Podcast appearances and mentions of steve martin prize

For this week's encore broadcast, we're joined by Shook Twins, the Portland-based indie-folk duo (and twin sisters) known for their incredible harmonies, as well as the wide range of instruments they play. Also with us is longtime friend of the show, gifted songwriter and player extraordinaire Danny Barnes (a past winner of The Steve Martin Prize for Excellence in Banjo and Bluegrass). To round things out, we'll share an inspiring eChievement Award story about Bill Lavin from New Jersey who started the Where Angels Play Foundation that builds playgrounds in areas of disaster or devastation to honor the victims of tragedy and provide places of hope and community for children and inspire healing.

www.patreon.com/banjopodcast Hosted by Keith Billik. This episode features one of the most influential banjo players of modern times, Sammy Shelor! Sammy is best known as the longtime 5-stringer for the Lonesome River Band. Sammy is also a 5-time IBMA Banjo Player of the Year award winner, along with the 2011 Steve Martin Prize, and numerous other accolades. Sponsored by Peghead Nation and Deering Banjos Use coupon code "pickyfingers" for 30 days of free videos at Peghead Nation! Thanks to Jerry Eicher of The Ol Hippie Bluegrass Show Contact the show: pickyfingersbanjopodcast@gmail.com  

www.patreon.com/banjopodcast   Host Keith Billik chats with banjo virtuoso Jens Kruger of The Kruger Brothers about his style, background, and philosophy about music.    Jens is a widely renowned performer and has won many awards, including the 2013 Steve Martin Prize for Excellence in Banjo.   Special thanks to Peghead Nation (www.pegheadnation.com) - use coupon code "pickyfingers" for 30 days of free videos!   Jens on the web: www.krugerbrothers.com   Contact the show: pickyfingersbanjopodcast@gmail.com  

Rhiannon Giddens is a vocalist, banjoist and fiddler from Greensborough, North Carolina. Rhiannon’s music draws from old-time, gospel, celtic, folk and jazz. She's won Grammys with her string band the Carolina Chocolate Drops, she won the Steve Martin Prize for Excellence in Banjo and Bluegrass, and she won a recent MacArthur Genius Grant. She’s a cast member of the TV show “Nashville” and is also the mother of two young children, Aoife and Caoimhín. Topics include: touring for 200 days with a baby in a minivan, her children’s idyllic life in Ireland, letting go of ego, music as activism and how motherhood has changed her creative approach.

In episode 26 we went deep on the banjo. I asked three leading contemporary players how they'd fallen for their instrument and what they thought about the state of the banjo in 2017. There is a LOT we did not and could not cover, including the African American origins of the banjo and its multi century journey through many genres of music. But there are great resources out there on that subject including the Earl Scruggs Center in Shelby NC and the American Banjo Museum in Oklahoma city. We were talking largely about bluegrass and its modern manifestations. And so I was intent on sitting down with Noam Pikelny, banjo player for the Punch Brothers and recipient of the first Steve Martin Prize for Excellence in banjo and bluegrass in 2010. That conversation was fantastic and it went on way too long to fit into the hour long episode. So here's the rest of the interview. We talk about the development of the Punch Brothers project and the influence of that band's instigator, mandolinist and musical master Chris Thile. We also get into a much deeper conversation about Noam's new album Universal Favorite, featuring solo banjo instrumentals.

In one of the early sequences of the celebrated new grateful dead documentary Long Strange Trip from Amazon studios, much is made of Jerry Garcia's first real girlfriend. She's feisty and adorable and ablaze with love for art and the bohemian life. She's planning to make a life with Jerry until! He picks up the banjo and starts practicing hours a day. And she leaves him. Man I wish Jerry could see the roots music scene today. Banjo has been, to use a term that's ubiquitous now in politics, normalized. It's' still essential to bluegrass and its progressive manifestations of course, but it's also reconnected to its folky traditions, strummed lustily if simplistically in the music of Mumford and Sons and Old Crow Medicine Show. And in recent years, the banjo wended its way back into pop country and into indie rock as a texture on records by Modest Mouse, Sufjan Stephens and others. The most visible and in-demand banjo player of this decade is and has been Noam Pikelny of the band Punch Brothers. The Chicago area native discovered the instrument and bluegrass culture before he was ten years old. In 2010, he became the inaugural recipient of the Steve Martin Prize for Excellence in Banjo and Bluegrass. In this hour Craig talks banjo with Pikelny as well as leading players Ned Luberecki and Kristin Scott Benson. 

