News

It’s a warm spring day in Asheville, North Carolina, and Charlie Parr is sitting on the back stairwell of Eulogy, a trendy music venue in the South Slope neighborhood. Later that evening, the singer-songwriter will play to a packed crowd. But, for now, Parr is soaking in every last ray of sunshine before he has to return to his native Minnesota, where winter has yet to fully let go.

“For a while, I think I was feeling intimidated by a lot of stuff,” Parr tells Rolling Stone. “Aging is intimidating.

Beyoncé’s knack for dominating the music scene in multiple genres is nothing new. Months after the 2016 release of her flavorful Lemonade, she made history as the first artist to garner Grammy nominations in the rock, rap, R&b and pop fields in the same year. The only genre not to recognize her, despite the category-appropriate track “Daddy Lessons”? Country music.

Beyoncé submitted the twangy song to the Grammys, and based on critical reception alone, it should have earned bids for best country song and/or best country solo performance. But it was not a surprise that the Houston-born singer was rejected from the category, a decision that mirrored her awful experience at the Country Music Association Awards, where her stirring performance of the song with the Dixie Chicks resulted in a firestorm, calls by some salty fans for a boycott and the megastar’s presence that night being omitted from the CMA website.

Bluegrass pioneer Earl Scruggs was born 100 years ago this week, and the tributes to the banjo picker have been many. On Friday, Tony Trischka, himself a banjo disciple of Scruggs, released a rollicking version of “Brown’s Ferry Blues,” a song dating back to the Thirties, that features an array of A-list players including Billy Strings, Béla Fleck, and Sam Bush.

Written by long-ago Grand Ole Opry stars the Delmore Brothers, “Brown’s Ferry Blues” features Strings on lead vocals, with Fleck and Trischka delivering a pair of banjo breakdowns.

With house lights turned all the way down, and a steady fog machine masking the glow of several hundred smartphones, Evan Felker stepped onto the Cain’s Ballroom stage in Tulsa.

He did a quick double-take when his eyes caught the 1,700 fans fortunate enough to have made it inside on Friday night, who roared at the collective realization that the six silhouettes on stage really were the Turnpike Troubadours.

Whether by design or blind luck, the lights stayed off while the band went through nearly two minutes of tuning and straightening microphone stands,...

When looking at Grammy nominations for 2022, you might notice that there are a few cover songs nominated. As per Grammy rules, a cover can only be submitted in a performance category or in an arrangement category; they’re not eligible for songwriting since they were written in a previous eligibility period, or sometimes before the Grammys were even created. This year I think three covers seem to be in a good position to win: Jason Isbell’s “All I Do is Drive,” Tony Bennett and Lady Gaga’s “I Get a Kick Out of You,” and Chris Cornell’s “Nothing Compares 2 U.” But just how common is it for covers to prevail?

Country is one of the fields with the most covers winning. A few of the most recent wins have included “Gentle On My Mind” by The Band Perry (originally performed by John Hartford), “Wagon Wheel” by Darius Rucker...

Singer-songwriter Dylan LeBlanc will look to his musical influences on the new EP Pastimes, due in June. The first release from the project is a sweeping cover of “Gentle on My Mind,” originally penned by John Hartford and made famous by Glen Campbell.

LeBlanc doesn’t mess too much with the arrangement of “Gentle on My Mind,” letting the wheels-in-motion brushed drums and restless acoustic guitar figures carry things forward. There’s a little extra atmosphere from steel, piano, and even washes of strings, while LeBlanc’s airy vocals add...

Five decades later, she can still remember the high points, like meeting a few Beatles, encountering Mick Jagger or a very young Michael Jackson in the studio, or sharing a bill with Tina Turner. And she can also recall the precise moment when she decided to shut it all down, at least for a long while.

It was the summer of 1971, and Kate Taylor — along with her siblings, especially her older brother James — was having a moment. Earlier that year, Atlantic Records had released her first album, Sister Kate. The...

Ingrid Andress and Miranda Lambert lead all country music artists at the 2021 Grammy Awards with three nominations each. Andress earned nominations in the Best Country Album and Best Country Song categories, as well as an all-genre nomination for Best New Artist. Lambert’s three noms include Country Album, Country Song, and Best Country Solo Performance.

Andress, a Colorado-raised songwriter, garners her country nominations on the strength of her debut single “More Hearts Than Mine” and her subsequent debut album, Lady Like. In May, the LP became the highest streamed country debut album by a woman.

