CMT Blog: The Greencards

As the sun rose on the Summer Solstice, high above the festival grounds, I was busy celebrating the birth of the season with a ridiculously late lie-in. I’d jammed the night before until 7 a.m. with some of the finest acoustic musicians in the world, and only got back to my bed by 9 a.m., dishevelled and exhausted. That’s why I’m unable to tell you how Mike Farris did. The same for WPA (featuring Glen Phillips and Sara Watkins), the SteelDrivers and Todd Snider. Is this why I’m a musician and not a journalist … ? I’ll leave it to Tim O’Brien, who gave Farris the award for Most Effective Use of Three Chords. He also raved about the SteelDrivers (listen to Lee Ann Womack’s version of “Either Way” for Chris Stapleton’s amazing vocals) and WPA. Tim himself gave an exquisite set, armed with Stuart Duncan on fiddle, Bryan Sutton on guitar and Dennis Crouch on bass — a real master class in singing, playing and writing.

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Drop a bluegrass festival in one of the most stunningly beautiful environments in the country and you better get some great acts to do it justice. So how do you choose two musicians to kick off the party? Why not Tim O’Brien and Jerry Douglas? Tim can do no wrong — not for me, and not for the thousands of people who watched his festival opening set with Jerry. If he was any more relaxed onstage he’d take a nap (I’ve seen him do that actually), and as they ripped into “Times in Life,” you could feel the Telluride crowd collectively let out a sigh of relief as all their troubles floated up to the mountain top. Singing a collection of originals and folk tunes, Tim announced that by then he had lyrically already killed two women and made love to one - and he hoped to restore the balance before the end of the set!

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Over the last few months, my mailbox has been bursting with independent roots music. Within this hand-picked playlist, you’ll find adventurous bluegrass bands (such as The Greencards), quite a few alt-country bands and a hearty helping of singer-songwriters. If you find an artist you like, go see them play. Going out to hear a cool band is still one of my favorite things to do, no matter the season.

“Outskirts of Blue,” the Greencards
“And It Didn’t Even Bring Me Down,” Los Lobos
“North and South of the River,” Jeremy Garrett
“Wishing for a Rainbow,” the Flatlanders
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I’ve only been to MerleFest one time, back in 2006, and I wish I was hanging out there this weekend. Held at Wilkes Community College in Wilkesboro, N.C., the festival offers 14 stages and thousands upon thousands of people. But because the campus is so large, I never felt cramped and I don’t remember waiting in any super-long lines, which is a blessing at music festivals. I also like how most up-and-coming artists play several times throughout the four-day festival. So if you miss North Carolina’s own Tift Merritt tonight, don’t worry — she’ll be hanging around all weekend. Other cool artists on this year’s lineup include Blue Highway, Sam Bush, Jerry Douglas and Travis Tritt, the Greencards, Emmylou Harris, Jim Lauderdale, the Del McCoury Band, Linda Ronstadt, the SteelDrivers, and of course, Doc Watson, who named the festival after his son, Merle Watson. If you go, please let me know how it was, and hopefully I’ll see you there next year.

Photo credit: MerleFest

Once holding the title of national mandolin champion in Australia for four consecutive years, Kym Warner of The Greencards is no stranger to playing musical instruments. On the Grammy-nominated band’s new album, Fascination, which drops Tuesday (April 21), Warner contributes not only his vocals and songwriting skills, but five different instruments as well. On the album, he plays the mandolin (see left), mandola, bouzouki and xylophone, as well as a new instrument for him — the ukulele.

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I’ve only been on one cruise in my life. And it was just as cliché as I’d pictured. Like an episode of the Love Boat, only without the beautiful people looking for love. I swore I’d never step foot on a “floating hotel” again. Now? I may go back on my word.

The Zac Brown Band and several others are climbing aboard for this Cayamo cruise in February. I knew that last year’s was good because I’d read about Craig Shelburne’s journey. And then in the current issue of Cowboys & Indians, the one with Jewel on the cover, there’s another story about the same musical cruise. It all sounds so good.

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A young band hitting the road has a very simple definition of success - your first tour bus. One glimpse of a mighty Prevost on the highway is enough to make a musician’s heart flutter from within the confines of a smelly over-crowded Chevy passenger van. Could that be Alison Krauss and Robert Plant? Tim McGraw and Faith Hill? The tour bus is the Promised Land.

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Four Corners Folk Festival - Aug. 29-31; Pagosa Springs, Colo.
This one gets in my list because I have a soft spot for about 90 percent of the performers there. The lineup includes most of my favorite young acoustic bands like the Infamous Stringdusters, Punch Brothers featuring Chris Thile, the Waifs, Crooked Still, the Wilders, the Greencards, Bearfoot and many, many more. I’ve never made it to this one, but the more I think about it I might now have plans for Labor Day weekend.

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Many people who regularly attend the Grey Fox Bluegrass Festival in upstate New York plan their entire year around getting onsite early and pitching their tents - it’s easy to see why. Having just got back from two days there, The Greencards are still buzzing from a contact high. A good festival experience feels like riding a big wave of cosmic goodness, and when you combine fantastic singing from Tim O’Brien, bluegrass royalty like Del McCoury, outrageous energy from Sam Bush, as well as gorgeous scenery in the Adirondacks, then the result can literally turn your whole outlook on life around.

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Hello, loyal CMT blog readers. While last weekend half the world was at Bonnaroo, we were at the Georgia Mountain Roots Music Festival in Hiawassee, Ga. We were part of a great line-up including the Greencards, Sam Bush, The Lovell Sisters and our favorite, Tim O’Brien. Tim played a solo set earlier in the day, but the highlight for us was the full set we did with Tim. We rambled through much of his catalog, including “Tombstone Blues” from his Grammy-winning album, Red on Blonde. Sam Bush was also in great form in spite of losing his father Charlie earlier in the week. Our condolences go out to Sam, whose father “introduced him to baseball and the fiddle.” I guess we all owe Charlie a debt of gratitude.

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