Relax Your Grid

In this episode, Matt interviews GRAMMY-award winning fiddler Jason Carter (The Del McCoury Band, The Travelin' McCourys) about his recent solo album Lowdown Hoedown. Jason sings lead on the record, plays brilliant fiddle parts, and is joined by an all-star cast that includes Tim O'Brien, Sarah Jarosz, Billy Strings, Jerry Douglas, Sam Bush, Dierks Bentley, Aoife O'Donovan, Marty Stuart, and many more.

Many regard Olov Johannson as Sweden's greatest craftsman on the nyckelharpa. With his brilliant solo playing and as a member of the group Väsen, he has been largely responsible for the explosion of nyckelharpa playing that has been witnessed recently in Sweden. Olov grew up in Tärnsjö in northern Uppland and began to play the nyckelharpa at age 14. About a year later he began to study with Curt Tallroth, a well-known bearer of the tradition from Harbo. Through Curt, Olov has learned tunes that have been played in northern Uppland for centuries, passed on from musician to musician. Olov has also played with Eric Sahlström, the most prominent nyckelharpa player of the 20th century. Since 1989, Olov has worked exclusively as a musician, principally with Väsen. But he also plays with Anders Bromander, Nyckelharpsorkestern, Björn Ståbi, Mats Berglund, Kalle Almlöf and as a solo artist. The popularity of the folk-rock group Nordman has brought the sound of Olov's harpa to the ears of more than one million record buyers. In 1997 he was honored to be the first Swedish folk musician to work with the world renowned American ensemble, the Kronos Quartet. Olov has toured in the U.S.A., Canada, India, Libya, Slovenia, France, Ireland, Scotland, Luxembourg, Italy, Japan and elsewhere. Olov works actively to pass on his musical inheritance, and has become a role model for many young nyckelharpa players. He gives instruction both at The Eric Sahlström-Institute and through the Royal Music College in Stockholm. Olov has received many awards and scholarships for his achievements as a musician. In 1984 he was selected as a National Musician, in 1989 he was awarded the Viksta-Lasse Scholarship, and in 1990 he was chosen as World's Master of both the modern and older type of nyckelharpa. In 1992 he received the Ceylon Wallin Scholarship and in 1995 the Vuxenskolan's Artist Stipendium. 2013 he received the Zorn Medal in gold, possibly the finest reward a traditional musician can get in Sweden.

Joey Ryan is best known as the taller member of The Milk Carton Kids. The group has been nominated for three GRAMMY Awards: Best Folk Album in 2013 (The Ash & Clay); Best American Roots Performance in 2015 (“The City of Our Lady”); and Best Engineered Album, Non-Classical, in 2018 (All the Things That I Did and All the Things That I Didn't Do). In this episode, Matt talks to Joey about what touring feels like after 2 years of Covid-19, the band's Sad Songs Summer Camp, and what to do about the obligatory encore. They also reminisce about the time Matt gave Joey banjo lessons so he could accompany Robert Plant on tour.

Bronwyn Keith-Hynes is an acclaimed bluegrass fiddler originally from Charlottesville, VA who now makes her home in Nashville, TN. She currently divides her time between touring with Molly Tuttle & Golden Highway and being a session musician in Nashville. In 2021 Bronwyn won the International Bluegrass Music Association's Fiddler Player of the Year Award. She is a graduate of Berklee College of Music in Boston, MA. During her time in Boston she co-founded and toured all over the world with progressive bluegrass band Mile Twelve and won the IBMA New Artist of the Year with them in 2020. Bronwyn has performed and recorded with Molly Tuttle, The Milk Carton Kids, Dailey and Vincent, Sierra Hull, Sarah Jarosz, Tim O'Brien, Chris Eldridge, Peter Rowan, Darol Anger, Tony Trischka, Michael Daves, Vince Herman and more. In this episode, she talks to host Matt Brown about her debut solo album Fiddler's Pastime, those years with Mile Twelve, and her path to bluegrass.

Jake Schepps is an uncommon banjoist & composer creating music for the traditional American string band that is anything but traditional. In this episode, he speaks with host Matt Brown in his capacity as director of the Banjo Summit, a progressive 3-finger banjo workshop for intermediate, advanced, and professional musicians. The next Banjo Summit will be held February 11-13, 2022 on Zoom. It features an extraordinary cast of banjoists including Kristin Scott Benson, Noam Pikelny, Bill Evans, Wes Corbett, and Jayme Stone. Jake also describes his recent online camp featuring the band Hawktail, and forthcoming banjo transcription books he will publish featuring the original music of Béla Fleck, Wes Corbett, Adam Larrabee, and Max Allard. Jake has taught at NimbleFingers, Berklee College of Music, Steve Kaufman Acoustic Kamp, British Columbia Bluegrass Workshop, University of Northern Colorado, and produced an instructional DVD entitled Modern Banjo Ideas & Techniques.