In Todd Snider’s mind, the most unusual aspect of Jason Isbell and Amanda Shires’ wedding in 2013 wasn’t that Snider was asked to marry them or that he wasn’t legally ordained to do so until that day. It was what Snider was asked to recite: “Prayer,” an obscure song by the late John Hartford. “Every morning I wake up,” it begins, “Saying in the back of my mind/’This could be my last day on Earth/This could be the last time/I’ll ever feel … the warmth...

No one ever knew what to call Mumford & Sons. The Guardian had already described them as “Coldplay reincarnated as hillbillies” by the time the group released their debut album in the U.S. in February 2010, a moment that garnered a slurry of descriptors: “foot-stomping British folk;” “skiffled Frames (nice banjo);” or, as this magazine wrote, “if Dexys Midnight Runners aged into boozy-pub session romantics.”

One word eventually stuck: Americana. The New York Times would describe the group as “Britons touched by Americana” later that year; a Spin cover story would...

Happy 73rd birthday to Rock & Roll Hall of Fame member Linda Ronstadt, born July 15th, 1946, in Tucson, Arizona. In addition to her mid-Seventies dominance as rock’s premier female artist, Ronstadt also delivered impassioned performances of country songs throughout, and beyond, that era, with crossover hits including the Everly Brothers’ “When Will I Be Loved,” Neil Young’s “Love Is a Rose,” and her Grammy-winning take on Hank Williams’ “I Can’t Help It (If I’m Still in Love With You).”

Also faithful to the origins of country music...

Just as the popular portrayal of Johnny Cash as a lawless hellraiser overlooks a nuanced man’s love of faith and family, painting 80-year-old Country Music Hall of Fame inductee Ray Stevens as just a comedy act undercuts his decades of work as a producer, businessman and multi-Grammy-winning singer of serious country and gospel songs.

Stevens’ role as an ambassador for country music began as soon as the Atlanta-area native inked his first record deal in 1957. Beyond making a mark with “Ahab the Arab” and other early-career novelty sides, Stevens...

“Few players have changed the way we hear an instrument the way Earl has, putting him in a category with Miles Davis, Louis Armstrong, Chet Atkins and Jimi Hendrix.”

Those words, penned by actor, comedian, author and banjo player Steve Martin, appeared in a New Yorker tribute following the 2012 death of legendary picker and Country Music Hall of Fame member Earl Scruggs, who revolutionized the three-finger style of banjo playing that now most commonly is referred to by his surname. Scruggs, who would have turned 95 years old on January 6th,...

Legendary songwriter and musician John Hartford, who came into millions of homes each week playing banjo on the highly rated Glen Campbell Goodtime Hour from 1969 to 1972, forged his own Grammy-winning career as a versatile session musician, unique lyricist and compelling storyteller on hits like “Gentle on My Mind.” Now, a collection of vintage Hartford cuts dating from 1965 to 1969, including 19 previously unreleased tracks, will be available with Backroads, Rivers & Memories — The Rare & Unreleased John Hartford, due March 1st via Real Gone Music.

A sideman on such influential LPs as the Byrds...

First-time recipients and repeat winners were honored at the 29th annual International Bluegrass Music Awards in Raleigh, North Carolina, held Thursday night. Balsam Range, a five-piece band from North Carolina’s Haywood County, took the evening’s top prize as Entertainer of the Year, an award they previously won in 2014.

Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver, one of the genre’s most enduring acts, earned their eighth Vocal Group of the Year award, while Female Vocalist Brooke Aldridge and Male Vocalist of the Year Buddy Melton, who leads Balsam Range, were repeat winners...

Aretha Franklin was the Queen of Soul, but she was also an interpreter of songs from all genres, including country and folk music. Franklin died Thursday at 76 after a bout with pancreatic cancer, leaving behind a catalog that showcased her diverse range. Here are six of her best country renditions.

“Gentle on My Mind” (1969)

Written by John Hartford, “Gentle on my Mind” was one of the most omnipresent songs of the late Sixties. Glen Campbell popularized it. Dean Martin turned it into an easy-listening hit. But it was Aretha Franklin...

Pickathon celebrated its 20th anniversary this past weekend. To put this in sharp perspective, Portland, Oregon’s four-day musical shindig has been around longer than either Bonnaroo or Coachella, the two standard-bearers in American music festivals. But despite its age, Pickathon doesn’t attract the same kind of attention as its peers — and that’s by design. Tucked away on a farm nestled in the woods of the Pacific Northwest, it’s a hard-to-find festival, with some stages requiring literal hikes to access. But its ruggedness is part of the charm,...

