Bluegrass Jam Along Interviews

My guest this week is Cameron Knowler. Cameron is a multi-instrumentalist who specialises in bluegrass, old time and jazz. I was first introduced to Cameron by Bob Minner, who I interviewed back in March 2022 (episode #177). Cameron also writes regularly for Acoustic Guitar magazine and has written a fascinating book called 'Guitars Have Feelings Too - A Method for Rural Guitarists', whi...

Hi everyone. This is another Food For Thought episode and it centres around the idea of perfection. Chris Eldridge said something recently that made me think about letting go of the idea of playing perfectly - I had an experience at a jam this week that really made me understand what he meant. Have a listen and feel free to head over to  Bluegrass Jamalong's Instagram  or  Facebook  and tell...

Hi. Just a quick update for those of you listening to the Bluegrass Jam Along Interviews podcast. You may not know there's another podcast just called Bluegrass Jam Along, featuring over 200 free jam along tracks for fiddle tunes. Spotify won't host those episodes as they break a rule about the amount of music in a podcast, which is daft, but is also their rule so I can't do anythin...

My guest this week is Steve Nall, better known as Nully, head of production at Collings guitars. I didn't realise till we sat down to chat that it was exactly five years to the day since Bill Collings passed. We talked about Bill, his approach to guitar making (and life in general), as well as how the business has developed, with and without him and how Nully got into guitar building in the f...

My guest this week is Marcel Ardans, from the Lessons With Marcel YouTube channel. Marcel has spent hours (probably weeks) transcribing the playing of bluegrass players. In this episode he picks four of his favourites and we chat about their styles, influences and what makes them unique. First up is Billy Strings, followed by Trey Hensley, Molly Tuttle and Tony Rice. Check out Marcel's fantas...

My guest this week is Emma John, author of the wonderful book 'Wayfaring Stranger - A Musical Journey in the American South'. We chat about what made a British journalist and cricket fan want to travel to North Carolina and write a book about bluegrass, the key lesson Emma learned from the Kruger Brothers and so much more. I loved this one - it feels as much a conversation about life and...

My guest on Bluegrass Jam Along this week is Happy Traum. Happy founded Homespun with his wife, Jane, in 1967. In the 55 years that followed, Homespun has helped hundreds of thousands of people learn to play music and has worked with some of the all-time bluegrass greats, including Tony Rice, Norman Blake, Bill Monroe, John Hartford, Sam Bush and many, many more. Happy share the story of how Homes...

Yesterday was June 8th 2022 and would have been Tony Rice's birthday. As a tribute to Tony I've put together a compilation of some of the conversations I've had for this podcast where the guests mentioned Tony. I wanted to wait till today to release it as yesterday, Tony's actual birthday, I was speaking to Happy Traum of Homespun, who was a good friend of Tony's and worke...

Hi. We haven't had a Food For Thought episode for a while, but I've had something in my head all week based on a few Facebook posts I saw. The general theme was whether something can be called bluegrass if it has a non-traditionally bluegrass instrument in it (e.g. pedal steel or accordion). In the episode I play a clip of my interview with Tristan Scroggins where he discusses genre and...

My guest this week is current IBMA Fiddle Player of the Year Bronwyn Keith-Hynes. We chatted about her fantastic record  Fiddler's Pastime , which features guest performances from Sierra Hull, Tim O'Brien and Sarah Jarosz. Check it out - it's great! We also talked about Bronwyn's current gig as fiddle player for Molly Tuttle and Golden Highway. You can order  Fiddler's Pas...

My guest (again) this week is Jake Eddy. Jake was my first ever guest on Bluegrass Jam Along. If you want to check out that episode it's  here Jake came back to chat to me about his latest project, 'Nor' Easter', a new collaboration with mandolin legend Andy Statman. Jake explains how the project came about (very quickly!), what the process was and talks about some of the amazi...

My guest this week is Tony Trischka, who the New York Times called 'the father of modern bluegrass'.  Tony has been at the forefront of the folk and bluegrass worlds since the 1960s. Our conversation focusses on his 2021 album  Shall We Hope , described on Tony's website as "a dramatized listening experience. It invites its audience into the lives of characters from America’s p...

