With ‘Do You Recall’ Dori Freeman Demonstrates Appalachia is Not a Monolith

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

One of the most stunning and enjoyable albums of 2023 was released in mid-November by Galax, Virginia-based singer-songwriter Dori Freeman. Entitled, Do You Recall, it’s a vibrant and energetic collection of eleven original songs that also feel cozy and down home, like a back porch jam or guitar pull – there’s a buzz in the air, but no overhanging urgency. It’s pure fun, but it’s also earnest and, at times, devastating.

That homey sense, pervasive and enveloping on Do You Recall, is thanks in no small part to Freeman and producer, her husband, drummer Nicholas Falk, having tracked the entire album in their backyard studio. But these tracks don’t feel antiquated or pastoral, and they certainly do not evoke a revisionist, white-washed, or sanitized rural ideal. There’s no preaching or authenticity signaling undergirding these songs, they’re simply genuine representations of Freeman and Falk intentionally following or guiding each song to its best, natural endpoint.

Freeman has decidedly re-centered her career and her music making away from so-called Music Cities – like Nashville and New York City – over the course of her five critically-acclaimed albums. She clearly feels no need to peacock or to raise a middle finger to the Music Industry, or play to “outlaw” narratives in country. Rather, she and her creative community have deliberately shifted the focal point of her songs and albums away from industry currencies and social or political structures bit by bit, click by click. As a result, her music truly shines – and certainly reaches audiences that see and appreciate that deliberation. Each of her prior albums are testaments to this growth and action, but Do You Recall may be Freeman’s best to date.

Our Cover Story conversation began discussing this shift away from music industry models and naturally and languidly, as the album, touched on agency, nuance and complication in Appalachia, solidarity and class consciousness, and so much more.

BGS: I wanted to start by asking you about how your priorities maybe have shifted in relation to the music industry? I sense that there’s this insulation between you and the capital M, capital I, “music industry,” whatever that means, right? It feels like you care less about what matters to the industry and more about what matters to you. And that feels so tangible in the music. Do you agree or disagree with that?

Dori Freeman: I do agree with that. I think I kind of always have written music from a perspective of not really caring – I never approach music through the lens of what would please a record label or what is going to be a song that people want to play on the radio or anything like that.

But I do think that perspective has only gotten stronger as I’ve gotten older. The longer I’ve written music, [the more] I write music that means something to me and that I hope will resonate with other people, because I find that the music that I’m drawn to is written in that same way. It’s music that is honest in the best way possible.

That honesty you’re talking about feels so homey, so grounded in your everyday. I think that’s part of what makes it feel like you’re not just giving a middle finger to the industry. It’s more that you’re re-centering what you do away from the industry record by record.

I would agree with that. It’s not that music isn’t a big part of my life – I mean, it obviously is, it’s the career that I’ve chosen – but as far as day to day goes, the majority of my life is spent living in a small town and raising a young daughter. That’s [why] I write a lot about both of those things. I don’t necessarily think those are really topics that record labels are begging to have more songs about, but that’s just what my life is and so those are the things that I write and sing about.

Can you talk a little bit about where you live? You live in Galax proper, yes?

Yeah, I live in Galax proper. I’m actually the last house on the street that I live on that’s technically still in Galax. The population in Galax is around 10,000, so it’s not very big. I’ve moved around a little bit in my life, but the majority of my life I’ve spent here in Southwest Virginia. And Galax in particular is a town that’s known for music. It’s like the self-proclaimed old-time music capital of the world, and we have a Fiddler’s Convention every year that’s one of the oldest. It’s known for music.

I mean, even the way that we – my husband and I – made this album [was] literally in our backyard. He built a timber-frame studio during the pandemic, so we recorded it here too, and at a much slower pace than I’ve ever had the privilege of making a record. In the past I’ve always had a strict timeframe, we have these four or five days and we have to have everything recorded in that amount of time. This time, it was just much more relaxed, and we could go out to the studio and work on one song for a couple days and then do another one the next week. It was just really refreshing to be able to approach it that way, compared to the way I’ve done it in the past. There are things that are really fun about recording in both of those ways. The pressure can be good, too, but it was nice to have a change of pace.

It may just be the time of year where all I want to do is cook something simmering on the stove all day long, but “Soup Beans Milk and Bread” — there’s so much in it that I, and I’m sure other listeners, can relate to. Especially the line, “You can’t lose something you don’t have.” That line bitch-slapped me, for real. In the best way. Can you talk about writing that one and where that line and that song came from for you?

I always find it a little difficult to articulate when I’m talking about Appalachia, just because I find it easier to write about it in song form, but I will do my best to try to talk about that.

It’s such a nuanced issue. I wrote that one – and then there’s another song on the record that’s also about growing up in Appalachia – and about the different layers of that and the different experiences you have here. The good and the more complicated.

In particular, the line, “You can’t lose something you don’t have.” I wouldn’t say I grew up poor, but I grew up not necessarily having a ton of stuff. But, in a lot of ways, I feel like I had a really happy childhood. Part of that line [is positive]. I mean, you can take it in a negative or more sad way, but it’s also, “Well, you can’t be unhappy about something that you didn’t ever have.”

If you grew up with less, a lot of times you just make the most of that and it ends up being better for you in a lot of ways. That line is definitely meant to be a double-edged sword. This area has been so taken advantage of by the government and by big business that it’s clear, yeah, you can’t lose something you never had, because we were never allowed to have it in the first place.

Another one that was my a favorite on the record is “Why Do I Do This to Myself.” I feel like I asked myself that question all the time!

It’s just such a universal feeling, I think. We all do these things to ourselves, certain things are good for you, certain thought patterns aren’t good for you – and you just can’t help it.

What you were hoping to accomplish musically and sonically with that one? Because it reminds me of classic Patty Loveless or like Terri Clark, very trad ‘80s or ‘90s country. Can you talk a little bit about what you were trying to get out of the production style on that?

Well, ‘90s country was definitely what we were going for with that one. I’m glad that came across with that track. I’ve got to give Nick a lot of credit for the production on a lot of these songs and for just picking out the musicians and for directing and deciding what the vibe would be for a lot of these songs. Our guitar player, Adam Agati, Nick hired him and they both came up with that real country lick, they kind of led the charge on that one.

You’re really playing with agency, I feel like it’s such a character in these songs – what are you choosing for yourself, what is being chosen for you, what’s being handed down to you, and how the speaker in your songs is kind of dancing around these things and talking about them.

I don’t know if I consciously approached it in that way, but I do think that it’s interesting – ‘cause you’re not the first person to bring that up. Someone else that I did an interview with said they felt the songs sort of felt like short stories that were part of the same book. After the fact, sometimes it’s like that. Sometimes you just write the batch of songs and then afterwards it becomes clear.

So I do see that in hindsight, but I don’t know necessarily if I was looking at it that way when I was writing songs, because I just write songs so individually. I’m not thinking of a theme when I approach writing songs for an album. It’s more just work on the songs individually and then hopefully they sort of come together in some sort of cohesive way.

Another thing, which I actually think has been a blessing in disguise, is that I’ve only had one album on an actual label. The subsequent four I’ve self-produced and put out on my own little label at home. I think that’s actually ended up being a good thing, because it has just left me without a lot of boundaries or feeling boxed in. I feel like I’ve had a lot more freedom to write about the things that I wanted to. It may be a smaller audience that I’m reaching and it may be a slower growth and a slower track, but actually, in the long run, I’m glad that I have done it the way that I have.

There are a couple more songs I wanted to ask you about. One is “Movie Screen.” It’s the one that feels most bluegrassy to me in some ways, and it feels very “mountain music,” which is always a nebulous term to me. “Movie Screen” is a story song, and it feels very specific, but it also feels so general and zoomed out and aspirational. It kind of reminds me of Dolly [Parton] and the way that she’d write songs about wanting to be the girl in the movie or on the radio or on stage.

[Laughs] Thank you for the Dolly comparison. I mean, I will always take that.

Yes, that is a really specific song. I wrote that song after becoming really obsessed with, during the pandemic, watching Peaky Blinders on Netflix and just having such a crush on Cillian Murphy, the lead actor in that. It’s pretty funny, because I wrote the song and my husband is one of the first people, if not the first person, I always share songs with. I play him this song and he immediately was like, “Oh, okay– so this is about that guy from Peaky Blinders?” Which is just so funny, because, my husband has brown eyes and there’s a very distinct line in the song about blue diamond eyes. It didn’t take him long to put that together. He likes to give me a hard time over that song. But it’s also about entertainment and movies and TV shows and books, as like an escape from reality and anxiety and all those things.

