David Holt and the Lightning Bolts Perform at Isis Music Hall on Sat, June 22nd

David Holt and the Lightning Bolts
Isis Music Hall and Restaurant
Saturday, June 22
828-575-2737
743 Haywood Rd. Asheville, NC 28806
Tickets:http://isisasheville.com/events/david-holt-and-the-lightning-bolts/
$18 advance / $20 at the door; 5pm doors; 9pm show

This is a seated concert with dinner reservations.  Reservations can be made by calling Isis at 828-575-2737.  There are a limited number of reservations at tables of 4 or 8. There is also theater-style and limited balcony seating seating available on a first come first serve basis.

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David Holt and the Lightning Bolts delivers old-time music with a new time jolt. With over ten different instruments including: banjo, fiddle, bottleneck blues guitar, mouth bow and even paper bag the Lightning Bolts present an entertaining and dynamic show filled with humor, stories and music.

Four-time Grammy winner David Holt has assembled a group of stellar musicians and entertainers: Laura Boosinger, Josh Goforth, David Cohen and Jeff Hersk who bring to life the joy and spirit of mountain music. Every concert sizzles with music learned directly from musical greats like Doc Watson, Tommy Jarrell, Grandpa Jones, Roy Acuff and the oldest person in the world, 123-year- old Susie Brunson. Using large black and white photographs taken by David of his mentors the audience hears the true life stories behind the songs and tunes. www.davidholt.com 

David Holt:
For over thirty years, David Holt has been living in the Blue Ridge Mountains collecting and performing the songs and stories of the old-time mountaineers. He has learned this treasure trove of music directly from musical greats like Fred Cockerham, Byard Ray, Grandpa Jones, Roy Acuff and the oldest person in the world, 123-year-old Susie Brunson. David is a four-time Grammy Award winner. Winning two Grammys with Doc Watson for their 3 CD set “Legacy.”

He is known for his folk music and storytelling recordings, his numerous programs on PBS including Folkways and Great Scenic Railway Journeys, Riverwalk Jazz on public radio, and for his popular concerts performed throughout the country. He was founder and director of the Appalachian Music Program at Warren Wilson College from 1975-1981. He is a three-time winner of Frets magazine readers’ poll for “best old-time banjoist.” Southern Living magazine recently featured David as a “Southerner Making a Difference.”

Laura Boosinger:
Laura came to the Swannanoa Valley in 1976 as a student in the Appalachian Music Program at Warren Wilson College. She was one of David Holt’s most outstanding students and upon graduation became a full time performer of mountain music. Says Boosinger, “I became acquainted with a variety of families for whom traditional music was a natural part of their lives. My relationships with Quay and Sue Smathers, and the Luke Smathers String Band of Haywood County, became lasting friendships that I count as some of my most valuable.” Laura took David’s place as Luke’s banjo player in 1984 and played in his band for the next 13 years. Her recording “Down the Road” celebrates the music of the region’s great musicians. Today, Laura Boosinger gives back the music she has gathered to the many young people she works with in schools throughout the South. She is director of the Madison County Arts Council, Madison Country, NC. http://www.lauraboosinger.com

Josh Goforth:
Josh was raised around traditional music in rural Madison County, NC. He has become one of rising stars of acoustic music and a Grammy Nominee. David met Josh when he was a fourteen-year-old student in Madison County. Josh is a descendent of many of the same people David learned from when he first came to NC in 1969.

After high school he went to East Tennessee State University to study music education, and to be a part of ETSU’s famous Bluegrass and Country Music Program. In 2000, he played fiddle for the movie “Songcatcher,” both onscreen and on the soundtrack. He has toured extensively with a variety of ensembles, including the ETSU bluegrass band, with David Holt and Laura Boosinger, and with several bluegrass bands including Appalachian Trail, Carolina Road, Open Road, and The Josh Goforth Band. He has performed all over the United States as well as Europe and Asia. In 2000,2003, and 2005, he was named Fiddler of the Festival at Fiddler’s Grove making him the youngest ever 3 time winner. This secured him the title “Master Fiddler.”

Jeff Hersk:
The upright bass became Jeff’s obsession about 10 years ago, after much less satisfying careers in auto body repair, rural homesteading, and computer programming. He played guitar for many years, performing in rock bands in Canada and California in the ’70s, but now finds that he was meant to be a bassist. Jeff replaced Zeb Holt (David’s son) when Zeb moved to NYC to work for NBC.

