days. I ordered coffee (black) and took a seat at a tiny round table outside Caffé Driade, […]
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Monroe Crossing may be one of the best bluegrass bands in the country that too few know anything about. Based in the great bluegrass hotbed of Minnesota, they have been together for 17 years, keep a busy schedule, and have […]
Country music in America has long marketed towards and embodied an eclectic blend of common folk: typically, southern, lower-class, God-fearing, hard-working, blue-collar white men, found in Appalachian homes and hollers scattered well beneath the Mason-Dixon line. From the earliest decades […]
Bluegrass music spent about four decades doing its best to try to establish a unique genre fully separated from country music. The origin came, as this column has often pointed out, on Dec. 8, 1945, with the addition of Earl […]
When I was a child growing up in an apartment building on Manhattan’s Upper West Side during the 1940s, I remember going down to the forbidden boiler room, where a huge furnace sat burning coal. Rosie, the building’s superintendent, opened […]
It was a slow week for news what with Christmas and the start of Hanukkah, unless you count celebrity deaths, in which case it was … sigh … busy. We’re fresh into mourning for Carrie Fisher and George Michael this […]
Well, after operating this column for months, I figure it’s about time I take a look in the mirror and answer my own questions about radio and being a DJ. This week’s subject is me. What else can I say? I […]
When Jim Lauderdale takes the stage on September 21 at the Americana Music Association’s 15th Annual Honors and Awards Show at the Ryman, I have no doubt he will receive not only thunderous applause, but likely the longest standing ovation anyone has ever […]
Two electric guitars recite a harmoniously staggered theme, shadowing a couple up a flight of stairs. They pause on every third step, perhaps restating their consent or to check if anyone is watching. At the 4-second mark, a phased rhythm […]
I love some colorful charcters and have been blessed to know so many in last 38 years. It is what makes the world go round if you ask me. One of these guys was a fellow by the name of […]
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