Lantern in the Ditch

It has become apparent to me that the real action at an old-time gathering never appears on any official schedule. Certainly I was excited to participate in...

Yesterday afternoon I returned home from a long weekend in Lanesboro, Minnesota attending the Bluff Country Gathering. It was amazing and I have a great deal...

The most surprising thing about Rhiannon Giddens’ Old Time Revue wasn’t that Justin Robinson – Giddens’ collaborator on her recently released album of...

It was cramped in the back room the other night at Brenda and Drew’s place - there were four or five fiddles, two or three banjos, two or three guitars, and...

This past weekend included poetry and music and a good deal of travel. Friday night my partner and I enjoyed a rare night out together sans kiddos, dining...

Rhiannon Giddens I’ve been listening to a new record this past weekend, What Did the Blackbird Say to the Crow, by Rhiannon Giddens and Justin Robinson. It’s...

Last weekend I acquired a copy of Ryan’s Mammoth Collection: 1050 Reels and Jigs, Hornpipes, Clogs, Walk-arounds, Essences, Strathspeys, Highland Flings, and...

President Taft giving a speech in downtown Decatur, Illinois, February 11, 1911 I’ve been going to a monthly old-time jam in Decatur since December. It takes...

3 versions of Durang’s Hornpipe Copying tunes into my notebook is becoming one of my favorite things to do. As a general rule, old time fiddlers learn tunes...

Last night I played some tunes with my buddy Aaron, and we recorded three of them on my phone, and I posted them to Soundcloud just now. It seemed like, if...

I think a lot about how my life might have been different. I know you’re not supposed to do that, but I do. How things might have turned out had I made...