The other song you mentioned as being about growing up in Appalachia, “They Do It’s True,” it reminds me of Charles Booker’s political action group in Kentucky, Hood to Holler. There’s a line: “If you’ve ever lived on a mountain side/ in a little shack or a double-wide/ Then there ain’t no seat at the table for you.” That line is so striking, especially because it then continues by naming solidarity with women and with Black and Brown folks. It mades me think of Hood to Holler and this idea that in the holler and in the hood, we are more similar than we are different. I wondered if you could talk a little bit about that line in that song and where it came from for you?

That’s definitely what I was trying to write about in that song. I think one of the tactics that conservatives and people in higher positions in government love to use is to pit poor white people against poor Black people just to use that for their own gain. It’s another perspective that I think gets lost when people talk about the Appalachians. They think it’s just 100% white and people have this very specific idea of what it is, but there’s a large Black population. West Virginia has one of the most concentrated populations of transgender teens. There are Appalachian queer film festivals – there are a lot of things that get lost in that bigger message, because people [in power] don’t want us to have solidarity, because that would mean there would be actual change.

Another example of that is the way prisons often end up in poor and working class white communities, and then that’s how they pit Black and white people against each other again, because the white people are afraid of losing the work from the prison. So they want it to stay there, and it’s just a very vicious cycle. I think that it’s something that we should talk about more, because I think the wider audience doesn’t realize a lot of these things about Appalachia.

The class consciousness in the album and the way that you wove class into these songs feels so artfully done.

Appealing to the commercial side of things has never been something that I’ve felt the need to do. That goes back to what I was saying as far as having the freedom to write about what I want to and not being beholden to record labels or anything like that or agents. But it’s also because those are all just important things to me. I grew up in a really rural area and I’m bringing up my daughter in a rural area. I don’t ever want to romanticize the area in an unrealistic way, but I do think it’s important to have conversations as much about the negative things that we do need to improve as all the positive things.

I think that’s it’s really important for people from the area to continue to talk about all of this. In music and writing – and whatever other mediums. So that the rest of America can see that [Appalachia] is not just one stereotypical picture that they have in their heads.

Photo Credit: Kristina Lynn

BGS Class of 2023: Reading Recommendations

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

I call January my reading month. To be clear, I do of course still scan words and decipher syntax throughout the remaining 11 months that fill the calendar, but I always seem to start and finish the most books in the first month of the year. I don’t think it’s because I have a romantic notion of what my new self will be like in this new year – always reading and writing more or doing xyz to “better” myself (though if I’m being honest, that’s probably part of it). Rather, I think it’s more so that in the hangover of the holidays, when the gatherings are over, and there are months of dreary winter to look forward to, I take comfort in the ability to transport myself to another time or place, or simply get lost in someone’s thoughts for hours at a time. 

This community, as much as any, understands the import of passing stories on – allowing a new generation to take the torch and keep honored traditions burning while evolving its culture and extinguishing the shameful parts of its priors. That’s why we at BGS compile notable books that tell the stories by or about these genres’ songs and songwriters and the scenes, places, and events that made them. 

Maybe you’re like me, looking for ideas of books to get lost in this winter, or maybe you are looking for a way to turn the page on the calendar and become your most “badass self” (we’ve got a book for that). You might be here looking for a last minute gift idea for that special music-loving person in your life. In all those cases, you’ve come to the right place! 

We’ve got a book by an esteemed songwriter who waxes poetic on the art form he loves. We’ve got titles about how certain times in certain places scenes have blossomed and sub-genres formed so palpable that listeners can identify a song by its roots. We’ve got biographies of famous musicians, and some of whom have looked back at their own lives and careers. Find all that and more in our list of reading recommendations, organized by categories below: 

Sense of Place

Night Train to Nashville: The Greatest Untold Story of Music City, Paula Blackman

Drawing on stories from her grandfather, E. Gab Blackman, a 30-year radio executive at WLAC, Paula Blackman shares the story of how the Nashville radio station became a pioneering source for Black rhythm and blues music in the 1940s and ‘50s. Seeing the opportunity to reach a more diverse audience – not, as Paula notes, to be a “white savior” – Gab teamed up with disc jockey Gene Nobles to play “race records.” In Night Train, Blackman also profiles William Sousa “Sou” Bridgeforth, the owner of New Era Club, a prominent Black nightclub in Nashville that blossomed as a result of the new artists being spun on WLAC airwaves, many of whom were introduced to Gab by Sou. Fitting that the story of Nashville, in the time leading up to the civil rights era, is told through the music played on the AM radio speakers throughout the city. 

This Must Be the Place: Music, Community and Vanished Spaces in New York City, Jesse Rifkin

Country and Midwestern: Chicago in the History of Country Music and the Folk Revival, Mark Guarino

In Their Own Words

World Within a Song: Music That Changed My Life and Life That Changed My Music, Jeff Tweedy

Wilco frontman and New York Times bestselling author Jeff Tweedy follows up on Let’s Go (So We Can Get Back) and How To Write One Song with a gushing love letter to songs. In it, Tweedy dedicates chapters to many (but clearly not close to all) of the songs that have resonated deeply with him for one reason or another. From Bob Dylan to Billie Eilish, from The Clash to ABBA, Tweedy sheds any and all pretense of what might be considered “cool” in his selections. 

Wayward: Just Another Life to Live, Vashti Bunyan

In Wayward, Vashti Bunyan, an English singer-songwriter, recounts her early career in the mid ’60s leading to her debut release, Just Another Diamond Day, in 1970. Disillusioned by its lack of success (at the time) and the fact that her songs, life, and career were all dictated by men, she left the music industry entirely before re-emerging in the early 2000s. Pick this up for the story of what happened in between, how she reclaimed her life, and is taking her second act in music on her own terms. 

Don’t Tell Anybody the Secrets I Told You: A Memoir, Lucinda Williams

3-time Grammy award-winning songwriter and now New York Times best-selling author, Lucinda Williams, recounts her upbringing and bumpy ride to fame. Once getting feedback from a record company who said her music was “too country for rock and too rock for country,” Williams stayed the course, and became one of the greatest and most influential songwriters of our time.

On Banjo: Recollections, Licks and Solos, Ben Eldridge

Born in Richmond, VA, Ben Eldridge fell in love with roots music watching WRVA’s Old Dominion Barn Dance. In this memoir-meets-tablature book, he recalls his path from upbringing to moving to D.C. to become a mathematician, and ultimately going from jam sessions to forming a group that would change bluegrass henceforth – the Seldom Scene. This conversational book with pictures that set the scenes even comes with licks and transcriptions for banjo playing fans. 

TransElectric: My Life as a Cosmic Rock Star, Cidny Bullens

This book starts with a bang! And I’m not even talking about the foreword from Elton John. As just a 24-year-old Cidny (then referred to as Cindy) had shown up uninvited to a live recording session for Dr. John at Cherokee Studios in Hollywood, and eventually found himself starting an impromptu jam with Ringo Starr, Eric Clapton, Dr. John, and Joe Cocker. This retrospective traces his arc from a backing vocal career in the drug-fueled ’70s for the likes of Elton John and Rod Stewart, and having trouble finding his footing as a solo artist who had expectations of how a woman could behave and perform. Bullens settled into the life of a typical suburban mom, experienced a personal tragedy, and eventually found his true voice. 

Nashville City Blues: My Journey as an American Songwriter, James Talley

Biographies & Histories

Brothers and Sisters: The Allman Brothers Band and the Inside Story of the Album That Defined the ’70s 

George Harrison: The Reluctant Beatle, Philip Norman

Oh, Didn’t They Ramble: Rounder Records and the Transformation of American Roots Music, David Menconi

Oh Didn’t They Ramble chronicles the comprehensive history of the quintessential folk record label for the last 50-plus years. With extensive access to Rounder artists, staff, and founders Ken Irwin, Marian Leighton Levy, and Bill Nowlin, BGS contributor David Menconi is able to tell Rounder’s story, from its humble but audacious and idealistic beginnings to becoming one of the most influential record labels in the history of recorded music. 

The Downhome Sound: Diversity and Politics in Americana Music, Mandi Bates Bailey

How-Tos

Light Beams: A Workbook for Being Your Badass Self, Valerie June

Like I mentioned, this workbook/journal might be coming just at the right time as you resolve to become your most “badass self.” But even if you’re reading this well into the new year, then there’s no time like the present! Published on Jack White’s Third Man Books, Valerie June’s Light Beams offers its readers “contracts and agreements, self-healing wishes and spells, and maps and prescriptions in exercises” on a journey to self-love and waking up with a promise of choosing kindness and shining like a “badass.”

