Craig Havighurst

Nashville-based breakout solo artist Allison Russell finds herself in a good place going into the 2022 Grammy Awards with three nominations, including Americana Album of the Year. Outside Child was released in late May on Fantasy Records and received immediate acclaim for its insightful and healing reflections on horrible abuse she suffered in her youth. Its song “Nightflyer” has been tagged for two possible Grammys, as American Roots Song and American Roots Performance.

Ten years ago, Phoebe Hunt was a new touring artist, playing progressive western swing with the Belleville Outfit out of her hometown of Austin. Now she’s applying lessons from travel, yoga, study and youth collaboration to her band The Gatherers and her two recent, highly complimentary albums, Shanti’s Shadow (2017) and Neither One Of Us Is Wrong, out last Friday.

Doc Watson captivated the 1960s American folk music revival like few other artists, with his authentic mountain music, his rich and emotional voice and his blazing technique on guitar and banjo. Craig speaks with Appalachian Studies professor Dr. Ted Olson about his work on a new career anthology about the late, great North Carolina musician.

A long-planned partnership between the Roots Barn venue development in Madison and radio show Music City Roots dissolved last week, and MCR producers and staff have departed the holding company Roots Productions, LLC.

The iconic gospel group, with a clear line of succession back to its 1930s origins, remains a powerful creative force in roots music, with abundant collaborations, several new recordings and a revived touring schedule. Craig Havighurst got to sit down with veterans Jimmy Carter and Ricky McKinnie on their recent swing through Nashville.

Doyle Lawson has been mingling the holy and the down home in his blistering traditional bluegrass over a career on the road stretching back just shy of 60 years. Now at 77, he's stepping away from touring and the album cycle, leaving us with the swan song album Roundtable. In a career-spanning conversation we talk about getting hired by Jimmy Martin at age 18, about forming and leading his band Quicksilver, and about his observations, as a conservative Christian, of efforts to diversify bluegrass music.

The Next Waltz has evolved from a YouTube sessions channel and a singles label to a compendium of what's new and special in Texas songwriting culture, steered by veteran artist and producer Bruce Robison. Recently the company took on management of breakout star Charley Crockett. And in late September, it released its first album by a solo artist, Back Down Home by Tony Kamel.

John Sebastian is most famous as the founder of and songwriter for the Lovin' Spoonful, which produced a fresh crop of folk rock hits in the late 60s. But there's much more to his story. In a full hour conversation, Sebastian talks about learning music in Washington Square in the 50s, about the great song "Nashville Cats," about Woodstock and his time with NRBQ. His most recent project was to team up with guitarist Arlen Roth to reinterpret great songs from the Spoonful catalog.

The revered Nashville songwriter has dropped a new Georgia-themed album on behalf of voting rights, wrapped his latest Ryman Auditorium residency and conspicuously stepped up on behalf of artists and his values in the public eye.

2020's lockdown inspired the first song on Della Mae's new album, a cathartic, vibrantly bluegrass project called Family Reunion. Celia Woodsmith and Kimber Ludiker talk about the band's origins, its overseas adventures and the feeling of making music again in the same room.