It's taken decades for the nature and impact of Jerry Garcia’s formative years as a musician and band leader to emerge and become semi-common knowledge, because for many, his devotion to old-time string band and bluegrass music between 1961 and 1964 doesn’t square with the quantum jams he’d be leading just a few years later. But because of the Dead, we have jamgrass, a popular branch of the family tree where instrumental interplay coexists with preservation of classic songs. And at last, this connection is made, and this story is told, in a new museum exhibit set for a two-year run, Jerry Garcia – A Bluegrass Journey, at the Bluegrass Music Hall Of Fame & Museum in Owensboro, KY. Episode 280 of The String takes you there with sound and voices from its grand opening weekend in late March.
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The Wonder Women of Country, a side project of busy Americana songwriter/artists Brennen Leigh, Kelly Willis and Melissa Carper, started in 2021 as a touring vehicle for three friends with compatible visions of country music. Fans have been loving it, and naturally they started asking if there was a recording to take home. The WWOC have made good on that desire with a self-titled EP, released on March 15. -
After more than a decade helming her progressive acoustic band The New Hip, bass player Missy Raines has reconfigured and turned back to the music she was raised on and the genre for which she’s been named Bass Player of the Year by the International Bluegrass Music Association ten times, most recently in 2021. Her new band is called Allegheny, and her new album Highlander finds her singing about the lonesome wind, fast-moving trains, and more weighty and contemporary subjects in the old school style. -
Few pickers have toured harder or traveled farther than jamgrass veteran Vince Herman, who co-founded the iconic Leftover Salmon 34 years ago in Colorado. Yet there are always new things to try, so he’s added the band The High Hawks to his list of collaborations. Our sit-down visit was sparked by that band’s album Mother Nature’s Show doing so well on the Americana chart and by his own recent move from Colorado to Nashville, where he’s become a hub of the picking scene and an avid co-writer. We cover a lot of ground from his origins in Pittsburgh and West Virginia to the everlasting desire to play the next show. Also in the hour, progressive banjo player Kyle Tuttle calls in from a fishing trip to talk about his years with Molly Tuttle and his new solo album Labor Of Lust.
LINER NOTES
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A closer look at the three bands performing Wednesday night from 7 to 9pm at Tennessee Brew Works for WMOT's Local Brew Fifth Anniversary show. -
Jessie Scott sat down with Willi Carlisle at The Fitting Room Studio in Madison, as he is getting ready to play the Basement East on April 13. -
Jessie Scott sits down with Grammy winner, Cedric Burnside for a WMOT Words & Music session.
WMOT VIDEO: LIVE SESSIONS ON NPR MUSIC
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Click here to watch Tommy Prine and Maggie Antone LIVE at Riverside Revival for WMOT's Wired In series on May 1st at 7 p.m. CST. -
KT Tunstall performed "Three", "Hallowed Ground" and "Big Black Horse & A Cherry Tree" at a beach house turned studio in Florida for WMOT's 2024 30A Songwriters Sessions. -
Earlier this month, Sarah Jarosz and John R. Miller performed at Riverside Revival for WMOT's Wired In series. Watch highlights from their show here. -
Last Friday, Allison Russell was honored with an exhibit at the National Museum of African American Music. To note the occasion, she was interviewed by Alice Randall and her daughter Caroline Randall Williams. Watch the full interview and performance here.
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