Y’all Eat Yet?: Welcome to the Pretty B*tchin’ Kitchen, Miranda Lambert

How To Produce A Record: A Player’s Philosophy For Making A Great Recordings, Pete Anderson

Other

Western Chill, Robert Earl Keen

As a set that features a double sleeve album, a DVD with music videos for every song, a graphic, illustrated novel that explains the writing process, and a songbook with lyrics, notes, and chords so the purchaser can play along, this title certainly belongs in a category of its own. 

 

LISTEN: Cary Morin, “Whiskey Before Breakfast”

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Artist: Cary Morin
Hometown: Born in Billings, Montana; now based in Fort Collins, Colorado
Song: “Whiskey Before Breakfast”
Album: Innocent Allies
Release Date: January 26, 2024

In Their Words: “‘Whiskey Before Breakfast’ is a song that I learned as a child, when my interest at the time was mainly bluegrass music, something I loved very much. Since those early days, I have abandoned the guitar pick and prefer to play fingerstyle guitar. I was inspired to record this old traditional tune by my interest in the famous Montana band, Mission Mountain Wood Band. I loved their combination of bluegrass and other genres of the time. Their album, In Without Knocking, was always on my list of favorite recordings and I particularly liked the album cover, which is the painting by [Charles M. Russell] titled, ‘In Without Knocking.'” – Cary Morin

Photo Credit: Grayson Reed

Out Now: Madeleine Kelson

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Madeleine Kelson blends traditional folk, country, and Americana. She played Queerfest and took part in AmericanaFest this year, has been featured multiple times on NPR, and was a finalist in the Kerrville Folk Festival’s New Folk Competition. 

Madeleine is from Chicago and based in Nashville, where she lives with her partner. Her single, “The Way I Do,” displays her relationship with her partner through a lens that shows how ordinary queer relationships can be: Drinking coffee every morning, coming home for dinner, and falling asleep beside each other every night. The hook declares, “God has never loved a woman the way I do.” It’s an iconic LGBTQ+ anthem, and in my opinion, it’s one of the most compelling songs about queer love and pride.

We’re proud to promote this dedicated and creative up-and-coming coming artist. Our Out Now interview discusses why Madeleine creates music, her favorite LGBTQ+ artists, her release and touring plans for 2024, and more.

Why do you create music? What’s more satisfying to you, the process or the outcome?

Making music has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. When I started playing and singing as a kid, it was a way for me to connect to the people around me – at first by singing around the house with my mom and my sister and then by playing music with my friends. That’s still a big part of it now, but starting around my teenage years music became a way for me to process big emotions and give them somewhere to live outside of my mind.

As far as the process versus the outcome, I don’t tend to think of making music as having an outcome. A song gets written, and maybe that’s the outcome of songwriting, but then it might get arranged, or performed, or recorded. Even after I stop playing a song at shows, people still listen to it and it grows and changes with them. I’d say the most satisfying part is the impact, whether that be for me or for someone else.

What’s the best advice you’ve ever gotten?

I love this question! I couldn’t pick just one piece of advice, so here are a few:

One from my mom: “No is a complete sentence.”

Some from my grandpa: “Shoot for the moon. You might surprise yourself and get it.” “Follow your passion. If you love what you do that’s what you will do best.“ And “Treat others with respect. The way up can be a hard slow journey but the fall can be very fast and you meet the same people on the way down as you did on the way up.”

I’ll throw in a good Yiddish saying too: “When you have a lot to do, go to sleep.”

Who are your favorite LGBTQ+ artists and bands?

Oh man! Here’s a big long list, because it’s so hard to choose!

Brandi Carlile (I will always look up to her), Freddie Mercury (I listened to a lot of Queen in high school), Indigo Girls, Linda Perry, Allison Russell, Brandy Clark, Aaron Lee Tasjan, Katie Pruitt, Amythyst Kiah, Celisse, Boygenius…

Also want to shout out some amazing local artists that I love: Purser, Autumn Nicholas, Jobi Riccio, Becca Mancari, Denitia, Jaimee Harris, Liv Greene, and Julia Cannon.

For anyone reading this who might not be out of the closet, were there any specific people, musicians, or resources that helped you find yourself as a queer individual?

I was really lucky to grow up in a very liberal city in a very liberal family. When I came out, I knew the people around me would be supportive. Any apprehension I felt had to do with the people outside of my circle and my life beyond Chicago. That being said, I still didn’t really know I was gay until high school. I think the things that helped me find myself were the people around me – having friends who were out, seeing queer couples, going to pride parades, watching shows with queer characters, going to concerts or other events that I knew lots of queer people would attend.

Seeing what that part of my life could look like in other people helped me make sense of who I could be. Coming out is something you don’t do just once, but constantly for the rest of your life. At some point it changed from something I dreaded doing to something that has brought me comfort, joy, and community.

What are your release and touring plans for the next year?

I’m currently releasing singles off of a four-song EP that will be out mid-February. I’ll be on tour with Alaina Stacey supporting that EP, through the Midwest and Northeast starting February 16th in Chicago. Touring is one of my favorite things, and I can’t wait to see everyone at these shows! Seriously, show up. I want to see you!

You’ve done a lot this year, from touring to playing several festivals, including Queerfest, AmericanaFest, and Perseids Music Festival. What’s that been like for you?

It has been so much fun! There are few things that bring me more joy, or make me feel more like myself, than being on stage. It’s such a rush and so emotionally gratifying, even to play sad songs and feel things so deeply with other people. There’s really nothing like it. It’s been a busy year, and one in which I have definitely overcommitted myself, but I’m grateful for every part of it.

In 2022, you released your debut album, While I Was Away, on Olivia Records. Can you share some of the key inspirations and themes behind the album?

While I Was Away was actually my college thesis project! The idea was to write and produce an album that musically pulled from the different building block genres of Americana (folk, rock, country, etc.), and lyrically spoke to the years since I moved away from home. It’s a real time capsule of my life from 18-22. It’s about leaving home, being gay in the South (oy), growing up, watching the kids I babysit grow up, my dog, so many things!

You were also a finalist in the Kerrville New Folk Competition. Could you tell us about that experience?

Kerville Folk Festival was incredible. I had no idea what to expect going into it. I applied on a whim and when I heard that I got in, I could never have imagined what it would be like. If you haven’t been to a festival like that, it can be hard to imagine, but essentially there’s a big piece of land in the middle of Texas and for three weeks every year it turns into a city of stages, tents, RVs, and so much good music. It’s home to the most respectful and outstanding song circles that carry on through the night, and quite possibly do not ever end. Playing and competing was an honor, but the real privilege was to be around so many phenomenal songwriters whom I’m happy to now call my friends.

Could you share the creative process, inspirations, and the significance behind your song ‘The Way I Do’?

“The Way I Do” started as a line that floated around in the back of my mind, honestly probably for months before I knew what to do with it. The line was, “If I don’t get to heaven for loving her true, God has never loved a woman the way I do,” which ultimately became the hook of the chorus.

Growing up, I was very aware of homophobia, but it wasn’t something I experienced personally in any significant way. That really changed when I moved to Tennessee. And I say that not to generalize or condemn the South – there are a lot of amazing people here who are deeply involved in fighting inequality. In my experience, it’s a more tangible and pervasive issue here, and if anyone is going to make a difference, it’s the people here who are fighting that fight every day. I think growing up with the experience of feeling entitled to confidence and comfort in my sexuality made me that much more pissed off when I was faced with intolerance. Especially the virulent brand of “Christian” homophobia that the South is so well known for. That, I really didn’t and still don’t understand.

The thought behind the song is kind of a sarcastic, “If your god knew how great it is to love a woman, he/she/it definitely wouldn’t hate me for it.” It’s definitely a “fuck you,” but it’s also an honest reflection on how easy and natural it is to love someone who happens to share your gender.

Photo courtesy of the artist.

