35th Annual Minnesota Bluegrass & Old-Time Music Festival
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Bluegrass Karaoke debuts
Volunteers needed The Minnesota Bluegrss & Old-Time Music Festival depends on volunteers to serve your needs and fill more than 500 time slots to keep this festival operating smoothly. Prior to the festival, the volunteer MBOTMA Festival staff does the planning and preparatory work. During the festival, volunteers take tickets, sell shirts, watch the gates, provide handicap services, set up
the grounds and clean up afterward. Can you help us? Please stop by the festival headquarters and check out the volunteer schedule for openings. And don’t forget to thank all the volunteers you see. For their efforts they receive a specially designed volunteer shirt, and they make new friends, learn new skills and have fun too.
Stay nimble with morning yoga Lucy Weberling is the founder of Inner Smile Yoga located in Tulsa, Okla. She is a 200-hour certified yoga instructor educated at the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health in Lenox, Mass., and is registered with the Yoga Alliance. Both organizations are dedicated to maintaining the integrity of yoga teaching. Weberling is also a long- time bluegrass musician and festival-goer, and is there-
fore well-versed in the rigors of the festival lifestyle – long hours, little sleep and sore fingers. So for you late-night pickers, and the rest of you too, Lucy will lead a morning yoga session at 10 a.m. both Friday and Saturday at the Showcase Tent. Come stretch your body, relax your mind, calm your spirit and prepare for another grueling festival day of fun.
We have an exciting new event this year at the Minnesota Bluegrass and Old-Time Music Festival. There will be a special “Bluegrass Karaoke Hour” with Long Road Home as your backup band, happening at 2 p.m. Saturday in the Showcase Tent. Here’s your chance to get up and sing with some of the best! Festival attendees will get a chance to pick a song and join the band on-stage to show off their talents. This event is open to all ages who can carry a tune, play an instrument or both! Participants will be encouraged to choose a vocal selection (within the realm of bluegrass or related “standards”), although instrumental pieces are also welcome. Sign-up will be available starting at 9 a.m. Saturday in the Gathering Place, and should there be open spots after that time, you can find the sign-up sheet starting at 1 p.m. at the Showcase Tent. Please note: these five-minute time slots are designed for individual performers. We hope you’ll join us for this great addition to our festival!”
The Volo Bogtrotters According to Wikipedia, “The Volo Bogtrotters were an old-time string band, based in the Chicago area that played songs and tunes from the string bands of the 1920s and fiddle music from the Midwest, as well as from other new and traditional sources. The band was together from about 1984 to around 2002 and made four recordings on the Marimac Label. They played at many music festivals and traditional dance venues, known for their driving twin-fiddle sound and old songs gleaned from 78 rpm recordings. Six members of the band have recently united again (2012) to play at some dances and festivals.” Can this be true? Has the group actually reunited to come to the Minnesota Bluegrass & Old-Time Music Festival? The answer is yes. According to their own
Facebook page (yes, they have a Facebook page!), “The Volo Bogtrotters are back. A Midwestern favorite since their first gig at the actual Volo Bog in 1985, the band took a rest after the festival season of 2002; 2012 saw them re-emerge as now a sixpiece old-time music powerhouse.” And Jim Nelson recently assured me, “Just for the record, there are six of us in the band: Chirps Smith on fiddle and mandolin, Fred Campeau on fiddle, banjo and Hawaiian guitar, Paul Tyler on fiddle and mandolin, Steve Rosen on banjo, fiddle [that’s a lot of fiddles!] and mandolin, Tony Scarimbolo on string bass and harmonica, and me on guitar.” Doug Lohman recently wrote in his magazine “The Volo Bogtrotters are one of the premier old-time bands from the Midwest. They have maintained their fire, passion, joy and respect for the music since the 1980s when I first met them.” They hail from Chicago, Skokie, Evan-
ston, LaGrange, Wis. and St. Louis, Mo. There influences range from Gid Tanner & the Skillet Lickers, to the Cofer Brothers, Pappy Taylor and Lotus Dickey. Jim Nelson says “There is a strong Midwest bent for our instrumental tunes. Chirps brought in a lot of tunes he collected while playing with Indian Creek Delta Boys in the 70s, with Garry and Steve Harrison. But we also grabbed tunes from Mississippi, Galax, Oklahoma. When someone heard something that caught the ear, we worked it up.” The Volo Bogtrotters are on the festival main stage on Thursday night and Saturday evening, and you can dance to their music in the Showcase Tent on Friday night. You’ll also find various members of the group in various specialty showcase events throughout the weekend such as the Old-Time Banjo Masters Showcase and the Midwest Old-Time Fiddle Showcase.
Armadillo Sound & Design Armadillo Sound & Design provides the highquality sound reinforcement for both the Main Stage and the Showcase Tent at the Minnesota Bluegrass & Old-Time Music Festival. The company was established in 1986 by Doug Lohman to specialize in providing production (sound and lights) for acoustic-music events. Lohman has more than 40 years experience as a musician, having performed many styles of music, such as hootenan-
ny, acoustic rock, country rock, blues, bluegrass, folk, swing and Cajun. Lohman brings to his love of music of all genres the production of sound, and his technicians focus on making the voices and instruments as clear as possible to allow the audience to fully appreciate what the performers are doing. This love for the music and attention to detail are what sets Armadillo apart. You can visit them at www.ArmadilloSound.com.