“Bluegrass On The Farm”

This year we are featuring some of the best bluegrass entertainment in the Washington, DC area.

Dirty River is a bluegrass quintet based in the Washington DC area, performing traditional, contemporary, and original American music. They play time-honored standards, unique arrangements of classic country, and folk-rock steeped in bluegrass traditions. They write noteworthy original tunes, while both their instrumental and vocal abilities get equal billing.

Danny Paisley and Southern Grass

The Lisa Kay Band

 This Year’s Bands

The Lisa Kay Band features folks from the DC area. Doug McKelway, news anchor for a DC-based TV station, is a clean, crisp, and imaginative banjo stylist. He also contributes his smooth baritone harmonies to the vocals. Kentucky native John Seebach is a fantastic young guitarist (not to mention mandolinist) who has a unique and beautiful approach to the instrument. The band recently welcomes Wally Hughes, of Smyrna, Delaware, on fiddle and dobro. The legendary bass player Tom Gray (Seldom Scene, Country Gentlemen) often guest stars with the band.

Dirty River

Danny Paisley and The Southern Grass is the real deal, straight up, straight ahead bluegrass, played with energy and passion by men who’ve been working together for years. Lead singer and band leader Danny Paisley is the Pennsylvania born son of Blue Ridge North Carolina parents who moved to the big northern city in search of a better life. They brought their music with them and passed it along to sons Danny and Michael. The brothers played in several bands and joined their father, Bob Paisley, in Southern Grass in 1979. TJ and Bobby Lundy, sons of a fellow bluegrass musician and former band mate of Bob Paisley, found their way to the band as well. Perhaps there was some generational karma working when Don Eldreth, Junior, who’s Dad was a well known mandolin player who’d also played with the elder Paisley and Lundy, also found his way to the group. Whatever it was, it made for a tight sound, and a tight family band feeling. That gave Danny Paisley to strength to step up and take the lead and continue the band when his father passed away in 2004. It turned out to be a way to honor the older musicians in their families, as the new generation dug deeper into the mountain sound and sought out more recording and touring opportunities.

Band Schedule

 

12:00 - 12:35 Clearspring

12:45 - 1:30  Lisa Kay Band

 1:40 - 2:25  Dirty River

 2:35 - 3:20  Danny Paisley

 3:30 - 4:15  Lisa Kay band

 4:25 - 5:10  Dirty River

 5:15 - 6:00  Danny Paisley

 

. . . . Subject to change.

In 2008 Danny was nominated as bluegrass vocalist of the year in the International Bluegrass Music Association Awards and signed a recording contract with Rounder Records where his recently released album “The Room Over Mine” has been listed in the top 15 of the National Bluegrass Music Survey for more than 6 months.