WATCH: Rob Ickes & Trey Hensley with Molly Tuttle, “John Deere Tractor” (A Tribute to the Judds)

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Artist: Rob Ickes & Trey Hensley and Molly Tuttle
Hometown: Franklin, Tennessee; Jonesborough, Tennessee; Palo Alto, California
Song: “John Deere Tractor”
Album: A Tribute To The Judds
Release Date: October 27, 2023

In Their Words: “It is an incredible honor to be included in this amazing tribute to The Judds. I grew up listening to these songs. I’ve always been a huge fan of The Judds and of that sound that they created with their producer Brent Maher. And ‘John Deere Tractor’ is one of my all-time favorite songs, so when we were asked to perform this song with the great Molly Tuttle, we of course jumped at the opportunity. I’m so proud to be a part of this album, and I’m so excited for everyone to hear it. Thank you to The Judds for creating such wonderful music that we’ll all be listening to forever.” – Trey Hensley

“I remember hearing The Judds on the radio for the first time — it blew my mind! It was a musical oasis on the radio, that’s for sure. As a kid growing up playing bluegrass, I loved their sound with the ACOUSTIC guitars(!), and the Dobros that were front and center in the mix (great production by Brent Maher!), and of course, their harmonies and song choices were impeccable. And Wynonna, what a voice! So strong, an amazing tone… ‘John Deere Tractor’ was a big song for me because my bluegrass hero, Larry Sparks, did a great version of it. I was really impressed when I saw that The Judds recorded it and loved their version also. It was such a thrill to record this awesome song, and I love the vocal performances by Trey Hensley and Molly Tuttle on this track. They hit it out of the park.” – Rob Ickes

Photo Credit: Rob Ickes & Trey Hensley by Jeff Fasano; Molly Tuttle by Bobbi Rich.

BGS Wraps: Patty Loveless, Darin & Brooke, Brei Carter, and More

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

How is December already half over? Christmas is merely 10 days away – and in just over six days, Winter Solstice will bring the light back into our lives. We hope your home smells of evergreen and sugar cookies and that a seasonal roots music tune is wrapping you up in wintry coziness. If that isn’t the case, we can help with the rootsy seasonal tunes bit!

For our third week of BGS Wraps, we have celebratory bluegrass alongside loping country, introspective indie and gothic Tim Burton-esque tales, too. Plus, don’t miss Jeannie Seely as Grand Marshal of the Donelson Hermitage Christmas parade in Nashville tomorrow.

Whatever you’re celebrating this season, we’ve got the music, songs, albums, and events to pair with your peace and joy.

Darin & Brooke Aldridge, Hometown Holiday

One of bluegrass’s preeminent couples, Darin & Brooke’s new Christmas album, Hometown Holiday, feels like an afternoon visit in their living room, as they play down a few of their favorite seasonal numbers. The husband and wife duo are known for their covers of non-bluegrass songs, and several among this collection truly shine – like Joni Mitchell’s “River,” rendered beautifully by Brooke. You’ll hear country piano, a modern classic popularized by Amy Grant, “The Chipmunk Song,” and more, all packaged with a neat and tidy bluegrass bow.

Beth // James, Christmas at the Burchills

Friends of BGS will know this team loves a good tiki drink, so including this Beth // James original seemed essential for our holiday Wraps. “Tiki Christmas Land” is one of four originals – joined by a cover of “Blue Christmas” – on Beth // James’ new EP, Christmas at the Burchills. Make yourself a holiday mai tai or painkiller and enjoy your visit with Beth, James, and the Burchills.

Brei Carter, Twinkling Tales of Christmas

Your cheeks may be a bit rosier after listening to Brei Carter’s jazzy, pop country holiday collection, Twinkling Tales of Christmas – and not just because of the chill in the air! “50 Shades of Christmas” will certainly get you in a festive and adventurous mood, and “Santa Wontcha” is for all Christmas season fans who proudly extend the season well prior to Thanksgiving. But “Bow on You” and “Christmas Is You” are certainly the stand out tracks.

38th Annual Donelson Hermitage Christmas Parade December 16, with Grand Marshal Jeannie Seely

If you’re near to Music City USA, head out to Donelson tomorrow afternoon, December 16, to catch country legend Jeannie Seely as she Grand Marshals the 38th Annual Donelson Hermitage Christmas Parade. Seely is standing in for Brenda Lee, who ended up being unable to attend the event – and who better to step into Lee’s Christmas hit-singing shoes? Seely has been involved with the parade many a time before and this year is an especially perfect time for the Grand Ole Opry member to Marshal, as she just released a holiday single with the Flat River Band entitled “Christmas Time.”

Pat McGrath, “Let’s Just Get Past Christmas”

A smooth, swingin’ Christmas song from singer, songwriter, studio musician Pat McGrath that looks forward, willing the new year to come fast and wipe the slate clean. A great tune for anyone who feels the holidays are often bittersweet, with a heavy dose of love and putting one foot in front of the other, you can get past just about anything. Christmas included.

Drake Milligan, “Cowgirl for Christmas”

More Christmas songs need yodeling, right? Right. Drake Milligan’s “Cowgirl for Christmas” is a delight, from the sound stage music video set that feels direct from a ‘50s western to the catchy, yodeled hook, to the danceable, western swing beat. Not a brand new track or video, but one worth remembering each year when December rolls around for sure. You’ll be wishin’ for a cowgirl under your tree, too.

The Nields, “The Darkest Day”

A harmony rich neo-folk song from The Nields, “The Darkest Day” was released earlier this year on their brand new album, Circle of Days. To herald solstice, they’ve brought out a video to highlight the track and ask the titular question, “What do you want on the darkest day?” A timely reflection, as we welcome back the sun and look ahead to spring – however far away it may feel.

Malin Pettersen, “Santa”

Malin Pettersen’s first ever Christmas song is an entire vibe. With a classic R&B back beat and conversational tone with Americana touches, Pettersen lays out her wishes for the holiday – for her longing to end and for some light to brighten the holidays and dark January. Whomever you’re trying to manifest into or out of your life, Pettersen can offer a shortcut to writing your letter to the big man at the North Pole.

Hannah Rose Platt, “The Wendigo Rag”

Wendigos and skinwalkers, oh my! If your TikTok For You Page knows that you love a cryptid tale or the paranormal or other unexplained phenomenon, Hannah Rose Platt has made a wintry, stop motion, Tim Burton-esque video just for you. And if you’d like to continue your rootsy Wendigo songs playlist, we have another selection from back around Halloween by Thunder & Rain you’d enjoy, too.

Larry Sparks, “White Christmas”

Each Christmas we’re reminded of this amazing album by bluegrass legend Larry Sparks and especially of this four-chord version of a holiday classic, “White Christmas.” Only a picker like Sparks could pave over such an iconic chord progression without leaving the listener missing it – at all. “White Christmas” is a jam buster no more, anybody can play along. We put this album on every year around the holidays and are never disappointed.

Sofia Talvik, “Alone for Christmas”

Swedish folk and Americana singer-songwriter Sofia Talvik utilizes jazz touches and dramatic strings to paint a lonesome Christmas portrait that both relishes and abhors the season. Playing around within that paradox – how can lonely holidays feel so bereft of Christmas spirit, while also epitomizing so many of the feelings of the season? The repetition in the song (“Alone for Christmas… Again. Again.”) underlines how being “Alone for Christmas” really isn’t as uncommon or unfamiliar as any of us would hope it is.

The Wildwoods, “Somewhere in the Snow”

Nebraska-based folk trio The Wildwoods offer their first-ever holiday song, “Somewhere in the Snow,” replete with a Peanuts-style animated video. It’s gauzy and sweet with a burnished patina and tone of redemption. Whether you love or hate the snow, it certainly seems like a perfect place to bury your troubles and fears.

Our Classic Holiday Album Recommendation of the Week:
Patty Loveless, Bluegrass & White Snow, A Mountain Christmas

Patty Loveless’s bluegrass bona fides are unassailable, it’s true, but this album might clinch her claims to the genre, if ever challenged by a naysayer or proverbial chair snapper. Bluegrass & White Snow is a perfect combination of classic, sing-along carols and bluegrass staples, plus a couple of bespoke beauties, too, sung as only Patty could sing them. With a big, belty voice that carries with it some of that signature high lonesome grit. Dr. Ralph would be proud. (And he was.)

Photo Credit: Darin & Brooke Aldridge by Kim Brantley; Brei Carter courtesy of the artist; Drake Milligan courtesy of the artist.

David “Dawg” Grisman Recorded His Own Journey to the Bluegrass Hall of Fame

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

(Editor’s Note: This story was first published in November 2023 by our friends at Roots Radio WMOT 89.5. Visit their website to hear the best in listener-powered independent American roots music and to read more by journalist and producer Craig Havighurst.)

