Song Sung Blue: IBMA World of Bluegrass festival ends run in Raleigh
For North Carolinians who like their grass blue, seeing a banjo strap slung around the bronze statue of Sir Walter Raleigh on the steps of the Raleigh Convention Center the last week of September is about as iconic as the Christmas tree lighting in Times Square to New Yorkers. It has been that way for three presidential terms. As many years as there are hot Krispy Kreme doughnuts in a green and white cardboard box. For college aged musicians, Raleigh is very likely the only International Bluegrass Music Association (IBMA) conference and festival location they have ever known. If you stood in just the right downtown spot, you could look in one direction and see the enormous bronze acorn, and in another, have the long-range view of vendor tents and the state capital building.
So after the announcement that in 2025 IBMA would move to Chattanooga, 2024 was preordained to be a bittersweet year. It would be like a high school graduation, throwing caps in the air, fully realizing that the World of Bluegrass landscape as we knew it was about to change. Optimism ran strong that a new bluegrass playground would be replete with bells and whistles, rather like boarding a newly christened cruise ship after a multi-year vacation run on a favorite vessel. But bluegrassers never anticipated IBMA moving to another holler would be wedged out of the primary circle of concern by something much more significant and life-changing: a hurricane impacting many of the musicians and constituency.
Helene blew in the back door like an uninvited guest at a dinner party when the table was set. Many attendees were already in place, having arrived in time for the three-day industry professionals’ conference that preceded the two day World of Bluegrass festival. Agile IBMA officials scurried to make last minute adjustments to the schedule, planning around rainfall, canceling Friday’s daytime street stage shows until 5pm. Some attendees spent Friday morning holed up in hotel rooms or at the North Carolina State Fairgrounds campground, tuned into WRAL-TV coverage, keeping a close eye on tornado warnings and storm drains. Others in the lobby and hallways of the Marriott never put down their instruments, like the Titanic’s orchestra playing “Nearer My God to Thee.”
Balsam Range, from Haywood County, was one of the bands scheduled to play Friday evening that had to cancel because travel wasn’t possible. But by Saturday the sun was out in Raleigh and the festival became a temporary bubble of bluegrass oblivion before the reality of damage reports came rolling in.
Awards Show
On Thursday evening, light drizzle was just making itself known in Raleigh through an elevated frizz-factor, threatening to wreak havoc with the fancy hair-dos of musicians dressed in their blueclassiest for the Awards Show. Stage curtains were draped like old Hollywood as fans found themselves rubbing elbows with bluegrass elite.
Hosted by John Cowan and Missy Raines – both bassists – the 38th annual award show featured plenty of low notes.
“It’s the age-old debate and it threatens to tear our world apart,” Raines said with all seriousness. “Upright or electric bass?”
After taking sides like bass-clef-boxers in the ring, Cowan diplomatically declared a theme that would be repeated throughout the week, “Music has a way of bridging differences.”
When accepting the Male Vocalist of the Year award, Danny Paisley said, “I just sing from the heart and I’m deeply touched that other people like what I do,” adding a nod to another nominee in the category with, “Del McCoury and my father were my two greatest heroes.”
When Authentic Unlimited was awarded Vocal Group of the Year, banjo player Eli Johnston said, “This is the culmination of a bunch of buddies doing hard work together.”
Authentic Unlimited at IBMA awards ’24
In his acceptance speech for Hall of Fame induction, Jerry Douglas said, “I want to thank IBMA for spreading the good word of bluegrass music,” adding, “you don’t get here alone.” Banjoist and educator Alan Munde and longtime WAMU radio producer and host Katy Daley were also inducted into the Hall of Fame.
An IBMA member who had worked a booth on the Expo floor all day talked about how heavy his eyelids got during the show – just because it had been a long day, not because the event was boring – and said he planned to sneak out “during the next standing ovation.” It was a story that told a story: the auditorium was full of enthusiastic fans and fellow musicians who were both ecstatic and exhausted, perhaps in equal measure.
Chatham County Line
Highlights
Conference attendees know they cannot physically attend all the sessions and shows, so the takeaway experience ends up being individualized. After elbowing past the dual elephants in the room (the move from Raleigh and the hurricane) some themes rose to the top. Like Black music in Appalachia, challenging myths of isolation and frozen time, asserting “there’s more in the holler than Scotch/Irish.”
Panelist Dr. Dena Jennings said, “I come from 7 generations of Black folks living in a holler in Kentucky. You sing a song from your culture, I’ll sing a song from my culture. We’ll probably find more things alike than different.”
Lee Bidgood, moderator from East Tennessee State University said, “Putting boxes around genres can limit our joy of the music.”
In workshops focused on voice, panelists said that “voice is the least studied instrument in bluegrass music and one of the most central.” Traditionally the mindset was to study technique in stringed instruments and “sing if you can” as something of an afterthought. Studying voice and learning technique is not going to turn you into a classical performer or hurt your bluegrass sound, the experts assured. “Learning how to breathe and relax muscles will bridge the gap between what you feel and what you are able to express.”
In a workshop on writing bluegrass gospel, presenters reiterated the timeless advice, “Write what you know.”
“I just sit down to write something honest. A lot of my writing is about real living, messing up. Honesty sells,” panelist Donna Ulisse said.
A distinction for 2024 was the inclusion of a Union Grove Stage and competition open to anyone present as a tribute to the 100 year anniversary of the Union Grove Old Time Fiddler’s Convention founded by H.P. Van Hoy. Fiddler Earl White was announced the grand prize winner.
Pattie & Hank
Local Connections
Martin County’s Screamin’ Bridge played a showcase set in the Convention Center Thursday afternoon. Hank, Pattie, and the Current (with Winterville’s Pattie Hopkins Kinlaw) performed in showcases and a set on the Pinecone stage. Greenville’s Ron Harris (former coordinator of Sunday in the Park events) was an enthusiastic audience member, holding Nevada, the baby of his niece, Noah Wall, as her band Barefoot Movement performed.
Finale
Another band impacted by the hurricane and unable to attend for their headliner slot Saturday night was the Steep Canyon Rangers, from Asheville. Sierra Hull’s band played before the final act of the night at the Red Hat Amphitheater.
“I started playing mandolin at 8 years old but came to my first IBMA at 9 years old and it was being a part of this community that made me stay,” Hull said. “What I like about festivals is we can all come together and put our differences aside and enjoy the beauty of music.”
Chatham County Line (CCL) had been scheduled to play their trademark song “Living in Raleigh Now” with the Steep Canyon Rangers, so in their absence, the band played a full set. A guest joining them on stage was Brenda Evans, the granddaughter of folk and blues musician Elizabeth Cotten from North Carolina, known for her left handed guitar style and song “Freight Train.” Evans sang a song written by Cotten and her six grandchildren, “Shake Sugaree.”
Brenda Evans
Introducing “Living in Raleigh Now,” CCL guitarist/singer Dave Wilson said,“We have purchased a headstone because this is the last time this song will be performed.” They wrote the song the first year IBMA was held in Raleigh and the lyrics recount the history of bluegrass music from Bill Monroe, to Earl Scruggs, and with this punchline, IBMA’s locations: “What was born in Kentucky, moved off to Nashville, is living in Raleigh now.”
Before selecting the next IBMA festival location, maybe organizers should have considered the difficulty of working a 4 syllable word like “Chat-ta-noo-ga” into song lyrics.
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Originally published in the Daily Reflector October 12, 2024.
Justin Moses & Sierra Hull & one of the last big street concerts at IBMA ’24