Artists representing traditional, contemporary and boundary-stretching styles are among the list of this year’s nominees for the International Bluegrass Music Awards, announced today at a Nashville press conference. In another banner year for women in bluegrass, the top nominees, with an impressive six nods each, are fiddle-playing singer-songwriter Becky Buller, the first-ever woman named Ibma Fiddle Player of the Year in 2016, and Molly Tuttle, who in 2017 earned an Ibma honor as Guitar Player of the Year, the first female artist to win in that category.

Also recognized among the...

The cast of “Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 2” graces the latest cover of Empire Magazine, ahead of the film’s May 5 release. Taking either their favorite song or a tune they would have liked to be included in the Marvel superhero film, Chris Pratt (Star-Lord), Zoe Saldana (Gamora), Kurt Russell (Ego), Elizabeth Debicki (Ayesha), Pom Klementieff (Mantis), Michael Rooker (Yondu), Dave Bautista (Drax), Sean Gunn (Rocket/Kraglin), Karen Gillan (Nebula) and director James Gunn curated a mixtape for the magazine, which can be found on Spotify. Listen to each song chosen by the cast and the director below.

Read More: ‘Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2’ Trailer: Kurt Russell and Baby Groot Highlight Action-Packed Clip

“Whiskey And You,” by Chris Stapleton – chosen by Pratt

“When I’m on the road, I tend to listen to songs that allow me to bask fully in my loneliness. When I want to dive headfirst into sorrow,...

We here at Quick Stop Entertainment are true lovers of music, in all its forms. We’re also quite keen on the spirit of competition, and of spurring creativity through said competition.

To that end, we launched a unique form of creative combat here at the Stop.

In this age of manufactured and painfully earnest talent contests, we’ve decided to instead shine a light on the quirky, quixotic underworld of musicians that don’t get nearly the attention they deserve.

Ah, but I did mention that there was a competition involved…

Like a songwriting version of Iron Chef, the competitors will be presented with a very specific songwriting challenge. They’ll be given one week to complete their songs - however they see fit, within the parameters set forth - after which time the entries will be uploaded to Quick Stop to be voted on by you, the audience.

We here at Quick Stop Entertainment are true lovers of music, in all its forms. We’re also quite keen on the spirit of competition, and of spurring creativity through said competition.

To that end, we launched a unique form of creative combat here at the Stop.

In this age of manufactured and painfully earnest talent contests, we’ve decided to instead shine a light on the quirky, quixotic underworld of musicians that don’t get nearly the attention they deserve.

Ah, but I did mention that there was a competition involved…

Like a songwriting version of Iron Chef, the competitors will be presented with a very specific songwriting challenge. They’ll be given one week to complete their songs - however they see fit, within the parameters set forth - after which time the entries will be uploaded to Quick Stop to be voted on by you, the audience.

We here at Quick Stop Entertainment are true lovers of music, in all its forms. We’re also quite keen on the spirit of competition, and of spurring creativity through said competition.

To that end, we launched a unique form of creative combat here at the Stop.

In this age of manufactured and painfully earnest talent contests, we’ve decided to instead shine a light on the quirky, quixotic underworld of musicians that don’t get nearly the attention they deserve.

Ah, but I did mention that there was a competition involved…

Like a songwriting version of Iron Chef, the competitors will be presented with a very specific songwriting challenge. They’ll be given one week to complete their songs - however they see fit, within the parameters set forth - after which time the entries will be uploaded to Quick Stop to be voted on by you, the audience.

Nickel Creek fiddler goes solo

Sara Watkins is a fine fiddler and guitar player—as tenure in Nickel Creek demands—but as a vocalist she might be even more compelling. Her voice is lush, warm and perfectly controlled, and she puts it to good use on her debut solo album. Singing about a lost love whose ghost haunts even the cupboards of her home, she slays on tearjerker “All This Time,” and later she gives Tom Waits’ homesick travelogue “Pony” a fittingly cinematic scope. Producer John Paul Jones (yes, of Led Zeppelin fame) leaves quiet spaces in songs like “My Friend” and “Bygones” that provide an elegantly spare backdrop for Watkins’ voice. She may not quite have the vocal calluses to convey the grit of John Hartford’s “Long Hot Summer Days” or the impish irony to put the necessary wink in Davíd Garza’s “Too Much,” but those are...