Sixty years ago, an 18-year-old David Grisman made his way to a place called the Coral Bar in West Paterson, New Jersey. He brought with him a portable Wollensak reel-to-reel tape recorder and a good measure of youthful chutzpah. He found the dressing room of his quarry – bluegrass stars the Osborne Brothers – and asked Sonny and Bobby if it would be okay if he recorded their show that night.

“And Sonny Osborne looked at me and said, ‘You can record the show. But if that ever comes out on a record, I’ll find you and I’ll kill you.’”

Grisman, now 78, recounts this memory at his home in Port Townsend, Washington. It’s a turn-of-the-20th century house with high ceilings, period furnishings and beguiling, music-themed paintings on the wall by David’s wife Tracy Bigelow Grisman. I got to visit the master mandolinist this summer, just weeks before he was announced as one of 2023’s inductees into the Bluegrass Music Hall of Fame, an honor that was consummated in late September during the IBMA Awards.

While he was hailed by the bluegrass establishment for his “distinctive and influential” mandolin playing, his visionary advances in string band music, and the creation and cultivation of an offshoot of bluegrass so particular that Jerry Garcia dubbed it “Dawg Music,” Grisman’s legacy also includes a lifelong passion for recording acoustic music. Taking cues from his mentor, the folklorist Ralph Rinzler, Grisman has captured live shows, friendly jams, and studio sessions across six decades. Many of his best tapes have been released since 1990 on his own record label, Acoustic Disc.

Artist-owned labels are rare enough in their own right, but there may never have been a label that documented an artist’s own influences and output across time as abundantly as Acoustic Disc does for Grisman. He’s reissued historic music that touched him, including that of mandolinist Dave Apollon and Argentine jazz guitarist Oscar Alemán. He’s documented his personal mandolin heroes and pals like Jethro Burns and Frank Wakefield. But at its core, Acoustic Disc is a catalog of Grisman’s various collaborations, as leader of his David Grisman Quintet, in his influential bluegrass supergroup Old and In The Way, and in duos with Jerry Garcia, Del McCoury, Andy Statman, Tony Rice, and Doc Watson.

For several decades Grisman partnered in the label with longtime friends Harriet and Artie Rose, but in 2020 he and Tracy acquired full ownership and took it all digital, which Grisman says “has allowed me to triple my production of new releases.” The newest, out last week, is a 50th Anniversary Edition of Old & in the Way Live at Sonoma State, recorded in November of 1973. That follows on a recent digital release of an informal 1976 session that Grisman calls the New Smokey Grass Boys with Darol Anger on fiddle, Tony Rice on guitar, Todd Phillips on bass and Robert Bowden on banjo. Also recent, the six-volume collection Dawg Works covering all of Grisman’s instrumental compositions recorded with a who’s who of acoustic and bluegrass pickers.

Acoustic Disc (encompassing the legacy CD releases in physical and digital form) and its sister label Acoustic Oasis (all download) offer a thread of immersive snapshots from the life of a man who seemed to be everywhere that mattered in bluegrass from the early 1960s into the 21st century. And we might not have this rich portrait of Grisman’s influential career if fortune hadn’t brought him early on into the world of renowned folklorist, artist manager, and promoter Ralph Rinzler as he grew up in Passaic, New Jersey.

“I was really into early rock and roll. You know, Chuck Berry and Buddy Holly and Jerry Lee Lewis and Elvis,” Grisman said. “It was being born really. And so I was one of those young, impressionable kids. But around 1958 or ‘59 it started evaporating. Buddy Holly got killed, you know? Little Richard got either busted or became religious. Elvis went to the Army. And pop music got very vapid.”

Into the vapid void came folk music, first the polite kind like the Kingston Trio but soon this rougher, richer sound called bluegrass began to reach teenaged Grisman. He and some friends formed a folk music club at his high school, and the cousin of his favorite teacher came to talk and demonstrate records and instruments. That was Ralph Rinzler, and the encounter changed Grisman’s life. Rinzler, 10 years older, hosted late night listening sessions at his home, which happened to be four blocks away, sharing music by Jimmy Martin and the Stanley Brothers, until Grisman’s mother telephoned to call her son home.

In 1961, Rinzler invited Grisman along on a road trip to the New River Ranch for an outdoor show with Bill Monroe and the Bluegrass Boys and another blazing mandolinist named Frank Wakefield. “There was a small backstage. I heard them play mandolin duets,” Grisman said. “And that really blew my mind. The whole experience blew my mind.”

In Rinzler, Grisman had latched onto a key figure in American folk music. He was a mandolinist with the popular Greenbriar Boys at Gerde’s Folk City in Greenwich Village. He’d go on to manage Monroe and Doc Watson, promote many shows, and run the Smithsonian Folklife Festival and Folklife Program. His passion as an archivist rubbed off.

“I got this all from Ralph, you know? He was going on these field trips, finding these musicians and recording them,” Grisman says of their early years together. “For a while, Ralph lent me his Nagra, the premier portable Swiss tape machine. I made a tape of Jesse McReynolds and Bobby Osborne playing duets in a shed outside a show in Maryland in 1965 that I still have.”

So Grisman was thinking like a producer by the time he started at New York University in Greenwich Village, and at age 18 he officially became one. First he took a recorder to Wakefield’s Hyattsville, Marylad home where he captured an informal jam session with great songwriting bluegrass star Red Allen. His young partner on that trip Peter K. Siegel, another acolyte of the music, worked with Grisman to gather the personnel and repertoire for the album Bluegrass by Allen, Wakefield and the Kentuckians on Folkways Records in 1964. The jam tape, which Grisman used as a practice guide for his own mandolin playing, was released by Acoustic Disc on CD and download as The Kitchen Tapes.

Grisman produced two more Red Allen albums and played in his band for a bit before the next major shift in his life, one that reflected the times. In 1967, he conspired with fellow bluegrasser Peter Rowan to go electric with the psychedelic folk-rock band Earth Opera. They made two albums for Elektra before disbanding, and by 1970, Grisman had moved to the Bay Area, where he’d spend most of his life. A fellow he’d met back east in ‘64 or so was out there making quite a name for himself in rock and roll, but Grisman knew that Grateful Dead guitarist Jerry Garcia’s first instrument was banjo and that he was good at it. That led to the first project that truly set Grisman apart as one of the great influencers of bluegrass music.

It wasn’t Grisman’s tape recorder that was running on October first and eighth of 1973 at the Boarding House in San Francisco, but Owsley “Bear” Stanley knew what he was doing as sound engineer for the Grateful Dead. Grisman was on stage with Garcia on banjo, Peter Rowan on guitar, Vassar Clements on fiddle and John Kahn on bass. The set lists blended classic repertoire with Rowan originals like “Panama Red” and “Midnight Moonlight” that would become standards.

Ten tracks from those two live sets were put out in 1975 on the Dead’s in-house record label as Old And In The Way, which became by some reckonings the best-selling bluegrass album of all time. With its reach from rock and roll through the songwriting sensibility personified by Rowan and the daring improvisation of Vassar Clements, it was certainly among the most influential. Grisman released both shows in their entirety for the first time as Live At The Boarding House – The Complete Shows in high definition digital download. It’s an extraordinary time capsule of a pivotal confluence in roots music.

The Mill Valley, California house where Grisman settled became a hub for musicians where the mandolinist got to work out the sound and approach he’d been thinking about for years, one grounded in the sounds of stringed instruments working together more than the high lonesome singing of traditional bluegrass music.

“At some point early on, we realized that we could play instrumentals if we made it interesting enough,” said Grisman about a stretch in a band with the innovative fiddler Richard Greene. “And so we would do ‘Lonesome Moonlight Waltz’ (by Monroe). We’d do a Duke Ellington tune. We’d do Django (Reinhardt) and Stéphane Grappelli tunes. We started mixing it up. And then I guess I always had this composer in me. And as soon as I had this outlet for it, I had a list of tunes.”

Original tunes and another reel-to-reel tape recorder played a role in bringing Grisman together with Tony Rice, an early ’70s hotshot bluegrass guitarist whose Kentucky tutelage with traditional band J.D. Crowe & the New South was coming to an end.

“I had put together an album of the music I had written – all these tunes that I later did with my first quintet. And I had this tape with me. And Tony wanted to hear it and we’re in this living room filled with people,” is how Grisman remembers their first encounter. So instead, they did some picking, and Grisman was astonished, overwhelmed with memories of the master flatpicker Clarence White, who had recently been killed by a drunk driver. (“I figured I’d never hear that (style) again,” he said.) Eventually, Grisman was able to play his recorded music for Rice. “I put the tape on,” said Grisman. “And he listened to it and said, ‘I’d give my left nut to play that music.’”

