Category Archives: music

Highlights of the McConnell Library Appalachian Music Collection- Steve Martin

(Used with permission from Roger Gupta, photographer) “Do you love to…..get small?” Back in the late 70s when anyone said that, most people in the room would start laughing and usually start reciting the entire comedy album called…. well it … Continue reading

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Highlights of the McConnell Library Appalachian Music Collection- Bela Fleck- Drive

Bela Fleck is a darned good banjo player and seems to be a darned nice guy too (I have not spent much of any time with him to actually know that, but the little bit that I have spent with … Continue reading

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Highlights of the McConnell Library Appalachian Music Collection- Butch Robins Part 2

(Used with permission from Bud Bennett, photographer) I started the first part of the Butch Robins posting with a story about how and when I met Butch.  Since this is the second part of the posting I will now continue … Continue reading

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Highlights of McConnell Library’s Appalachian Music Collection- John Hartford

(Used with permission from C.L. Garvin, photographer.) When I was younger, I had a very good friend, Billy.  Billy was a lot older than me and he loved bluegrass music.  He would play and loan his bluegrass records to me, … Continue reading

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Highlights of McConnel Library’s Appalachian Music Collection- John Balch

Earworm.  The definition of that word from dictionary.com is “a tune or part of a song that repeats in one’s mind”.  I did not need to look that word up actually but I did anyway just to see if there … Continue reading

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Highlights of the McConnell Library Appalachian Music Collection- JD Crowe

   (Used with permission from Mark Harvell, photographer.) If you ask a roomful of bluegrass banjo players who their favorite 5 banjo players are, I’ll bet two names will be on most every list- Earl Scruggs and JD Crowe.  I … Continue reading

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Highlights of the McConnell Library Appalachian Music Collection- Butch Robins PART 1

This will be part 1 of a multi-part post on local legend Butch Robins. In 1981, while a student at VPI, I had a show at WUVT, the college radio station there.  The show was from 6:00-9:00 AM Monday mornings … Continue reading

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Bascom Lamar Lunsford- the man who wrote Good Old Mountain Dew

Last semester I found myself talking to an Appalachian Studies class about Appalachian Music and used the song Good Old Mountain Dew as an example of a traditional song.  After the class, as I walked back to my office I … Continue reading

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Highlights of the McConnell Library Appalachian Music Collection- Farewell My Home

Some years ago electronic and rock musician Brian Eno recorded a series of albums he referred to as ambient music.  In the liner notes he mentioned that he tried to make music as enjoyable as it was ignorable.  I liked … Continue reading

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"Give Me the Banjo" on PBS Nov 4

There has been a documentary in the works for quite a while now and it is apparently finished and will air Nov 4 at 9:00-pm on PBS. The Banjo Project has a very nice website talking about this documentary and … Continue reading

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