Molly Tuttle

Molly Rose Tuttle is an American vocalist, songwriter, banjo player, guitarist, recording artist, and teacher in the bluegrass tradition. She is noted for her flatpicking, clawhammer, and crosspicking guitar prowess. Wikipedia

“A female flat picker extraordinaire with agility, speed, and elegance who distinctively brings American roots music into the spotlight.”—NPR

“A vibrant blend of bluegrass with flashes of Old West, anchored by Tuttle’s earthy-yet-angelic vocal and the entire group’s ace musicianship.” —Billboard

Raised in northern California, singer-songwriter and bluegrass musician Molly Tuttle moved to Nashville in 2015. In the years since, she has been nominated for a Best New Artist Grammy and won awards for Album of the Year at the 2023 International Folk Music Awards, Female Vocalist of the Year at the 2022 International Bluegrass Music Awards, and Instrumentalist of the Year at the 2018 Americana Music Awards. She also won consecutive Guitar Player of the Year awards from the International Bluegrass Music Association in 2017 and 2018—and was the first woman to win the award, let alone win it twice.

Tuttle and her band, Golden Highway, released their latest album, City of Gold, in July 2023. The Grammy-winning album followed Tuttle’s acclaimed 2022 record, Crooked Tree, which also won a Grammy for Best Bluegrass Album. Produced by Tuttle and celebrated progressive bluegrass musician Jerry Douglas, City of Gold was inspired by Tuttle’s constant touring with Golden Highway, during which she and the band have grown and cohered as musicians and performers. Musical Instrument Museum

Her song Crooked Tree (video w/Jerry Douglas) also visits the subject of Alopecia Areata (article) and Molly.

Little Feat

The Can’t Be Satisfied Tour is hitting the road for much of 2024. Check the list for a city near you.

Paul is gone and Lowell George, gone so long we can only imagine what he may have accomplished as his 78th birthday recently passed.

R.I.P. Paul Barrere

Now, a Billy Payne led band has opened a new chapter. Out on the road, hosting festivals, and recently featured on a cruise (Big Easy Cruise 2023.)

Gotta Love ‘Em. FEAT, FEAT FEAT FEAT.

Must check out this Video , featuring very young guests, Emmy Lou Harris, Bonnie Raitt, and Jesse Winchester.

Other former members of the band to be cherished:

Shaun Murphy

Craig Fuller

Read this great article:

Where Do I Start With Little Feat?

By Lara Zarum

Steinar Ytrehus

This is what is online:

Steinar Ytrehus is a guitarist and recordingartist from Norway. He started out playing the guitar when he was 15 years old, and soon after he started recording music on his Tascam 4track Taperecorder. Since then he has always been making and recording music . Some of his songs were even used on several Norwegian TV shows. The music is a mix of blues, rock, country, jazz and Americana.

For some years he was an active remixer on Indaba music, and he won several contests. When Indaba Music was discontinued he decided to just write and record his own music. Until the end of his remixing career he only made instrumentals, but from now on he started writing lyrics and doing the vocals too.

The result was the release of his debut album Dark Songs in early 2020. The following year he also released 4 singles and he did some collaborations with other artists.

After building up a brand new studio in 2021, he has now finished a new album called “Black Coffee and Sweet Lovesongs” which was released on the 17th of June 2022.

What makes this musician interesting to Roaming the Arts:

Given, he is channeling the sound of other artists, especially Mark Knopfler, but he is writing very good original music, recording and marketing it himself on platforms such as Spotify, and creating a brooding, melancholy sound that is hard to stop listening to. His recent single “Call me King,” is another good example why Steinar Ytrehus deserves, and will be getting more attention well beyond the borders of Norway.

Follow him on Facebook and Instagram.

Lukas Nelson & Promise of the Real

Lukas Nelson

“In case you didn’t know, Willie Nelson has a son. His name is Lukas Nelson.

Lukas Nelson has long been better known for being the son of a country music legend than for the music he’s made, but that’s changing.

With the release last summer (2023) of their eighth album, “Sticks and Stones,” Nelson and his band, Promise of the Real, are affirming their identity as musicians who can play just about anything, from rock to country.

