GMBR Announces More Acts, the Line Up Gets Even Stronger Festivals Music Features by Brian Carroll - January 30, 20190 Less than a week ago Green Mountain Bluegrass & Roots announced their initial line up and early ticket sales, and 6 days later we already get another addition of 4 incredible acts. Last year's theme was really the collaboration and improvisation between artists and bands. Two of the musicians on site that played an extremely important role in that were Christian Sedelmyer and Eli West. The two popped up in others sets, on stage and off stage, during tribute sets and morning time gospel hours through the weekend in Manchester, VT and this year I am sure much of the same will occur. West performing alongside master mandolinist John Reischman and Christian seeming to be commanding his very own set (of
Green River Fest Rolls Out Initial Artists…More To Come Soon Festivals Music Features by Brian Carroll - January 10, 20190 Perhaps what has been most exciting about Green River Fest over the years is the sheer balance and diversity in their line up. Bluegrass, funk, folk, jazz and more seem to dot their festival poster year after year and already with just 5 acts announced in the first roll out of performers, we get just a taste of that. From GRF: The Green River Festival is pleased to announce that 2019's artists will include First Aid Kit, The Wood Brothers, The Devil Makes Three, Rhiannon Giddens, and Tyler Childers. More bands will be announced in the coming weeks. + First Aid Kit: A Swedish indie folk duo with a devoted international following, First Aid Kit blend the bright vocal harmonies and pastoral, contemplative songwriting of sisters Klara and Johanna Söderberg. 2014's Stay Gold, their first
Winter Wondergrass Stratton Announces “Grass After Dark” Shows Festivals Music Features by Brian Carroll - November 13, 20180 As if you needed more of a reason to grab your hotel room and stick around for the entire inaugural Stratton WWG weekend they have announced special "After Dark" shows at Grizzly's and the Green Mountain Room at The Black Bear Lodge. Capacity for the shows will be extremely limited and with artists like the ones listed below in smaller rooms, you know they are going to sell out...that Billy Strings and WWG All Stars show is particularly enticing to us. Hit the link and grab those tickets up today. Plan ahead and bring your parka and dancing boots. Its gonna be a heck of a festival next month!
Shreddin’ the Gnar: Winter Wondergrass Stratton (Vermont) Announces Killer Lineup Festivals Music Features by Brian Carroll - September 13, 20180 We are just coming down from our post festy depression from another new to Vermont festival and luckily Winter Wondergrass has swept in with just what we needed to keep us moving through the rest of 2018. The tickets are on sale now and you can get them here. Given the fact that Vermont is now home for 50% of the two person team over here at Red Line Roots, to say we are incredibly stoked for the announcement of the inaugural Green Mountain WWG event this year would be an understatement as big as the peak of Stratton Mountain itself. Particularly, we cannot wait to see old bud Billy Strings and the boys, the always wonderfully soulful Lindsay Lou, and the
Ghostland: Festival Review (Thompson’s Point, Portland, ME 9/1/18) Festivals Music Features by Ken Templeton - September 10, 20180 Well, that was damn fun. We’ve known for a good long while that the fine gentlemen in The Ghost of Paul Revere know how to throw a party, but Ghostland 2018 was more a lot more than that: it was a celebration of a musical community that has truly bonded artists and fans. Thompson’s Point, one of Maine’s premier music venues, was the perfect place to celebrate. It was a gorgeous summerish night and while there were easily a few thousand people there, it felt like we were all hanging out at the Ghosts’ house in the backyard. (They even made a limited-run beer for the occasion--they are nothing if not gracious hosts.) Sibylline kicked off the evening at 5:00,
Triple Threat Festival Weekend: Freshgrass, Grand Point North and Festival at the Farm Festivals Music Features by Brian Carroll - September 10, 20180 Decisions, decisions. It can be tough when you are chasing those end of summer blues and getting out to take in the last of the warmer weather weekends of music, food and fun. Luckily for those still running down the dream of jam packed music schedules this coming weekend is full of choices up here in New England. There are few views that I see regularly which take my breath away each and every time I see them. Coming up over the hill from I-89 before descending down into Burlington is one of them. The diamond glistening surface of Lake Champlain laid out before the Adirondack's on the other side. Its like a damn painting, but its not. Its actually real.
Newport Folk Festival 2018: Let’s Get Together Festivals Music Features by Ken Templeton - August 6, 20180 About mid-way through a swampy, humid day on Friday at Newport, I experienced a very pointed case of FOMO: fear of missing out. It hit me right when I knew it would: St. Vincent on the Quad Stage, The Wood Brothers on the Harbor Stage, and Sturgill Simpson on the Fort Stage. But, as one person put it on twitter a week or so before the festival: conflicts are the sign of a good lineup, and I resolved right then to remind myself that less is more and to be where I could and not worry about where I wasn’t. So, this recap of Newport is not so much about what I saw and heard as what I felt throughout
Summertime, and the Living is Easy: Wildwood Revival Announces Line Up Festivals Music Features by Brian Carroll - March 29, 2018March 29, 20180 Wildwood Revival has made its mark on the festival season these past couple of years as the place to be for a "family feel" with a keen focus on a smaller, more intimate audience and an incredibly well curated line up that dovetails beautifully from set to set throughout the weekend. Its basically just having your favorite bands play for you and your friends in a killer setting. Just yesterday their unveiled the line up for this year's weekend of musical magic and its not surprise that its going to be a scorcher. Immediate stand outs are on of my personal all time favorites, Hayes Carll, alongside some of the most promising songwriters today springing out of the mid south in Caleb
Freshgrass Announces 2018 Line Up Festivals Music Features by Brian Carroll - March 23, 2018March 23, 20180 Yesterday, a day that many folks who make the yearly pilgrimage to the quaint industrial town of North Adams, Mass wait eagerly for, came: The day that Freshgrass rolls out its first bolus of artists that will perform among the brick and art installations at Mass Moca in September. Since its inaugural event in 2011 the festival has exploded, both in its general roster size as well as the acts that is has managed to land and those that continue to come back to event. 2011 started things off strong with newer generation artists Sarah Jarosz and Aoife O' Donovan and bluegrass legend Del McCoury alongside Newgrass pioneers Yonder Mountain String Band. 2018 sees the return of YMSB as well as staples
STACKED! Green River Festival Announces Initial Line Up, We Are Mighty Excited Festivals Music Features by Brian Carroll - March 8, 2018March 8, 20180 A festival, despite whether it is know for a certain genre or even has one in its title, should have a little something for everyone. Be it stretching the boundaries of what bluegrass might be at certain festivals by including folk bands that just so happen to have a mandolin or banjo player. Perhaps its having modern day rock n' roll royalty back to back with some of the finest roots musicians out there on the road today? There is a certain balance to be struck in a line up that makes what might be a good festival, a great one. With the announcement of the 2018 Green River Festival today, well I do believe that greatness is looming for