Beer, bluegrass, occasional other stuff
There was an interesting theme Thursday at the 81st Gettysburg Bluegrass Festival, one that bodes promising for the kids who are taking part in the festival’s bluegrass academy this weekend. The two bands that bookended Thursday’s lineup were both bands with sort of roots at the Gettysburg festival. Members of Serene Green, which was appearing at Gettysburg for the first time, and the Travelin’ McCourys, who have graced the Starling Pavilion stage many times, both[…]
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Hugs were back in fashion last weekend at DelFest LIte at B Chord Brewing Company as the CDC lifted its mandatory mask advisory for vaccinated folks, especially outdoors. It wasn’t quite back to pre-covid “normal.” Greetings among old friends not seen since 2019 usually included folks’ vaccination status. Folks stopped and asked before hugging. But make no mistake, hugging was back. Which does not mean people didn’t still greet by bumping elbows. After all, the[…]
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If you are a fan of the Infamous Stringdusters, you are used to a style of bluegrass that is heavily improvisational with long instrumental jams that can last so long that they actually wrap one song around another. In live shows, it is not unheard of for the Dusters to stretch a song as long as 20 minutes. What is unheard of is the Infamous Stringdusters playing seven songs in about that same time span,[…]
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It’s fall. The chilly temperature and the cool breeze rolling down the hillside at B Chord Brewing Sunday night made that abundantly clear. Fall, of course, is time for baseball metaphors. Time to write clever headlines like “B Chord knocked it out of the park again,” or “B Chord hits a grand slam,” or “B Chord keeps hitting streak alive.” Any of which, cliche aside, would work to describe the weekend’s festivities in Round Hill,[…]
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You hear people talk about the healing power of music. About 500 people experienced it Friday night in Round Hill, Va., when the Sam Bush Band stepped onto the newly built stage behind BChord Brewing and launched into a jammy, almost three minute intro to an explosive, emotional “Play By Your Own Rules.” Bush’s usual Cheshire cat grin was even wider than usual as he delivered his trademark “Good evening music lovers” greeting. “I’m happy[…]
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When Mile Twelve fiddler Bronwyn Keith-Hynes moved to Nashville two years ago, she rented a room from one of her former instructors at Boston’s Berklee College of Music, banjo picker Wes Corbett. During her time as Corbett’s tenant, the two got into a routine when Keith-Hynes was not on the road with her band. Each morning they’d get up, eat breakfast, then jam for an hour or so on old banjo-fiddle tunes. Now that collaboration[…]
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A child prodigy, Bronwyn Keith-Hynes picked up a fiddle at the age of 3 and by the time she turned 16 she was off to Boston, having won a scholarship to attend the American Roots Music Program at Berklee College of Music. It was in Boston, in 2014, that she and her bandmates formed Mile Twelve. In 2018 she won an International Bluegrass Music Association Momentum Award for her fiddle playing. This year she is[…]
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When Charles Humphrey II left Steep Canyon Rangers and took up with his buddies in Songs From the Road Band, some folks speculated he had grown weary of SCR’s heavy touring schedule. Suffice to say nothing could be further from the truth. If anything, Humphrey went from the frying pan into the fire when it comes to touring. After starting as a side project with a rotating cast of whatever Asheville musicians were in town[…]
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We first met Chris Luquette at a house show in Virginia’s horse country. We immediately became a fan. We were blown away by this picker’s chops. The kid can play guitar with the best of them. Our DelFest wish list is for a Billy Strings-Luquette pairing. Doesn’t matter who sits in with whose band. Just be sure it is somewhere with nothing flammable nearby. Anyhow, after that show, we sat and talked a bit over[…]
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Review by Chris A. Courogen The Central Pennsylvania bluegrass band Colebrook Road’s name references a two-lane country road that winds through the countryside sort of in between the cities of Harrisburg and Lancaster. It’s a fitting moniker in a number of ways. For starters, it sort of represents the connection between the bands’ five members, some of whom live near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania’s state capital, and some of whom live close to Lancaster, about an hour[…]
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