by Christine | Dec 9, 2014 | Welcome Column
For about a dozen or so years my wife Irene and I have spent a goodly portion of our lives listening almost exclusively to bluegrass music, that grand amalgam of old English folk music, gospel, jazz, western swing, and, yes, pop that emerged from Bill Monroe’s...
by Christine | Jan 19, 2020 | Welcome Column
Act One Scene One Recap: enter stage right a confident, maybe arrogant individual, in business attire, wearing a Stetson, polished boots, gently strumming a mandolin. He looks out on the audience and says in a strident voice “fake instruments should be banned; dobros...
by Christine | Nov 17, 2019 | Welcome Column
Politics run amuck. The BTBP (Big Tent Bluegrass Party) whose national logo was a medley of guitars, fiddles, mandolins, accordions, beat boxes, and didgeridoos, was attempting to out-muck out the STP (Small Tenter Party) that proudly displays a golden banjo logo with...
by Christine | Feb 3, 2011 | Welcome Column
Walking through the Nevada County Fairgrounds during the Fathers Day bluegrass festival, one couldn’t help but spot that shiny silver Airstream trailer. More often than not, there was a circle of pickers gathered outside the Airstream, but the songs coming from the...
by Christine | Jul 9, 2011 | Welcome Column
There are few musicians who have had a whole new musical genre created because of what they did while dwelling in time and space for their alloted time on this revolving sphere in the sky that we call earth. When they start off doing what they’re doing...
by Christine | Dec 25, 2017 | Welcome Column
Snow flake’s a-fallin’My old heart’s a-callin’Tall pine’s a-hummin’Christmas Time’s A-Comin’. Christmas Time’s A-Comin’ Christmas Time’s...
by Christine | Sep 8, 2017 | Welcome Column
(Editor’s Note–I’m certain that when Bill posted this column back in 2013 it had special appeal for me because 1) Bill’s been a close friend for many years, and friends live vicariously through friends; and 2) I’ve always loved listening...
by Christine | Mar 22, 2013 | Welcome Column
I was driving to the Pacific Northwest with a SUV packed full of banjos when the email came in: if I still had the weekend available, would I like to play on A Prairie Home Companion? There are times in a musician’s career when spontaneous jumping up and down is in...
by Christine | Apr 21, 2019 | Welcome Column
(A flash from the past…Geoff Sargent from ten years ago.)I recently came across an account of an archeological expedition to ancient ruins in Kentucky and Tennessee that unearthed a glass mason jar stuffed full of paper towels covered with difficult to decipher...
by Christine | Apr 7, 2018 | Welcome Column
I caught up with Billy Pitrone, the guitarist, lead singer and songwriter for Bean Creek, at his ditch-side camp at the CBA Fathers Day Festival. Billy is a multi-year winner of the Northern California Bluegrass Society’s male vocalist of the year and is known to sing...