That extreme sacrifice wouldn’t be necessary. A short time later, Rice had decamped for the Bay Area and joined what became the David Grisman Quintet with Todd Phillips on second mandolin and a young Bay Area fiddler named Darol Anger (now a Nashvillian). Soon, the great Mike Marshall took over the second mando seat with Phillips shifting to bass, where he’d have an outstanding career. With this, Dawg Music really took off, with its fusion of bluegrass, gypsy jazz, and classic swing. It was all instrumental, with all the architecture and improvisational freedom of a jazz band, played on bluegrass instruments, propelled by a fierce sense of timing and dynamics. Acoustic Disc offers a triple-length, 20-year retrospective DGQ compilation and a 1979 live show at the Great American Music Hall.

Also in that decade, Grisman decided to build a studio in his home, a rarity at the time. A San Francisco recording studio he’d worked at was closing down and he was able to make a deal for the recording console and tape machine, opening up the prospect for sessions that could be spontaneous and unbounded by budget. The most historic of them might be his duo recordings with Jerry Garcia. The two had been out of touch for about a decade when Garcia sponsored Grisman for an artist grant from the Dead’s foundation, which prompted a call and a get together.

“(Jerry) walked in the door, and he said, I know what we should do. We should make a record. And so I said, Wow, I just started a record company, and I have a studio in the basement. He said, Great, we’ll do it for you. And we walked downstairs. And I put two microphones up, and I still have the tape of what we played for the first time,” Grisman said. “Anyhow, it’s just been kind of serendipitous like that. And then we did over 40 sessions for the next five years until he passed away.”

The seminal release in 1991 was simply called Garcia Grisman, with vocal/instrumental arrangements including the blues standard “The Thrill is Gone,” Irving Berlin’s “Russian Lullaby,” and an acoustic “Friend of the Devil.” Like Old And In The Way, this album circulated like mad among open-minded bluegrass and roots aficionados who adored its mellow swing, its fascinating repertoire, and the chance to hear Jerry Garcia play acoustic guitar in a manner so different from the Dead. They also released a jazz forward album called So What and an ostensible children’s album called Not For Kids Only that became, according to Grisman, his label’s all-time best-seller.

In early 1993, Tony Rice spent a few days at Grisman’s home making an album that tapped those masters’ love of great vintage instruments. Tone Poems featured 17 instrumentals, each with a pairing of guitars and mandolins made between the 1890s to the 1990s. (Acoustic Disc offers an expanded edition.) And what else to do in the evenings but invite Jerry Garcia over to meet and pick with Tony Rice? Recordings from those picking parties circulated among bluegrass nuts for years as bootlegs but were finally released formally as The Pizza Tapes, and Acoustic Disc offers the complete recordings as a 170-minute download. Other iconic duo sessions paired Grisman with Doc Watson (Doc And Dawg was another guidepost album for me and others) and Grisman with Del McCoury.

Grisman moved from California to a small seaside town on the Olympic Peninsula about a decade ago, but he still has a studio where Dawg magic happens. One recent project with implications for Grisman’s family legacy is the Dawg Trio with dissident banjo player and songwriter Danny Barnes (also now a Puget Sound resident) and Grisman’s son Sam on bass. Their collection Plays Tunes & Sings Songs is a multi-generational romp that shows the grooving power of Sam, who has his own Sam Grisman Project, a band that’s touring with a mix of original music and Dawg meets Dead repertoire.

While Grisman avows that he’s never been a Grateful Dead fan per se, being generally uninterested in electrified music, he’ll forever be part of the Dead’s story and reach because of his relationship with Garcia. As such, Grisman will play a key role in the upcoming exhibit Jerry Garcia: A Bluegrass Journey, which opens in March of 2024 in Owensboro, Kentucky. It will tell the story of Garcia’s acoustic roots, including Old and In The Way and the Grisman/Garcia sessions, establishing what a historic relationship it was.

Speaking of museum-worthy stuff, Grisman told me that he donated most of his studio multi-track masters to the Southern Folklife Collection at UNC Chapel Hill a while ago. The rest of the archive lives in his climate-controlled studio, where he works with Tracy and a small team to produce releases for Acoustic Disc and Acoustic Oasis. The growing collection assures us that Grisman’s diverse musical legacy will be available in perpetuity. They’re even talking about releasing that Osborne Brothers bootleg tape from 1963 – with permission of course.

(Editor’s Note: Read more writing by Craig Havighurst and listen to The String at WMOT.org)

Craig Havighurst is WMOT’s editorial director and host of The String, a weekly interview show airing on WMOT 89.5 Mondays at 8 pm, repeating Sundays at 7 am. He also co-hosts The Old Fashioned on Saturdays at 9 am and Tuesdays at 8 pm. Havighurst has been a regular contributor to BGS over the past decade. 

Photo Credit: Eric Frommer

Maya de Vitry & Ethan Jodziewicz are Seriously Playful on Basic Folk

Posted on by Shelby Williamson

Songwriter Maya de Vitry and bassist Ethan Jodziewicz come to their partnership with an understanding for their chosen lifestyle and a creative playfulness that enhances their connection. While Maya’s roots are firmly planted in folk music, Ethan brings classical music and improvisation to the table. They’ve been collaborating together since Maya’s post-Stray Birds solo career, which launched in early 2019 with her record, Adaptations. Fast forward to 2023, they are back alongside Joel Timmons and Hannah Delynn with the fabulous new EP, Infinite. For the first time in years, Maya is back on the road, while Ethan has been touring basically non-stop with musicians like Aoife O’Donovan, Sierra Hull, and Lindsay Lou. In our conversation, they talk about how it’s helpful to be in a relationship with someone who is also deeply committed to a musician’s lifestyle while understanding when someone needs a break.

LISTEN: APPLE • SPOTIFY • STITCHER • AMAZON • MP3

Maya also reflects on her current state of being within her body and how she has trouble recognizing physical pain to the point where she can’t move. She talks of the realization that she had the tendency to tense up when picking up a guitar and how that was because she felt like she didn’t belong. Ethan and Maya share their observations on working within a boundary. Ethan laments that he often works within a boundary with improvisation while Maya speaks of placing limitations around touring and performing live shows. We end this insightful interview with Maya revealing celebrity sightings are her Nashville Starbucks and a very fun Lightning Round called “Which One.”

Photo Credit: Maya de Vitry by Kaitlyn Raitz; Ethan Jodziewicz by Lily Smith

LISTEN: Diane Coll, “I Don’t Know”

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Artist: Diane Coll
Hometown: Chicago, Illinois
Song: “I Don’t Know”
Album: Old Ghosts
Release Date: January 16, 2024

In Their Words: “This is a lighthearted song about spiritual surrender and my own internal dialogue of learning to let go. There is great relief in detaching from any outcome. There is great beauty in not knowing what’s around the corner and just simply sitting, watching the river flow.

“I love how Daniel Groover’s drums and Jonny Daly’s guitar solo magnify the playful, nothing-to-lose mindset needed to truly let go of control and trust in the flow of life. It is affirming to me that, although I had not originally planned for ‘I Don’t Know’ to be on the album, the song took on a life of its own and became a no-brainer for inclusion. To surrender control can lead to some happy surprises!” – Diane Coll

Photo Credit: Troy Moore and Diane Coll

BGS Class of 2023: Our Year-End Favorites

Posted on by Justin Hiltner

Year-end lists can be so problematic – pitting distinct sounds and music against each other, peddling absolutes, attempting objectivity in a demonstrably subjective field. Each year, as we consider the music that impacted us over the course of twelve months, we try to challenge ourselves and each other, as BGS contributors, to think outside the year-end round up “box.” 

For the BGS Class of 2023, our intention is to highlight music, songs, albums, and performances that have stuck with us, or that we know will continue to stick with us into the future. We wanted to deliberately look beyond the music and creators that merely have the resources, networks, and access to reach us; we wanted to utilize genre as a checkpoint or touchstone, but never as a blanket criterion; we wanted to broaden what forms of media or formats are included; and overall, we wanted to attempt a holistic look at what a year of listening, learning, watching, and hearing can look like to this particular group of people. 