Byron Hedgepeth:
Byron Hedgepeth,is among the most versatile percussionists in the southeast, performing and recording regularly with a wide variety of artists across genres from jazz to classical to old-time music.

Watch David Holt Perform:
“Sittin’ on Top of the World”:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQG09VWR7e8

“Johnson Boys”:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9fSaNRigYU

http://www.davidholt.com

 

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Doc Watson “Sitting Beside Himself” Video by Brian Adam Smith

Doc Watson “Sitting Beside Himself”
by Brian Adam Smith with music by Glory On The Floor

Clips from the first time Doc Watson ever sat beside his own statue in Boone, NC.

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Doc Watson Biography ‘Blind But Now I See’ by Kent Gustavson: A Definitive Biography of an American Icon

Doc Watson Biography ‘Blind But Now I See’
by Kent Gustavson
A Definitive Biography of an American Icon

“A touching story about overcoming life’s obstacles…”
–Vintage Guitar Magazine

“Musicologists will appreciate the chapters on Doc’s singing style and guitar work… Music fans will delight in the book as a whole, a splendid recounting of Doc Watson as man whose ‘…approach to folk music on a guitar was like Horowitz’s approach to the piano…”
–Gary Presley, The Internet Review of Books

“This is a highly informative, fascinating biography of the great Doc Watson. What a life. It’s a page-turner that will keep you up past your bedtime. Don’t miss it.”
–The Inland Northwest Bluegrass Association

“This is a valuable, anecdotal work anyone interested in Doc’s music and life will enjoy reading.” –Bluegrass Unlimited

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Award-winning author Kent Gustavson was born immersed in a rich musical heritage. As the son of peaceniks, he grew up with family sing-alongs. From Pete Seeger, Joan Baez, and Bob Dylan, he darted to classical, jazz, and avant-garde jazz, before circling back to the Greenwich Village folk canon and tracing that music back. In singer-guitarist Doc Watson, Gustavson found a treasure of American music. His biography of Watson, Blind But Now I See (Sumach-Red Books) is the definitive biography of an American icon.

The Tulsa, Oklahoma-based author is uniquely qualified to write a book that merges myth, musicology, and American history. He holds a PhD in classical composition from Stony Brook University in New York, where he taught leadership, writing, literature, music and German for ten years. He’s an active musician with 14 critically acclaimed albums, and his music has been featured on National Public Radio’s All Songs Considered. He also hosts a radio show, Sound Authors, where he has interviewed hundreds of award-winning authors and musicians.

Blind But Now I See is the first comprehensive biography of Doc Watson. It was written over 6 years, culled from meticulous archival research and well over a hundred interviews. The book brims with insights from such legendary musicians as Bela Fleck, Ben Harper, David Grisman, David Moultrup, Jerry Douglas, Jonathan Byrd, Marty Stuart, Michelle Shocked, Mike Seeger, Norman Blake, Ricky Skaggs, Tommy Emmanuel, Tony Rice, Tony Trischka, and Warren Haynes, among many others. It is a winner of a Next Generation Indie Book Award, and finalist in the Foreword Book of the Year Awards. The book has sold 5,000 paperbacks and 25,000 e-books. Vintage Guitar Magazine praises it as: “A touching story about overcoming life’s obstacles.” Blind But Now I See is now available in its expanded second printing, with a third and even more expansive edition already in the works.

Two-time Grammy Award winner Ben Harper says in his Blind But Now I See interview: “There was a sense of grace, effortlessness, and fluidity to Doc Watson’s musicianship and singing that is nothing short of miraculous.”

Watson’s influence has been recognized by presidents and by heroes of modern music such as Bob Dylan, Jerry Garcia, Ben Harper, Robert Plant, and Gillian Welch, but little is known about his personal life, his complex relationship with his son, Merle, his mythical rise to prominence, and his awe-inspiring musicality. Watson was a blind boy from the small town of Deep Gap, North Carolina who grew up in the Depression, then lived in abject poverty until being brought into the 1960s folk scene. For over 52 years, Watson mesmerized bluegrass, folk, and rock audiences with his soft baritone and fiery guitar licks

Gustavson’s congenial but probingly insightful interview skills help piece together a powerful and honest character mosaic. His vibrant, erudite, and enthusiastic prose demystifies Watson’s astounding musicality and dissects the paradoxes and complexities of the man with bold sensitivity.