Darrell Scott's Modern Hymns gets my vote for Best Bluegrass Album of 2008. Here "bluegrass" is used loosely, and is a catchall term for music anchored by acoustic guitars, fiddles, and dobros. It certainly doesn't fit within the fairly narrow strictures of the genre. But Scott, best known as a songwriter (Tricia Yearwood, Dixie Chicks, Garth Brooks) and sideman (Steve Earle) is a soulful, nuanced singer, and here he lends his pipes to songs written by pretty much the whole Sixties/Seventies Folkie Pantheon -- Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, Gordon Lightfoot, Paul Simon, Leonard Cohen, John Hartford, Guy Clark, Mickey Newbury, and Kris Kristofferson, for starters.

First, there was the film, "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" And the film begot a soundtrack. And the soundtrack begot a concert. And the concert begot another film. And that film begot another soundtrack. And so on.

You can't accuse the Coen brothers of neglecting the synergy involved in their use of classic American bluegrass and country music in their recent film. Featuring such performers as bluegrass legend Ralph Stanley, Emmylou Harris, Alison Krauss, The Fairfield Four, Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, Chris Thomas King, Norman Blake and the late John Hartford, the soundtrack has become one of the biggest surprise hits of the year. This film -- by the documentary team of Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus, and D.A. Pennebaker, and executive produced by T-Bone Burnett (the album producer) and the Coen brothers -- documents a concert at Nashville's historic Ryman Auditorium in May 2000 featuring music from "O Brother". It is playing an exclusive theatrical engagement at New York's Screening Room.

Mixing onstage performances by the various artists with backstage interviews in which they discuss their music and their involvement with "O Brother", "Down From the Mountain", while it offers many stirring musical performances, doesn't stand out either as a concert film or an enlightening documentary. The musical segments are filmed in lackluster style, with little of the flair or excitement of the better concert films ("The Last Waltz", etc.). The backstage sequences are not particularly enlightening, and the interviews lack depth.

Still, the film is valuable if only for its recording of a group of great and sadly unappreciated American musicians who have toiled far too long in relative obscurity. Watching Stanley perform a stark, a cappella version of the mournful "O Death", Hartford comically warble through "Big Rock Candy Mountain" or the Cox Family raising chills with their rendition of "I Am Weary", one is vividly reminded of the utter triviality of most modern-day popular music.

DOWN FROM THE MOUNTAIN

Cowboy Booking International

Directors:Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus, D.A. Pennebaker

Executive producers:T-Bone Burnett, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen

Producers:Bob Neuwirth, Frazer Pennebaker

Cinematographers:Joan Churchill, Jim Desmond, Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus, Bob Neuwirth, Jehane Noujaim, D.A. Pennebaker, John Paul Pennebaker

Editors:Nick Doob, D.A. Pennebaker

Color/stereo

Running time -- 98 minutes

No MPAA rating...

First, there was the film, "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" And the film begot a soundtrack. And the soundtrack begot a concert. And the concert begot another film. And that film begot another soundtrack. And so on.

You can't accuse the Coen brothers of neglecting the synergy involved in their use of classic American bluegrass and country music in their recent film. Featuring such performers as bluegrass legend Ralph Stanley, Emmylou Harris, Alison Krauss, The Fairfield Four, Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, Chris Thomas King, Norman Blake and the late John Hartford, the soundtrack has become one of the biggest surprise hits of the year. This film -- by the documentary team of Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus, and D.A. Pennebaker, and executive produced by T-Bone Burnett (the album producer) and the Coen brothers -- documents a concert at Nashville's historic Ryman Auditorium in May 2000 featuring music from "O Brother". It is playing an exclusive theatrical engagement at New York's Screening Room.

Mixing onstage performances by the various artists with backstage interviews in which they discuss their music and their involvement with "O Brother", "Down From the Mountain", while it offers many stirring musical performances, doesn't stand out either as a concert film or an enlightening documentary. The musical segments are filmed in lackluster style, with little of the flair or excitement of the better concert films ("The Last Waltz", etc.). The backstage sequences are not particularly enlightening, and the interviews lack depth.

Still, the film is valuable if only for its recording of a group of great and sadly unappreciated American musicians who have toiled far too long in relative obscurity. Watching Stanley perform a stark, a cappella version of the mournful "O Death", Hartford comically warble through "Big Rock Candy Mountain" or the Cox Family raising chills with their rendition of "I Am Weary", one is vividly reminded of the utter triviality of most modern-day popular music.

DOWN FROM THE MOUNTAIN

Cowboy Booking International

Directors:Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus, D.A. Pennebaker

Executive producers:T-Bone Burnett, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen

Producers:Bob Neuwirth, Frazer Pennebaker

Cinematographers:Joan Churchill, Jim Desmond, Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus, Bob Neuwirth, Jehane Noujaim, D.A. Pennebaker, John Paul Pennebaker

Editors:Nick Doob, D.A. Pennebaker

Color/stereo

Running time -- 98 minutes

No MPAA rating...