You’ll find ravishing and large indie folk, earnest and literary – and raucous and silly – bluegrass, legendary legacy artists and brand new lineups, soundtracks and live shows, and more. Ultimately, whatever the year, we always want our retrospective lists to be a starting point, a springboard, for our readers, followers, and for roots music fans. This is not the end-all, be-all “Best of 2023” list. Instead, it’s a reminder of the music that scored a year absolutely filled to bursting with excellent, exemplary, ecstatic roots songs, albums, and shows. 

boygenius in Pittsburgh, June 2023

When I saw boygenius this summer, I was milktoast about the whole thing going into it. As soon as I arrived, I realized I was surrounded by young people – and not just any young people: All the beautiful freaks were out for Lucy, Julien, and Phoebe. The energy was palpable and something that I have not experienced in over 20 years. Everyone knew every word. They were FaceTiming friends who cried and sang along remotely with these heroes on stage. It was inspiring!

boygenius feels like an important band. I so wish they had been around when I was an outcast teenager feeling such confusing, wild emotions. Music has a way of helping the world make sense. boygenius radiates communion and it felt like an honor to be a part of their world. – Cindy Howes

Caitlin Canty, Quiet Flame

My favorite bluegrass album of the year is often an album that, through no fault of its own, ends up receiving little to no bluegrass radio airplay or IBMA Awards recognition, and as I listened to Caitlin Canty’s Quiet Flame over and over this year, I couldn’t help but expect it would end up criminally underrated by the general bluegrass community. It’s made by bluegrass pickers – Canty assembled Chris Eldridge (who also was the project’s producer), her husband Noam Pikelny, Brittany Haas, Paul Kowert, Sarah Jarosz, and Andrew Marlin for her band – and as a result Quiet Flame, more often than not, is just an unencumbered string band album that’s as much bluegrass as it is Americana and singer-songwriter folk. But while Mighty Poplar, with a similar lineup of folks, takes off in bluegrass circles, it raises an eyebrow that this impeccable, heartfelt, and complicated set of songs hasn’t seen the same trajectory. Not that that was Canty’s goal – it’s obvious her priorities in music making are grounded and community-minded, part of why this album is such a stunner. “Odds of Getting Even,” co-written with another BGS favorite, Maya de Vitry, is one of the year’s best songs, bar none. – Justin Hiltner

A Homeplace Pilgrimage to Earl Scruggs Music Festival, August 2023

L: Nina Simone’s homeplace in Tryon, NC. R: Earl Scruggs’ homeplace in Boiling Springs, NC. Both photos by Justin Hiltner.

BGS once again co-presented the Earl Scruggs Revue tribute set hosted by Tony Trischka at Earl Scruggs Music Festival, held just outside of Shelby, North Carolina at the Tryon International Equestrian Center in August. On my drive to the festival grounds, I made stops in Tryon proper, to visit Nina Simone’s childhood home, and also in Shelby, to visit the Earl Scruggs Center and to drive by both of the Scruggs homeplaces just outside of Boiling Springs, North Carolina. It was stunning to visit both homes on the same day, to realize the interconnectedness of so much of American popular music. Simone grew up with a view of the Blue Ridge Mountains from her front porch nestled in one of their hollers, yet we place Scruggs as an Appalachian musician and not Simone? 

The festival and Scruggs Center, for their parts, did an excellent job of demonstrating how broad, varied, and intricate American roots music is, even while focusing closely on bluegrass, string band, and Americana music. Listeners of our podcast, Carolina Calling, will know how much BGS loves North Carolina music history – the show features episodes on both Scruggs and Simone. Seeing that history in person, while heading to a first-class, banjo-heavy festival was a favorite musical moment of this year, for sure. – Justin Hiltner

East Nash Grass, Last Chance to Win

East Nash Grass seems to be all the buzz on the bluegrass circuit these days and those who have ventured to Dee’s Country Cocktail Lounge on any Monday night since 2017 can certainly understand why. The band’s long-standing residency at the Madison, Tennessee dive bar has taken them from a weekly pick-up band to performing at the Grand Ole Opry, the Ryman Auditorium, and at bluegrass festivals across the U.S. Their sophomore album, Last Chance to Win, captures the band at their very best (albeit, without their lovable stage antics). Following a 2023 IBMA nomination for Best New Artist, it won’t be a surprise if we see this record, and these musicians, sweeping awards in 2024 and beyond. – Thomas Cassell

Alejandro Escovedo at Cat’s Cradle Backroom, Carrboro, NC, November 2023

There are countless good reasons why you should make a point of seeing the Texas punk/soul godfather if he’s ever playing anywhere near you. But what might be the best reason of all is it’s a lead-pipe cinch that everyone in your town worth hanging out with will be there, too – onstage as well as in the crowd. Escovedo was among a dozen stars drawn to the North Carolina Triangle for an all-star “Nuggets” tribute show overseen by Lenny Kaye in November. So, he came a night early and played a solo show, too, ably supported by local luminaries Lynn Blakey and Pinetops/The Right Profile guitarist Jeffrey Dean Foster. The love in the room was palpable on deeply moving originals like “Sister Lost Soul” and “Wave Goodbye.” And when Kaye and R.E.M.’s Peter Buck came on for a closing Velvet Underground cameo of “Pale Blue Eyes” and “Sweet Jane,” the circle was complete. – David Menconi

Ben Garnett, “Open Your Books” (featuring Brittany Haas and Paul Kowert)

Before I’d listened to the complete #BGSClassof2023 Spotify playlist and realized this track was one of our first additions, the app kept recommending “Open Your Books” to me – and it’s not hard to see why. From guitarist and composer Ben Garnett’s debut album, Imitation Fields, the track features bassist Paul Kowert and fiddler Brittnay Haas and is an example of what bluegrass music can be, and what traditionally bluegrass instruments can do.

The tune opens slowly, with guitar and mandola – provided by Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway’s own Dominick Leslie. Fiddle swells, orchestral arrangements, and dreamy acoustic production make for a piece that feels distinctly intellectual. It’s chambergrass, but it’s also highly listen-able. While there’s a strong melodic thread throughout, the surrounding instruments and their players are allowed to wander off up the guitar neck, throwing in trill-y banjo licks, and detouring outside traditional fills and solo styles. The record was produced by Chris Eldridge and also features Matthew Davis on banjo and additional guitar from Billy Contreras. I’d recommend this tune to low-fi lovers, roots music fans, and anyone looking for a chilled out moment. It’s perfect for an introspective drive or a rainy winter day spent drinking hot tea at the window. – Lonnie Lee Hood

Alice Gerrard, Sun to Sun

Never, over the course of her lifelong career in music, has Alice Gerrard stopped, having reached her musical destination. She has challenged herself, time and time again, not simply for reinvention’s sake, but because she is a consummate old-time and bluegrass musician, someone so solidly bitten by the string band bug that making music requires that constant movement, that aspirational looking into the future, girded by songs of the past. But Sun to Sun, her latest – and perhaps final – album, features songs decidedly of the present. A synthesizer of traditional art forms, Gerrard takes textures and colors we relate to “authenticity” and leverages them to serve the messages in these tracks. Aging, mortality, justice, apartheid, gun violence, community are all woven into this collection. Alice is their nexus point, around which the entire project revolves and reflects the cosmic light she continues to shine on all of us – and on roots music subjects too often hidden in the shadows. – Justin Hiltner

A Good Year for Soundtracks – Asteroid City, The Holdovers, and More

Between the Writers Guild and Screen Actors’ strikes, 2023 was a weird year for the entertainment industry. But for those releases that did make it to the screen, it was a great year for movie soundtracks, especially for roots music fans.

First up, Wes Anderson’s western sci-fi Asteroid City. In addition to the usual cadre of Anderson’s cast, the film was peppered with classic country and bluegrass recordings from the likes of Tex Ritter, Slim Whitman, Bill Monroe, and Johnny Duncan & the Blue Grass Boys (you read that right). That’s to say nothing of the incredibly catchy original ear worm, “Dear Alien (Who Art In Heaven)” which felt as classic as those twentieth century tunes of the frontier written decades ago.

Capping off the year was Alexander Payne’s The Holdovers, a beautiful ode to a particular style of 1970s filmmaking that stars Paul Giamatti. Set in snowy western Massachusetts over a lonely winter break in 1970, the soundtrack plays like an old, soft blanket – familiar and warming.  Newer tracks from Damian Jurado and Khruangbin weave seamlessly alongside ‘70s AM gold and Mark Orton’s pensive, folksy score. But the real standout of this soundtrack is a rediscovery of British folk artist Labi Siffre. His music has been shamefully overlooked in U.S. folk canon. Hopefully this movie can help start to rectify that.

