Bradley Laird's Grass Talk Radio - Bluegrass

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 179   Megan Chowning Interview   I always enjoy swapping stories and notes with other teachers. But this is no ordinary teacher! In this episode you will meet champion fiddler, professional musician and teacher Megan Chowning. It is a long winding conversation with something for players of all levels and all instruments. A part of the discussion is about her involvemen...

  GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 178   The Bluegrass Way of Life   After a bit of talk about starting seeds for the garden and an Amateur Radio event, I bring you Heather's (see episode 177) response to my advice regarding my Personal Feedback Solution . The String Changing Exercise I speak of is available free over on my Patreon page. Here is a link: https://www.patreon.com/bradleylaird   Also, at...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 177   Personal Feedback   Teaching yourself via online lessons, books and videos can be incomplete without the feedback from a teacher. In this episode I demonstrate my Personal Feedback Solution with Heather, a beginning mandolin student. Heather was kind enough to allow us all to be a "fly on the wall" for this session. I encourage you to take advantage of this too!...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 176   In The Press Room   I am taking a bit of a break from bluegrass in this post-Christmas week. This week I present the second episode of my "other" podcast, never released, just to help you fill your time. I hope you enjoy it. Merry Christmas!   The episode also features a big discount on: ----------------------------------- The Mandolin Treasure Chest http://www.b...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 175   In A Giving Mood   In the spirit of Christmas I am in a giving mood. I have a hoard of freebies and discounts that I am tossing from my sleigh. I also discuss a super cool little Pick Pocket sent to me by Steven Mead, a listener to the show. Help me give away $1,000,000 worth of video lessons! I even grew a Santa beard for the holidays! Merry Christmas!   The epi...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 174   Make Something   This episode is meant to encourage you to try your hand at making something. Something that can be fun and useful to your bluegrass picking! I present 16 ideas to get your wheels turning.   The episode also features a 20% discount on two products if you act before Dec. 17, 2020: ----------------------------------- The Christmas Songs For Mandolin...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 173   The Mike Bub Interview   Mike Bub, familiar to bluegrass fans for his long stint with The Del McCoury Band, sat down for a marathon chat about how he got started, gigging in the Nashville scene, gear talk about the bass, amps, mics, monitors, and before we knew it we had clocked nearly two hours!   Mike has a a great sense of humor, a thousand stories and lots of...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 172   The Andy Leftwich Interview   I had the honor and pleasure of a nice long conversation with Andy Leftwich and I know you will enjoy hearing it. Andy earned his "creds" by playing for over 15 years with Ricky Skaggs and Kentucky Thunder. That is no small feat and one he should be rightly proud of.   Andy is a humble guy and also an amazing musician. We could all l...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 171   Ranger Brad's Crystal Ball   The advantage of doing a lot of teaching is that the teacher gets to observe many, many students. I have learned a lot from my students. In this episode I share some of what I have learned and I present you my theory, and an interesting method, to predict just how far you may go in your musical quest. Follow along, do a little self-an...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 170   The Rob Ickes Interview   In this episode I share a recorded chat that I had with the masterful dobro player and musician Rob Ickes. We go from how a kid in California got into the dobro all the way to playing with... well, rather than spoil it for you... you will just have to listen to the episode.   Here are links to the various things we talked about: Rob's we...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 169   The Life Blood of Bluegrass   This episode is a discussion of a topic near and dear to my heart. I am talking about jam sessions! Not taking anything away from the pros and the heroes; I just want to remind you that there are more of us than there are of them. We need them and they need us. I hope this episode encourages you to go to a jam or start a jam.   For t...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 168   Mandolin Super Heroes   This episode is an introduction to the great mandolin players. This episode took a while to formulate since, quite frankly, there are so many very good mandolinists. I couldn't possibly include every mandolin player "of note" so I decided to focus on the people who influenced me strongly.   I hope you enjoy this episode and will take my ad...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 167   Report From The Barn   In this episode I talk about a recent jam session, two new mandolin video lessons in my store ( Stealing Jazz Licks 1 and Stealing Jazz Licks 2 ), my son Jackson's new 6 song EP "Beacon" which you can get for free, and then I discuss the value of doing the same old thing over and over and over.   The intro music is "Prison Walls" written by...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 166   Rattles, Buzzes & Twangs   It happens to everybody! You are blissfully playing along and suddenly (or slowly) your instrument begins to sound like crap! Buzzing, rattles, twangs, tinny sound! What the H.E. double hockey sticks is going on?   Listen to this episode where I walk you through the myriad of possible causes for these annoying sounds. We start with the...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 165   "Jason" Meets The Inquisitor   In this episode you will meet "Jason" (boo hiss!) who has been accused of multiple infractions against civil society and, in particular, reckless destruction of the good character of untold numbers of bluegrass musicians.    As the self-appointed inquisitor, I brought the guilty, I mean "the accused", before the court of public opin...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 164   Western Red Interview   Think you don't like country music? Well, considering what I hear on "country" radio today, I tend to agree. But, if you dig back just a bit you will find that bluegrass is country music!   Today I present something a little different. It has long been my contention that bluegrass, honky-tonk, western swing, and old-time country are all br...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Special Episode 2   Special Episode - Jam Tracks 3   This short episode is to announce the release of new material on my site. As promised, I have completed Bluegrass Jam Tracks #3. It is a collection of 68 MP3 tracks covering 10 songs/tunes at multiple tempos. I had a number of requests from folks who have collection #1 and #2 asking for specific tunes. I have answered those...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 163   The Dobro Pioneers   Bill Monroe said that a Dobro sounds like an old tin bucket! That's one thing Bill and I disagree on. I think he was just sore because Lester and Earl left him, dropped the mandolin and added Josh Graves. (In later years, Bill and Josh were good friends and I think the tin bucket comment was dropped.)    Dobro is a big part of bluegrass music...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 162   Dog Days of Summer   The dog days of summer are upon us. In this episode I catch you up on the bluegrass happenings around the Kingdom of Lairdonia and tell you a little story from my first real job. Then I get to the heart of the episode: "Lessons From The Dawg". Not him. Real dogs! You'd be surprised what you can learn from watching a couple of dogs. And, amazi...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 161   Lizzy Long Interview   Today I had a chance to catch up with Lizzy Long and discuss how she learned to play, what it's like to play with Little Roy Lewis, her new album on Vine Records "Dreaming Again", and her stories of time spent with Earl and Louise Scruggs.   Be sure to scope out her new album here: https://117group.com/award-winning-roots-artist-lizzy-long-...