THE KRUGER BROTHERS are three soulful world-class virtuosos originally from Europe and now living in North Carolina. They were first introduced to American audiences in 1997, quickly gaining the attention of fans and the music industry alike. In an ever expanding body of work, Jens Kruger (banjo, vocals), Uwe Kruger (guitar, lead vocals), and Joel Landsberg (bass, vocals) personify the spirit of exploration and innovation that forms the core of the American musical tradition. In fact, Jens Kruger was recently named the fourth recipient of the Steve Martin Prize for Excellence in Banjo and Bluegrass Music. Kruger is known for his innovative banjo composition and performance that integrates folk music with European classical music. This is personified in the band's latest work 'The Spirit of the Rockies'. A poetic, spiraling tale about ghosts, relationships and guides � both seen and unseen that was written by Jens for a small orchestral ensemble,

NOAM PIKELNY returns to the WoodSongs Stage to celebrate his long awaited second album "Beat The Devil and Carry A Rail" on Compass Records. Pikelny is undeniably the next big thing to happen to the 5-string banjo, a player of unparalleled technique, he confounds and inspires listeners with his mastery of the instrument. As a member of Punch Brothers, he has helped to broaden the awareness of the banjo in the mainstream, earning the first annual Steve Martin Prize for Excellence in Banjo and Bluegrass Music and a coveted appearance on Late Night with David Letterman with Martin. Noam will be joined on the show with a few of his friends: fellow Punch Brothers Gabe Witcher (fiddle) and Chris Eldridge (guitar), Aoife O'Donovan from Crooked Still (vocals), Jesse Cobb (mandolin) and Mark Schatz (bass). VICTOR FURTADO is an amazing 11 year old banjo player from Front Royal, VA. He has won numerous awards for his Old Time banjo playing, quite often competing in the adult categories. Some of the contests he has placed in are: Deer Creek Festival, Maryland 1st Place Adult Old Time Banjo, Maury River Fiddlers Convention, Virginia, 1st Place Adult Old Time Banjo and best in show, Grayson County Fiddlers Convention, Virginia, 1st Place Adult Old Time Banjo, Virginia State Fair, 1st Place Adult Banjo, National Old Time Banjo Championship,(Uncle Dave Macon Days Festival, Tennessee, and 2nd Place Adult Old Time Banjo. Victor recorded his first cd in 2011 titled "Sounds from the Openback."

PUNCH BROTHERS return the WoodSongs stage with a brand CD on Nonesuch Records called "Antifogmatic." Led by mandolinist Chris Thile (founding member of Nickel Creek), the band's second CD showcases the collaborative power of this virtuosic, genre-blurring combo. The Punch Brothers' line-up includes some of the most impressive and widely respected musicians performing today: Chris Eldridge (guitar), Paul Kowert (bass), Noam Pikelny (banjo), and Gabe Witcher (fiddle). In fact, Noam Pikelny just won the first annual Steve Martin Prize for Excellence in Banjo and Bluegrass. THE CHAPIN SISTERS are singing and songwriting sisters who have been performing since 2004. Lily and Abigail (daughters of veteran singer/songwriter Tom Chapin and nieces of famed folk singer Harry Chapin) are known for pristine harmonies and haunting melodies that have gained comparisons to sister acts of old and Appalachian family groups, yet their songs and arrangements have a very contemporary feel, with elements of pop, blues and psychedelic rock.