AG & Kate

(The following text is an excerpt from the book “High Lonesome Below Sea Level: Stories and Faces of Bluegrass Music in the Netherlands” by Loes van Schaijk and Marieke Odekerken. The book can be ordered in the webshop of the Bluegrass Music Museum or the...

Ah, show biz

For reasons that only a psychoanalyst at the top of her game could divine, I awoke this morning thinking about the blue-haired lady who hired my bluegrass band for a gig at the San Mateo Elks Lodge back in 1979. She was the wife of the top Elk guy, the Supreme Bull,...

Alaska Over-rated

Mrs. Slim and I just returned from a vacation in and around Anchorage, Alaska. Those folks have exaggerated some of their biggest selling points, to wit: They claim to have the highest mountain, Mt. McKinley (aka Denali) in the U.S.A., but when you get there they...

Alison Brown Comes to Town

San Diego has been home to many a successful bluegrass musician. One example is Alison Brown.She grew up in the La Jolla area playing bluegrass banjo and guitar at The Pizza Place, a monthly jam where she met and played often with world-renown bluegrass fiddler Stuart...

All Aboard Amtrak to Bakersfield

Trains and bluegrass go together like Lester and Earl, as J.D. would put it. You and I between us could probably come up with enough songs about trains off the top of our heads to keep a jam going for hours. That’s pretty much what a small band of bluegrass brothers...

All About Harmony

Welcome back to the #1-Article-Most-Read-By-Me, Bluegrass ‘n Stuff! This months column is all about harmony, and we’ve got a lot to cover, so let’s get right to it. Oh, first, you might want to get a snack. It makes the reading experience more enjoyable, that’s all....

All in the Wrist

Consider the wrist joint, one of the most complicated joints in the human body. In fact it isn’t really a single joint at all, though most people think of it that way. If you take a closer look at the anatomy of the wrist you will discover that it is really made...