Deregulator: Alive since '85!

IBMA exhibit hall, 2015 (author photo) From intimate gatherings to mega events, live music is back. North Carolina may be the center of one dimension of the universe (pardon the inept metaphor). Earlier this week, the International Bluegrass Music Association announced its annual business meeting and music festival, renamed  IBMA Bluegrass Live! , will go on as normally as possible, Sept. 28 - Oct. 2. It’ll be the ninth straight year Raleigh has hosted the event. It’ll also serve as a gauge of how well downtown Raleigh has bounced back from COVID business closings, and last summer’s demonstrations and riots. Touted as the world’s largest free urban bluegrass festival, the week will feature more than 100 performances, along with plenty of workshops and demonstrations, strategy sessions for people in the industry, countless opportunities for musicians of all abilities to jam, and lots and lots of merch.  It’s delightful. A couple hundred thousand of us will head to Fayetteville ...

  (Performing at Cameron Village Library, September 2019) It started with an email from a stranger. With that unexpected message, my grateful acceptance, and later exchanges with Deborah and the on-site librarians, the Raleigh Uke Jam became part of the Triangle’s performing arts community.  More or less. We had our three weeks in the spotlight thanks to the 21st century technologies many, left and right, want to suppress with regulations.  Here’s a contrary, personal take on how social media enabled us to build a bridge that otherwise couldn’t have been constructed. I circulated the invitation to a handful of people on our email list (which comprised about 70 at the time), choosing several players I thought would work well with minimal rehearsing in a small ensemble. Deborah asked me to mix some narrative history with the music — try to keep me from talking about history — and pull together a 60-minute program. I set up a playlist, emphasizing the versatility of the inst...