This episode describes the Treasure Hunt. Find a gold coin by digging around on www.bradleylaird.com and get a massive discount off any instructional material in the store. Listen to the episode, find a gold coin on my site, and cash in with an insanely huge discount before July 31, 2020. Happy hunting!

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 160 Make Hay While The Sun Shines   Today, for perhaps the first time I really get into grass! Real grass--the kind my donkeys eat-- and talk about hay making, baling and why you will not be able to play your bass fiddle for two days due to sore hands if you spend the day totin' hay bales by the string!   This episode also includes information about my brand new checko...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 159 Tab Vs Standard, Et Al Today, after the usual introductory baloney, I discuss the merits of tablature versus standard notation. Then I take the topic further by discussing 3 more ways to learn to play music. I hope you enjoy the episode. Have fun!   In today's episode I also talked about a cool page on the internet you should check out with a directory of the top b...

Today's episode is a mish-mash of thoughts running through my head. First I talk a bit about the garden and the rural roots of bluegrass--and bugs! Then, I tell you about a real life "Little Girl and The Dreadful Snake" tale and how those reptiles which have been attacking my chickens and their eggs. After that I chill out and read you another listener email, describe the new jam track collection...

GrassTalkRadio.com - Episode 157 Chord Progressions In this episode I talk about chords, chord progressions and jam tracks. Having an understanding of the "Chords By The Numbers" idea can be very useful both in backup and lead playing. Ride along as I do my best to explain.   Links to the various resources I discuss in the episode are listed on the show notes page at grasstalkradio.com   If you en...