“I’m discovering more who I am in every album. And this album is completely who I am,” Nelson says in an interview on his website. (Michael Shapiro, The Press Democrat)

Randall Bramblett

Jesup, Georgia native, multi-instrumentalist Randall Bramblett may be known as Southern Rock Royalty for playing on stage with rock heroes like Bonnie Raitt, The Allman Brothers Band, Steve Winwood (16 years), Widespread Panic. And respected for his songwriting – Bettye LaVette, “The Great Lady of Soul” just released an album of 11 of his songs in June 2023. He also penned the title track for the Grammy nominated Blind Boys of Alabama’s album Going Home, adding to a long catalog of songs covered by Raitt, Gregg Allman, Bonnie Bramlett, Hot Tuna, Delbert McClinton and more. But it’s Bramblett’s own career as frontman, creating 12 albums, where his artistry is in full display.

“One of the South’s most lyrical and literate songwriters.” Rolling Stone

“Randall Bramblett is the William Faulkner of Southern music” Hittin’ the Note

“He’s a soulful, poetic badass if ever there was one.” Marc Cohn

The video featured above is an old one, but a favorite song. (ed.) For more recent video click onto his website below.

Joan Osborne

also see: Trigger Hippy

Joan Elizabeth Osborne is an American singer, songwriter, and interpreter of music, having recorded and performed in various popular American musical genres including pop, soul, R&B, blues, and country. She is best known for her recording of the Eric Bazilian song “One of Us”, from her debut album Relish. Wikipedia

Recent Video showing her heart and feeling....Great American Cities

News from her website:

Joan Osborne is back with Nobody Owns You, out today on Womanly Hips Records and produced by Ben Rice (Valerie June, Norah Jones). While the Grammy-nominated singer’s highly praised 2020 release Trouble and Strife took a frank and honest look at our socio-political landscape, Nobody Owns You finds Osborne in a very personal place, contemplating life’s major questions. The introspective collection highlights Osborne’s songwriting prowess, and offers inspiration, optimism and hope, surrounded by a rootsy and deeply soulful sound.

As the writer and co-writer on all twelve new songs, Osborne shares her profound personal beliefs but still has much to say regarding the current climate in the US. The first offering off the album is “Great American Cities,” a rebuttal of right wing TV pundits disparaging America’s urban centers.

Osborne shares, “I go to these cities all the time, and while they have issues like anywhere, they are full of life and energy and creativity and joy. This song came from my desire to celebrate America’s big cities and challenge the disinformation that’s being put out about them.” Listen to Nobody Owns You HERE.

Band of Heathens

Performance Video — Heaven Help Us All

When The Band of Heathens decided to dub their sixth studio album of original material Stranger (its first since 2017’s Duende), the veteran band, formed in Austin, TX nearly 15 years ago, had no idea how prophetic that title would turn out to be. Although the name references the famed existential Albert Camus novel and Robert Heinlein’s sci-fi classic Stranger in a Strange Land, it also touches on the “strangers” who make up the band’s loyal fan base, who supported the band during this period with all touring canceled.

As co-founder Ed Jurdi acknowledges, it is certainly an unusual time to release a new album. “The strangest,” he says. “Maybe no time stranger. Since we started, there have been sweeping, revolutionary changes in the music business, but, in this global pandemic, we’re just a microcosm.”
“We’re really fortunate that we have been able to turn directly to our fan base during the pandemic,” adds fellow co-founder Gordy Quist. “The last few months we’ve spent four nights a week live-streaming personal private concerts to fans, and one night a week publicly live-streaming with the whole band Zooming in from their respective homes in California, Texas, North Carolina and Tennessee. At first it seemed very strange until
these walls started coming down and we realized how connected we are by the fabric of music.”