In an interview with esteemed alt-country publication No Depression Gustavson said: “I stumbled across a copy of The Watson Family by Folkways records. Watson’s voice was so rock-solid in those family hymns that I still sing the bass part today, because it’s stronger in my mind than the melody! He pointed me towards the blues, early rock and roll, traditional Appalachian fiddle music, and balladry. He literally started a brush fire in my musical mind.”

In 2004 Gustavson began writing Blind But Now I See, and nearly 10 years later and three editions in he’s emerged an authority on the enigmatic icon. He told No Depression: “Countless close friends and family members of Doc have come to me over the past two years and thanked me for writing this biography, and for really framing the reality surrounding his life.” Besides the plaudits from insiders, the biggest reward is bringing this journey back home. “In the new edition I finally got a chance to speak to Pete Seeger,” Gustavson says. “I called my parents and told them ‘Pete Seeger just spoke to me!’ What an honor.”

Biography Written By: Lorne Behrman

www.kentgustavson.com

Great review by Professor Puppet

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Thank you Peter Rowan for writing such a touching song in honor of Doc Watson & sharing it for the very 1st time!

Thank you Peter Rowan for writing such a beautiful and touching song in honor of Doc Watson and sharing it with all of us for the very first time at Pisgah Brewing Company at last night’s show with The Mosier Brothers!!!

Thanks to Mark “DaBabe” Roth for recording.

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Lazybirds Perform their Ragtime Style of American Roots Music at MoDaddys on Friday, September 23, 2011

Lazybirds. Photo by Jen Fox

Lazybirds is a classic American roots band from the mountains of North Carolina. Specializing in good time music that is just about impossible not to move to, there is also a depth to the band that faithful fans have treasured over the years. According to the legendary Doc Watson, “Lazybirds play a good variety of blues, jazz, and that good old ragtime sound, and you will hear the flavor of that in anything they play.” The ‘Birds cover a lot of musical ground, from early American stringband music to Dylan classics, as well as classic sounding originals, but deep roots are what hold all of these sounds together.

The Lazybirds most recent CD release (2010), “Broken Wing,” pays homage to founding member Andy Christopher, who played tenor banjo and tenor guitar, and sang with the band until being stricken suddenly with a mysterious heart condition. The title track, a Lazybirds original, describes how the band misses their soul brother; “It seems wrong you’re not here on my right,” “There’s a hole where there should be your banjo.” Andy was with the band for part of the recording before he took sick, and you can hear his distinctive banjo picking particularly on “Life,” a Lazybirds rendition of the Sly and the Family Stone classic that will surprise most listeners other than long time fans, who expect the occasional knuckle-ball from this band. In essence the CD is life-affirming, moving through the blues, swing and deep country with humor and heart. “Broken Wing” has received sparkling reviews across the American southeast and in Europe.

Lately the band has been incorporating more original music into the mix. Some of these will certainly find their way onto the next Lazybirds recording, but you’ll have to check the credits to know which songs are Lazybirds originals and which are old classics, as the band has been steeping in the American roots melting pot for so long that it flavors anything they do. The band began nearly twenty years ago, when Jay Brown and James T Browne, who had played acoustic blues and folk together in high-school, moved up to Boone NC where they immediately met Mitch Johnston. Eventually Mitch became the hard driving bass man who perfectly complimented James’ jazz drumming and Jay’s finger style blues-swing guitar and jazzy harmonica. Shortly afterward they met Andy, who’s rhythmic style opened up more doors for the band. A few years later they were joined by German born fiddler and blues guitarist Alfred Michels who, evidence clearly suggests, is from 100 years ago.

Together they have played top festivals across the southeast, including Merlefest, Bristol Rhythm and Roots, LEAF, Birmingham City Stages, Music on the Mountaintop, and Bele Chere. They have shared the stage with their friends The Old Crow Medicine Show and Doc Watson. They’ve been a longstanding favorite in some of the best bars from Birmingham to Boone. Lazybirds is an American classic worth getting to know.

Show Details at a Glance:

LazyBirds
MoDaddys
Friday, September 23, 2011

9:30, $5
(828) 258-1550
77 Biltmore Ave.
Asheville, NC 28801
http://www.modaddysbar.com

www.lazybirds.net

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