The Murphy Method Blog

After an extremely slow afternoon tending our booth at the IBMA tradeshow, I popped down the street to the Hilton hotel to interview the band G2, on whom I’m writing a magazine article. I’m old fashioned and still use a cassette recorder to tape interviews. To my embarassment I had brought the recorder, a mic, and extra batteries…but no tapes! Luckily Erik, the mandolin player, had an iPod with a little recorder to capture our conversation. Wshew!

After that I headed down to lower Broad to Roberts Western Wear to catch the Bloggrass boys show. The single, if you can call it that, from the new CD is a hilarious song called “Democrat Ain’t a Dirty Word No More.” They had some great guests, including the amazing singer Jonell Mosser. And I had the unique experience of purchasing their CD from Suzy Bogguss, who sings on it.

L-R: Josh McMurry, (hidden Mike Witcher), Travis Stinson, Paul Kramer, Chris Jones, Jon Weisberger, Aaron Till.

My next stops were at after-hours showcases where I caught a wide variety of bands including:

Red Wine, from Italy.

Goldheart, a wonderful trio of sisters from Virginia. I first heard them two years ago and since then they have developed their musicianship by leaps and bounds. The 16-year-old sister, Jocelyn, writes some wonderful songs and picks the fire out of the guitar. 18-year-old Analise holds her own on the mandolin, while 13-year-old Shelby tears it up on the fiddle. Their trio is stunning.

I caught my brother Chris playing with former Two-Stringer and Winfield Guitar Champion Tyler Grant.

The above band tours Japan every year. Shin Akimoto, Andy Ball, Sammy Shelor, Maro Katawba (I apologize if I’ve misspelled names there…). When I stuck my head in the door they were picking a triple-mandolin version of “Golden Slippers.”

And once again to end up the night, G2. There were very few people in that 1:30 am showcase, so we clapped twice as loud to make up for it. L-R: Tobias Strömberg, Christoffer Olsson, Jimmy Sunnebrandt, Erik Igelström, Jens Koch.

Monday night I caught a couple of after-hours showcases when the official showcases were over. I dropped in on Gloria Bell and Tennessee Sunshine and enjoyed hearing Gloria pick the fire out of the mandolin:

Gloria started playing when she was young and even quit high school so that she could play music for a living. That’s gutsy.

My next stop was watching G2, the wonderful Swedish bluegrass band. Here are some randomly arranged shots of them:

Since I’m not regularly a late night person I pooped out relatively early (1:30) and headed to the house. I like to say that I’m just saving up my energy for later in the week!

Last weekend I journeyed up to Owensboro, KY for the ROMP festival, which benefits the International Bluegrass Music Museum. My friend Sally Jones and I drove up with her daughter Joanna, and their friend Cindy, visiting from Switzerland. It is rare that I get to go to a festival purely for fun, and rarer still to get to go with friends. Saturday at the festival was particularly international. The new young band G2, from Sweeden, played a wonderful set. They are absolutely the best European bluegrass band around and their banjo player, Jens Koch, plays it like it should be played (according to no less an authority than Pete Kuykendall). I had picked some with them at a party in Nashville the night before and couldn’t have enjoyed it more. This is G2:

The Italian band Red Wine appeared. They are one of the longest running European bands. Banjo player Silvio Ferretti founded the group in 1978. People drove from as far away as Texas to see them. This is Red Wine:

Also on the bill, Americans the Claire Lynch Band, Cherryholmes, and the Infamous Stringdusters, among others. A nice surprise was seeing Crooked Still. This combo of cello, fiddle, bass, banjo, and vocalist has amazing groove. Their banjo player, Greg Liszt and I were at the University of Virginia at the same time. He has appeared with Bruce Springsteen, and plays the banjo with four fingers (three fingerpicks and a thumbpick). Amazing. I have no idea how he does it. (more…)