Extending the metaphor of Stranger even further. The Band of Heathens traveled to another city, Portland, OR, with a brand-new producer, Tucker Martine [The Decemberists, My Morning Jacket, Modest Mouse, Camera Obscura], and the result is something different – a more airy, intimate atmosphere, with added emphasis on songcraft and intricate arrangements set in a spacious sonic landscape that reinvents the band’s sound. These are songs stripped of pretense, but teeming with the emotion borne of personal experience, as has been The Band of Heathens’ method from the very start. Stranger moves off into a new place, but still echoes the group’s artful songwriting and multi-layered narrative observations.

The Stranger was released in 2020 and is a top ten roots rock album riding high in the charts.

Playing for Change

Playing for Change Foundation

Playing For Change is a movement created to inspire and connect the world through music. The idea for this project came from a common belief that music has the power to break down boundaries and overcome distances between people.

Playing For Change was born in 2002 as a shared vision between co-founders, Mark Johnson and Whitney Kroenke, to hit the streets of America with a mobile recording studio and cameras in search of inspiration and the heartbeat of the people. This musical journey resulted in the award-winning documentary, “A Cinematic Discovery of Street Musicians.”

In 2005, Mark Johnson was walking in Santa Monica, California, when he heard the voice of Roger Ridley singing “Stand By Me.” Roger had so much soul and conviction in his voice, and Mark approached him about performing “Stand By Me” as a Song Around the World. Roger agreed, and when Mark returned with recording equipment and cameras he asked Roger, “With a voice like yours, why are you singing on the streets?” Roger replied, “Man I’m in the Joy business, I come out to be with the people.” Ever since that day the Playing For Change crew has traveled the world recording and filming musicians, creating Songs Around the World, and building a global family.

Creating Songs Around the World inspired us to unite many of the greatest musicians we met throughout our journey and form the Playing For Change Band. These musicians come from many different countries and cultures, but through music they speak the same language.Songs Around The World The PFC Band is now touring the world and spreading the message of love and hope to audiences everywhere.

The true measure of any movement is what it gives back to the people. We therefore created the Playing For Change Foundation,a separate 501(c)3 nonprofit organization dedicated to building music and art schools for children around the world, and creating hope and inspiration for the future of our planet.

No matter who you are or where you come from, we are all united through music.

Watch the embeded video -R.I.P – Robbie Robertson

Support this movement by becoming a Member , and together we will make the world a better place.

California Honeydrops

The Honeydrops have come a long way since guitarist and trumpeter Lech Wierzynkski and drummer Ben Malament started busking in an Oakland subway station, but the band has stayed true to that organic, street-level feel. Listening to Lech sing, it can be a surprise that he was born in Warsaw, Poland, and raised by Polish political refugees. He learned his vocal stylings from contraband American recordings of Sam Cooke, Ray Charles, and Louis Armstrong, and later at Oberlin College and on the club circuit in Oakland, California. With the additions of Johnny Bones on tenor sax and clarinet, Lorenzo Loera on keyboards, and Beau Bradbury on bass, they’ve built a powerful full-band sound to support Wierzynski’s vocals. More like parties than traditional concerts, their shows feature extensive off-stage jamming and crowd interaction. “The whole point is to erase the boundaries between the crowd and us,” Wierzynski says. “We don’t make setlists. We want requests. We want crowd involvement, to make people become a part of the whole thing by dancing along, singing, picking the songs and generally coming out of their shells.”

Leftover Salmon

For the past quarter-century, Colorado’s Leftover Salmon has established itself as one of the great purveyors of Americana music, digging deep into the well that supplies its influences; rock ‘n’ roll, folk, bluegrass, Cajun, soul, zydeco, jazz and blues. During their twenty-five plus years as a band they have headlined shows and festivals from coast to coast, released nine albums, and maintained a vibrant, relevant and influential voice in the music world. The evolution of Leftover Salmon’s music is influenced by Leftover Salmon co-founders Drew Emmitt (mandolin/vocals) and Vince Herman‘s (guitar/singer) keen musical instincts, and follows a musical path that adheres to the deep tradition the duo started when they first formed the group along with deceased banjo player Mark Vann. The addition of new band members over the years has nurtured an unmistakable evolution and freshness in Leftover Salmon’s sound, and has added an edge to the long-lasting power of the band’s music. (youtube)

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