Visual artist Gregory Block was born in Kansas City, Missouri, in 1986 and moved to Colorado at an early age. During his childhood, he attended a Waldorf school where he discovered a love of painting, sculpture, music, and the natural world. He continued to develop his skills as an artist and musician throughout high school, and painted whenever he could while earning his BA in biology at Colorado College. As a student, he made a conscious decision not to take any painting courses or adopt a mentor, opting instead to learn through experimentation and close scrutiny of paintings by artists he admired. After graduating in 2009, he devoted his studies to painting and has since gained recognition as “one of the most promising young artists in the representational art world” (Fine Art Today). He lives in Denver, Colorado.

Juilliard grad Natalie Haas is one of the most sought after cellists in traditional music today. She and Scottish fiddler Alasdair Fraser have toured as a duo for twenty years, wowing audiences at festivals and concerts worldwide with their unique sound. In this episode, Matt asks her about a number of their albums, including the latest, Syzygy. Natalie has also toured with Mark O'Connor as a member of his Appalachia Waltz Trio. As a studio musician, Natalie has been a guest artist on over 50 albums, including those of Cape Breton fiddler Natalie MacMaster, Irish greats Altan, Solas, and Liz Carroll, and Americana icon Dirk Powell. She is an associate professor at the Berklee College of Music in Boston, and an instructor at music camps all around the globe.

Deemed a "banjo virtuoso" by the Washington Post, Adam Hurt has fused several traditional old-time idioms to create his own elegantly innovative clawhammer banjo sound. A highly respected performer and teacher of traditional music, Adam has played at the Kennedy Center, conducted banjo and fiddle workshops around the world, and been featured on the cover of Banjo Newsletter. In this episode, Adam talks about how his celebrated banjo approach references the Round Peak style, the difference between tempo and drive, and several of his albums: Insight, Earth Tones, Inside Out, and Back to the Earth. The latter album, his most recent, includes collaborations with Ricky Skaggs, Brittany Haas, and Paul Kowert. Patreon supporters of this show have exclusive access to a video in which Adam shows off an assortment of beautiful antique banjos. Pledge your support at $2/month to become a Relax Your Grid Superfan and gain access to every episode's bonus content.

Max Allard is a banjoist, guitarist, pianist, and composer from Chicago. He has performed in a duo with his brother Otto and with a trio (From the Start) featuring Ruben Whitaker and Otto Allard. Max recently toured with the Minneapolis-based progressive bluegrass band Barbaro. He was the winner of the 2018 RockyGrass Banjo Competition and the 2019 FreshGrass Banjo Award. He was also selected to participate in the 2020 Acoustic Music Seminar in Savannah. He is now a freshman composition student at Oberlin Conservatory. Max spoke to host Matt Brown in August 2021 about his forthcoming solo album Odes/Codes, which was produced by Jayme Stone.

Bruce Molsky is one of the most revered “multi-hyphenated career” ambassadors for America's old-time mountain music. For decades, he's been a globetrotting performer and educator, a recording artist with an expansive discography including seven solo albums, well over a dozen collaborations and two Grammy-nominations. He's also the classic “musician's musician” – a man who's received high praise from diverse fans and collaborators like Linda Ronstadt, Mark Knopfler, Celtic giants Donal Lunny and Andy Irvine, jazzer Bill Frisell and dobro master Jerry Douglas, a true country gentleman by way of the Big Apple aptly dubbed “the Rembrandt of Appalachian fiddlers” by virtuoso violinist and sometimes bandmate Darol Anger. Matt reminisces about studying fiddle with Bruce, and they cover a wide variety of topics including Bruce's highly-anticipated guitar album, his responsibilities as an educator, and why he likes collecting fountain pens.

Jayme Stone is a musician, singer, songwriter, composer, and producer based in Colorado. He talks to Matt about the genesis of his albums Africa to Appalachia (2008) and Jayme Stone's Lomax Project (2015). Writing his latest album, aWake (2020), allowed Jayme to process some of the grief he felt upon losing his brother Michael in 2017. During the Covid-19 quarantine, Jayme engineered & produced the forthcoming debut album from Max Allard, who will be a guest on this show this fall. In addition to all the music Jayme makes, he is about to launch in August 2021 an online music business course called Compose Your Career. Check it out if you are an independent artist who wants to better arrange the business side of your working life. Relax Your Grid Superfans who support Matt Brown on Patreon for $2/month get exclusive access to a beautiful performance of Jayme playing his banjo just for you! Sign up now, and you'll get a Relax Your Grid sticker to proudly display on your travel mug or theremin case.