First, there was the film, "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" And the film begot a soundtrack. And the soundtrack begot a concert. And the concert begot another film. And that film begot another soundtrack. And so on.

You can't accuse the Coen brothers of neglecting the synergy involved in their use of classic American bluegrass and country music in their recent film. Featuring such performers as bluegrass legend Ralph Stanley, Emmylou Harris, Alison Krauss, The Fairfield Four, Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, Chris Thomas King, Norman Blake and the late John Hartford, the soundtrack has become one of the biggest surprise hits of the year. This film -- by the documentary team of Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus, and D.A. Pennebaker, and executive produced by T-Bone Burnett (the album producer) and the Coen brothers -- documents a concert at Nashville's historic Ryman Auditorium in May 2000 featuring music from "O Brother". It is playing an exclusive theatrical engagement at New York's Screening Room.

Mixing onstage performances by the various artists with backstage interviews in which they discuss their music and their involvement with "O Brother", "Down From the Mountain", while it offers many stirring musical performances, doesn't stand out either as a concert film or an enlightening documentary. The musical segments are filmed in lackluster style, with little of the flair or excitement of the better concert films ("The Last Waltz", etc.). The backstage sequences are not particularly enlightening, and the interviews lack depth.

Still, the film is valuable if only for its recording of a group of great and sadly unappreciated American musicians who have toiled far too long in relative obscurity. Watching Stanley perform a stark, a cappella version of the mournful "O Death", Hartford comically warble through "Big Rock Candy Mountain" or the Cox Family raising chills with their rendition of "I Am Weary", one is vividly reminded of the utter triviality of most modern-day popular music.

DOWN FROM THE MOUNTAIN

Cowboy Booking International

Directors:Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus, D.A. Pennebaker

Executive producers:T-Bone Burnett, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen

Producers:Bob Neuwirth, Frazer Pennebaker

Cinematographers:Joan Churchill, Jim Desmond, Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus, Bob Neuwirth, Jehane Noujaim, D.A. Pennebaker, John Paul Pennebaker

Editors:Nick Doob, D.A. Pennebaker

Color/stereo

Running time -- 98 minutes

No MPAA rating...

First, there was the film, "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" And the film begot a soundtrack. And the soundtrack begot a concert. And the concert begot another film. And that film begot another soundtrack. And so on.

You can't accuse the Coen brothers of neglecting the synergy involved in their use of classic American bluegrass and country music in their recent film. Featuring such performers as bluegrass legend Ralph Stanley, Emmylou Harris, Alison Krauss, The Fairfield Four, Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, Chris Thomas King, Norman Blake and the late John Hartford, the soundtrack has become one of the biggest surprise hits of the year. This film -- by the documentary team of Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus, and D.A. Pennebaker, and executive produced by T-Bone Burnett (the album producer) and the Coen brothers -- documents a concert at Nashville's historic Ryman Auditorium in May 2000 featuring music from "O Brother". It is playing an exclusive theatrical engagement at New York's Screening Room.

Mixing onstage performances by the various artists with backstage interviews in which they discuss their music and their involvement with "O Brother", "Down From the Mountain", while it offers many stirring musical performances, doesn't stand out either as a concert film or an enlightening documentary. The musical segments are filmed in lackluster style, with little of the flair or excitement of the better concert films ("The Last Waltz", etc.). The backstage sequences are not particularly enlightening, and the interviews lack depth.

Still, the film is valuable if only for its recording of a group of great and sadly unappreciated American musicians who have toiled far too long in relative obscurity. Watching Stanley perform a stark, a cappella version of the mournful "O Death", Hartford comically warble through "Big Rock Candy Mountain" or the Cox Family raising chills with their rendition of "I Am Weary", one is vividly reminded of the utter triviality of most modern-day popular music.

DOWN FROM THE MOUNTAIN

Cowboy Booking International

Directors:Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus, D.A. Pennebaker

Executive producers:T-Bone Burnett, Ethan Coen, Joel Coen

Producers:Bob Neuwirth, Frazer Pennebaker

Cinematographers:Joan Churchill, Jim Desmond, Nick Doob, Chris Hegedus, Bob Neuwirth, Jehane Noujaim, D.A. Pennebaker, John Paul Pennebaker

Editors:Nick Doob, D.A. Pennebaker

Color/stereo

Running time -- 98 minutes

No MPAA rating...