Finally, it would be criminal if I didn’t mention the key placement of Indigo Girls’ “Closer to Fine” in the biggest hit of the year, Barbie. Here’s to another generation of young women finding themselves in Amy and Emily’s music. Thanks, Greta Gerwig. – Amy Reitnouer Jacobs

Kristen Grainger & True North, “Extraordinary Grace”

Take the anvil from my chest…

I am gasping for breath at this opening line. In her extraordinary, intimate voice, Kristen Grainger is pleading, letting us know she has lost hope. And we are right there with her. Whether we believed salvation came from the church or the Voting Rights Act, we believe no more. We are a fractured world, and it seems there is no bringing us together. Kristen’s melodies pull you in as much as her words, and I sometimes wake with this haunting song emerging from my dreams. Her bandmates’ graceful harmonies and instrumental accompaniment support the stunning words. 

I once believed in extraordinary grace
I put my faith in saints and saviors
In the mirror, I can’t bear to see my heroine
Killing time until time returns the favor.

Still, there is cause for hope: the promise of more music from True North. – Claire Levine

Angélique Kidjo at New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival, April 2023

“We can’t hear! We can’t hear!” Not what a performer wants to hear an audience chanting – though Angélique Kidjo didn’t hear it for a couple of songs at the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival in April. She was giving it all, singing and dancing with vigor and verve, as she does. But the Benin-born star’s voice and all but the drums and percussion from her band were not reaching the crowd, that had already waited out a 45-minute rain delay. Finally, the stage crew got the message, but it still took some time to get things working. When they did, Kidjo betrayed no frustration – just pure, joyful release as she packed a full set’s worth of spirit into the handful of songs she could squeeze in the remaining time slot, including a few highlights from her re-infusion of Talking Heads’ Remain in Light album. Closing with her idol/mentor Mariam Makeba’s signature “Pata Pata,” she was radiant, as was everyone who stuck around to see and hear her. – Steve Hochman

The Lemon Twigs, Everything Harmony

This album is, without reservation or exaggeration, one of the most beautiful records I have heard in my entire life. Building on inspiration from ‘60s/’70s pop-rock (think the Byrds,Todd Rundgren, the Beach Boys, the Flamin’ Groovies), the Lemon Twigs achieve a layered delicacy of nostalgia and innovation. Their creative impulses are so detailed, articulate, and inspired that the entire album feels unfathomable; how could music reach such timelessness that it tickles at the preterhuman? Brothers Michael and Brian D’addario share the songwriting credits for pieces that feel distinctly matured from much of their earlier work. They’ve pared down the theatrics, tightened the sprawling lyrics, and created from a place that strikes a quintessential balance of self and influence. Their result is something oceanic – music that calls upon its ancestry in a way that is pervasive, striking, and sublimates the query of eternity. – Oriana Mack

Ronnie Milsap’s Final Nashville Concert, October 2023

Ronnie Milsap’s final Nashville concert will resonate with me for many years to come, both because of the multiple memorable performances and because it represented the best of country music from the standpoint of diversity and inclusion. Various performers from across the musical spectrum covered Milsap hits, with songs from every arena – honky-tonk and straight country tearjerkers, reworked doo-wop, R&B, and pop classics, love songs, and slice of life retrospectives. The roster of artists who displayed their love and affection for Milsap’s music crossed racial, gender, and sexual orientation lines, and it was also great to see the legend himself conclude the proceedings. While the Nashville audience and community will miss Milsap’s performances, this last outing provided plenty of wonderful moments and lots of great music that will never be forgotten. – Ron Wynn

New Dangerfield’s Debut at IBMA Bluegrass Live!, September 2023

For years a growing number of Black musicians have entered the trad scene and reclaimed Black traditions key to its development and evolution. Their work has run the gamut from preservation to experimentation. Audiences at this year’s IBMA Bluegrass Live! were introduced to a new Black string band that does it all: New Dangerfield. Made up of powerhouses Tray Wellington, Kaïa Kater, Jake Blount, and Nelson Williams, New Dangerfield has, in their own words, “risen to carry the torch.” In their premiere performance the band delivered an eclectic set of early jazz, early blues — and even a cover of R&B musician H.E.R’s “Hard Place,” led by Kater’s deliciously lush vocals. Each member, proficient instrumentalists in their own right, also showed off their technical chops and drew whoops from the crowd. Their set was something historic, and I’m excited to see what comes next from New Dangerfield. – Brandi Waller-Pace

Railbird Festival, June 2023

Set in the heart of Lexington, Kentucky, under a deep-red Strawberry Moon, the 2023 Railbird Festival was an under-the-radar masterstroke, highlighting the confluence of roots music and the mainstream. Held June 3 and 4 on the spacious lawn of The Infield at Red Mile, a sold-out crowd of 40,000+ enjoyed a non-stop lineup of performers from across the “Americana” pantheon, expertly curated and spread out over three stages. With 32 acts in total, country, rock, folk, bluegrass and more were all represented, as headliners Tyler Childers and Zach Bryan topped a bill including Charley Crockett, Whiskey Myers, Morgan Wade, Nickel Creek, Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway – even Weezer and Sheryl Crow. Combine all that with a well-thought out fan experience and an off-the-beaten path vibe, and the weekend was an ideal kickoff to festival season. – Chris Parton

Sam Shackleton at the Horseshoe Tavern, October 2023

Country fandom has always been ideological, but in the last few years the genre’s politics have felt plainer – clear villains and clear heroes, but also messy interior politics. Through this time, I’ve mostly been listening to folk music far away from the fighting at home, from musicians like Sam Shackleton, a genius singer and banjo player from Scotland. He was supporting the Mary Wallopers, the radical Irish party band, in Toronto in October. Shackleton was great, working the audience, singing his songs, and classic folk tracks. The crowd was restless, the beer he was offered on stage seemed pro forma, but he tried. There was a version of “All You Fascists (Are Bound To Lose)” that gave me hope for a few minutes. We step out for a smoke, and Shackelton is on the patio, nursing a lager. I tell him I loved the show and that I wanted vinyl. He hugs me and thanks me. Walking back in, the room is filled with Irish expats who are singing along to the Wallopers in ways that feel a little hostile. I leave early, going for Chinese food. These couple of hours were country/folk in 2023 for me – inclusive, exclusive, hand shakes, hugs, and isolation – plus enough physical/emotional distance from the world that I didn’t ask exactly how the fascists would lose. – Steacy Easton

Sleeping in the Woods Festival, May 2023

At a time when money in the music industry is at an all time low, and expenses are at an all time high, I have immense gratitude for anyone starting new community projects to showcase and uplift musicians and songwriters. I was lucky enough to get to be a part of Nicholas Jamerson’s Sleeping in the Woods Festival in Cumberland, Kentucky in May of 2023, and this event makes my best-of list. The festival bills itself as songwriter specific and showcases many lesser known Kentucky songwriters and bands. The strategy is to create a listening environment and bring together a Southern audience hungry for more straight-shooting roots music and hard hitting lyrics after becoming fans of Tyler Childers, Sturgill Simpson, and of course, Jamerson himself. After a successful first year, the festival is poised to grow exponentially and become a beloved annual event for all of those involved. – Rachel Baiman

Billy Strings at Bourbon and Beyond, September 2023

After five years of programming the BGS stage at Bourbon & Beyond, the Louisville-based festival has become something of a homecoming for our whole team. But nothing was more special than this year, when we got to see Billy Strings headline the main stage in front of over 50,000 people. It seems like just yesterday (in reality it was more like 2018) that Billy played our own stage inside the Bourbon Tent, a memory made all the sweeter by his surprise appearance this year on our stage during Michael Cleveland’s set. Hopefully it’s one of many happy returns to B&B for Billy, his fans, and BGS for years to come. – Amy Reitnouer Jacobs

Sunny War, Anarchist Gospel

Nobody sounds like Sunny War. As her profile has risen over the past decade, Sunny has held onto her punk rock politics and direct lyricism, grounding her artistry in the blues. Listening to one of her songs is like looking at a diorama of a nearby planet, similar to our own, but with none of human society’s bullshit. 2023’s Anarchist Gospel features Americana heavyweights David Rawlings, Jim James, Allison Russell, and Chris Pierce, but always sounds exactly like Sunny. Her hypnotic guitar work and precise songcraft shine. Her vocals walk a fine line between eerie and inviting. And at the end of a year when riot grrl aesthetics have gone mainstream, Sunny War is a rare reminder of what the real thing sounds like.  – Lizzie No

Photo Credit: Angélique Kidjo by Fabrice Mabillot; Billy Strings by Christopher Morley; boygenius by Matt Grubb.