My guest this week is Wes Corbett. Wes is the current banjo player in the Sam Bush Band and has previously played with Molly Tuttle, Joy Kills Sorrow, The Bee Eaters and hammered dulcimer virtuoso Simon Chrisman. I chatted to Wes about his recent instrumental record  Cascade , co-produced by Punch Brothers' Chris Eldridge and featuring Sierra Hull, Paul Kowert, Simon Chrisman, Alex Hargraves...

My guest this week is Bob Minner. Bob has been the acoustic guitarist for country icon Tim McGraw for almost 30 years now, and he's also a fantastic bluegrass picker. His latest project, 'From Sulphur Springs To Rising Fawn : The Songs of Norman Blake' is a wonderful tribute to the music of Norman and Nancy Blake, featuring duets with people from the worlds of country and bluegrass,...

My guest this week is Jarrod Walker, best known to most of you as the mandolin player in Billy Strings' band. We chat about all sorts of stuff, including what Chris Thile taught him about learning fiddle tunes, how he almost ended up selling instruments for a living rather than playing them, the pros and cons of plugging in onstage and going from landscaping one day during the pandemic to pla...

This week's interview is with author Tim Brookes, about his fascinating book 'Guitar - An American Life.' The book looks at how the guitar took shape as the modern instrument we know today, but also its place in American culture and how it went from being a fringe instrument to reaching the point where it outsells every other instrument combined. Tim talks about the process of havin...

Here's the final interview of the year! My guest for this one is Josh Turknett, author of the fantastic book 'The Laws of Brainjo - The Art & Science of Molding a Musical Mind’. Josh's book is all about how our brains work and, specifically, what that means for learning to play an instrument (any instrument, not just banjo). It's crammed with interesting stuff but, most imp...

My guest this week is the brilliant Chris Eldridge. Chris is a member of my favourite band in the world, Punch Brothers, but he also records and tours with Julian Lage as a duet, as well as recording, writing and producing with a whole range of musicians, from Paul Simon to Renee Fleming and many points in between. We chat about Chris's online bluegrass guitar course at ArtistWorks, as well a...

My guest this week is the fabulous Charlotte Carrivick. Charlotte's one of my favourite guitarists and we've been chatting about getting this interview done since July, so I'm thrilled we finally managed to find a time to record it. It would be quicker to tell you which instruments Charlotte doesn't play than which she does, but she's probably best known for her guitar and...

I've got another great guest for you this week - multi-instrumentalist Justin Moses. Justin plays all the bluegrass instruments at an incredibly high level. He's played fiddle in Dan Tyminski's band, banjo with Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder and guitar and mandolin with Sierra Hull (who he's also married to). That doesn't even cover the fact that he's been voted IB...

I've got another great interview for you this week, with mandolin virtuoso and all-round acoustic legend Mike Marshall. We talk about Mike's career, his teaching and his collaboration with Northfield mandolins, plus much (much) more! Enjoy and happy picking, Matt Links to stuff mentioned in the podcast Mike's Website Mandolin lessons with Mike at  Artistworks Northfield Mandolins Ma...

I've got a great conversation with Tristan Scroggins for you. This one was such a joy to record. We chat about Tristan's recent IBMA Writer of the Year Award as well as his research into the background of fiddle tunes and what makes something 'authentic.' For more on Tristan's music and writing, check out -  www.tristanscroggins.com To hear more on Tristan's route int...

This week we have a very special interview with bluegrass flatpicking legend Bryan Sutton. Bryan is not only a Grammy Award winner, he was also awarded the IBMA Guitar Player of the Year award 10 times. On top of that he's the flatpick guitar teacher at ArtistWorks and has spent the past decade helping players (like me) improve their technique and musicianship. Check out the links below to fi...

My guest on the podcast today is Marcel Ardans, who most of you will know through his site and YouTube channel Lessons With Marcel (if you don't know those, check out the links below!) We chat about learning to play, how both of us came to love bluegrass despite not being raised with it and how all musicians are on the same journey (and all fall flat on our faces sometimes!). It was a lot of...

My guest today is Jake Eddy. Jake's the guitarist with The Becky Buller Band and also has a  great new record  of fiddle tunes, featuring top pickers including Kenny Smith and Bryan Sutton. We chat about Jake's intro to bluegrass, his experiences teaching, why you should practice with a metronome and how he acquired his '51 D18...plus lots more. If you want to find out more about Ja...