Bonnie & Taylor Sims have long been fixtures of the Colorado roots music scene, including with their band Bonnie & the Clydes. In 2018, Bonnie was approached by Robbie Nevil (of "C'est la Vie" fame) to be the voice of a new project that would become Everybody Loves An Outlaw. In 2020, Nevil's original song "I See Red" featuring Bonnie's singing, Taylor's guitar playing, and Robbie's production, went to #1 on Spotify's Viral 50 - Global chart thanks to its climactic placement in the Netflix film '365 Days.' This is a conversation about that transformative chapter in Bonnie's and Taylor's careers, beginning with their being signed to Columbia Records. Relax Your Grid Superfans who support Matt Brown on Patreon for $2/month get exclusive access to a live video performance of Bonnie, Taylor, and Matt performing Taylor's original song "Texas Again."

Mark Harris is a musician and teacher based in Fort Collins, Colorado. During the Covid-19 pandemic, Mark recorded and released his debut solo album entitled Old Time Guitar. Matt consulted with Mark as he was preparing to record, and in this conversation they chat about the finished product and how Mark developed his impressive sound. They also discuss Mark's new YouTube guitar lesson in which he teaches the arrangement of "Ducks on the Millpond" that is featured on the album. This show is underwritten by Matt's Patreon supporters. Pledge at $2/month and you'll receive a trendy sticker with the Relax Your Grid logo as well as exclusive digital content for each month's episode. This month's bonus is a video of Matt and Mark performing a duet together on one of Matt's original tunes!

Dr. Gregory Reish, director of the Center for Popular Music (CPM) at Middle Tennessee State University, chats with Matt about how they met, their duo album Speed of the Plow, what happens at the CPM, and a number of the wonderful albums that Greg's label Spring Fed Records has released. They focus in particular on the Tejano music that the label has put out in recent years. They also discuss Spring Fed's forthcoming Ed Haley box set that will surely send waves of excitement throughout the old-time music community. Patreon supporters of this show will get exclusive access via that site to Greg's passionate and detailed description of how he makes BBQ! Being a Relax Your Grid Superfan on Patreon also entitles you to a beautiful sticker with the show's logo on it. It ships globaly and will look perfect on your kombucha bottle or Dobro case.

Matt Brown and Michelle Billingsley chat about her debut album Not The Marrying Kind (Western Myth Records), which he produced in 2019. They discuss her songwriting process and what it was like to record at Narwhal Studios in Chicago. They also chat about how the album came about, all the great musicians who join her, engineer Brian Deck, and Michelle's new project that is now underway. You'll hear clips from Not The Marrying Kind as well as the entirety of its eighth track, "She's Gone," which concludes the episode. For exclusive bonus content (Michelle gives Matt's patrons a quick songwriting workshop!) and the show notes replete with hyperlinks, become a Relax Your Grid Superfan on Patreon for just $2/month. You'll even get a cool sticker to slap on your mandolin case!

To support this podcast so I don't ever have to bore you with CBD underwear ads from sponsors, please become one of my Patreon donors. My Patreon tiers range from $2/month to $50/month with various rewards and features at each level. You can save 15% if you donate annually rather than monthly. Music in this episode: "The Big Scioty" [theme music] - Matt Brown & Greg Reish "Polska efter Monis Olle" - Patrik Ahlberg "Werther's Dream" - Patrik Ahlberg "Polska av Karl Stenberg" - Patrik Ahlberg "Deer Walk" - Matt Brown & Greg Reish "Soldier's Joy" - Matt Brown & Matt Brown "Gamlestovslåtten" - Patrik Ahlberg "The Big Scioty" [more theme music] - Matt Brown & Greg Reish In the episode, Patrik mentions The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. We talk about Simon Stålspets , one of Patrik's teachers who plays cittern and guitar. One of Simon's bands is the Stockholm Lisboa Project with Patrik's first fiddle teacher Sergio Crisostomo. Patrik also mentions Sven Ahlbäck from the Royal College of Music in Stockholm (KMH). Sven wrote the folk music theory textbooks they used at Sjöviks Folkhögskola, the folk music school Patrik attended. I also mention: * Brittany Haas * Seman Violins in Skokie, IL * The Lonesome Touch - Martin Hayes & Dennis Cahill * Jacob Collier * Greg Reish and the album we made together, Speed of the Plow * Bruce Molsky * Ginny Hawker * Jayme Stone * Dave Sinko Relax Your Grid is produced, edited & mixed by Matt Brown. This episode was recorded by Matt Brown and Patrik Ahlberg. Tim Brown and Dave Sinko provided essential post-production assistance. The Relax Your Grid logo was designed by Otto Allard.