One of the bands who impressed me most back in January on Jam Cruise 9 was none other than Michigan’s Greensky Bluegrass. This motley five-piece has been honing their original
On October 21 PBS’s American Masters series will premiere Cameron Crowe’s highly anticipated documentary Pearl Jam Twenty. Crowe recently sat for a panel at the Television Critics Association press tour in
Each year when the calendar turns from July to August, along with countless others, I turn my attention to one man: Jerry Garcia. With August 1 being the birthday of the Grateful Dead guitarist and August 9 the anniversary of his death, the first weeks of August tend to be filled with memories of Jerry. Last Monday, on what would have been his 69th birthday, we asked the @Hidden_Track followers on Twitter to share their favorite Garcia moment of all-time as part of the #htconvo.
My favorite moment came from the storied Oregon State Prison show with John Kahn (no relation) in May of 1982 – sorry about the typo (*Cherise).
READ ON to see our readers’ favorite Garcia moments…
The schedule for next weekend’s Outside Lands festival has finally come out and the event’s main stage, Lands End, will feature a dream sequence of The Original Meters followed by
The Cave Singers emerged as one of the big winners at the Newport Folk Festival this past weekend, as they delivered a terrific set which was featured live on NPR
Old 97’s @ Lincoln Hall, July 19
It’s unfair, when you think about it, but I’m also kind of glad the Old 97’s aren’t as beloved as many of their musical peers. Then, they’d be your band, in addition to my band.
We all have “my” bands. The band you hold tight and celebrate for your depth of knowledge and their consistently winning live experience. The band for which you’re more of an apologist than you should be when they don’t deliver. The band you spend a hell of a lot of time evangelizing and dragging less enthused pals to see in concert just because then they might finally get it.
Most “my” bands seem to have certain characteristics: a critical darling, perhaps, languishing in that concert space between rock clubs and theaters, too big for the former and not quite ever ready for the latter. You spend less time worried about whether they’ll ever make it over that hump, however, and just enjoy that they are. Rare do “my bands” ever seem to get there, anyway, unless, of course — like the band most often discussed on Hidden Track — they ascended on grassroots popularity and the wondrously shared experience of a whole lot of people who saw a true “my band” in formative years in Vermont.
READ ON for more on Old 97’s at Lincoln Hall…
Last week, we discussed Subsonic, which allows you to stream music and video to any PC or Mobile Device. While Subsonic offers many features & capabilities, it is not an ideal solution for everyone. This week we’ll be examining Google Music Beta which may be a better solution for some.
So wait…why tell us about another way to listen to your music away from home?
As we pointed out last week, there are many different options to be able to access your music anywhere you want. Google Music Beta differs from Subsonic and other streaming options in that your music is uploaded and hosted by Google. If your music resides on a laptop or another machine that is not constantly on, streaming from that computer is not a viable option. Likewise, if your music is behind a firewall and you do not have the ability to open ports on a router (for example on a campus), streaming from your own computer will be an issue. READ ON for more of this week’s column…
Following webcasts of sold out shows from Madison Square Garden and the Verizon Wireless Amphitheatre in Alpharetta, Phish will once again offer pay-per-view broadcasts on Aug. 9 and 10 from
With its five famous verses and a chorus that just begs to be sung along to, The Weight is one of the best known songs by The Band and was released on their 1968 debut album Music From Big Pink. For all the information you ever could possibly want to know, check out this link.
The Contestants:
Artist: Aretha Franklin
Album: Soul Folk in Action
The Skinny: Leading off this week is definitely one of the best covers of The Weight and the first of this week’s contestants to feature the late Duane Allman on guitar. Also the first of a few really incredible soul/gospel arrangements.
READ ON for more covers of The Weight by The Band…
When The Del McCoury Band teamed up with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band to record the album American Legacies, the merging of the two bands represented more then just a simple musical collaboration. The union brought together two groups who serve as the ambassadors of their respective genres, stewards of American music heritage. Over the years, beyond being of the foremost musicians in their fields, both The Del McCoury Band and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band under the direction of Ben Jaffe have taken on roles tasked with spreading the legacies of bluegrass and New Orleans Jazz music.
Del McCoury has not only spread bluegrass to the younger generation (quite literally) through teaching and playing with his own sons, but he has participated in countless collaborations throughout the festival circuit and embraced the various derivations of traditional bluegrass such as newgrass and the jambands. Similarly, Ben Jaffe and Preservation Hall have reached new audiences by incorporating New Orleans Jazz into collaborations with My Morning Jacket, Ani Difranco and Tom Waits, among others.
In what was undeniably one of the greatest honors I’ve ever had as a writer, I sat down with both Del McCoury and Ben Jaffe at the Ameritania Hotel just around the corner from the Ed Sullivan Theater right before the bands took the stage to tape their performance for the David Letterman show later that night. In speaking with Del and Ben, it takes all of about five seconds to see why everybody wants to play music with them. They radiate charisma and come across instantly as truly genuine people who are happy to be doing what they do. What follows is an intimate conversation that touches on the cross-fertilization of the two genres of music, the surprising similarities between New Orleans Jazz and bluegrass, the importance of family, and honoring one’s heritage.
Hidden Track: I was going to ask this to both you, but before Ben gets here, Del, when you were first starting out in music and learning your chops what led you to your style, to bluegrass, and to your instrument?
Del McCoury: I learned to play the guitar when I was about nine. My brother taught me to play. When I was about 11, he bought a record of Earl Scruggs and when I heard him play that three finger style banjo, it turned a light on. I thought, “That is what I want to do!” I learned it, and I played it until I went to work for Bill Monroe.
He needed a guitar player and a lead singer, which I thought, “I don’t know if I can do this?” I had played with him here in New York City, my first time in this town. Later, I went down to Nashville, because he offered me a job, and when I got there he still didn’t have a lead singer and guitar player. All along I think he was thinking that of me, because a lot of his musicians through the years could play different instruments and sing.
Anyway, he put me on that path instead of the path I wanted to go on, which was playing banjo and singing harmony. I could sing all the harmony parts. I was kind of a natural tenor singer and I sang baritone in a lot of bands, but when he got me to play guitar, it was a pretty big challenge, because I had to learn to play all the songs he had recorded and wanted to play at the shows. He told me, “You know, if you can make the grade doing this, you’ll like it better.” I remember thinking, “I believe he’s wrong there,” but he was right. So that’s what got me here on this path. It was actually Bill Monroe.
[Ben arrives and pulls up a stool]
READ ON for more of Ryan’s chat with Del and Ben…
